More Than Half of Americans Turned To Video Games During Lockdown (theverge.com) 48
According to Nielsen company SuperData's 2020 year in review, 55 percent of people picked up video games during the first phase of lockdowns. The Verge reports: According to SuperData, 66 percent of consumers from 18 to 24 played more console games, while 60 percent played more mobile titles. Unsurprisingly, buyers also tended toward digital purchases. SuperData reports that 27 percent of people -- about 1 in 4 -- played games to stay in touch with each other. [...] As physical spaces disappeared, video games became one of the few places for people to spend time together... SuperData estimates that digital games alone garnered $126.6 billion over the course of the year. The numbers may not spike this year as much as they did in 2020, but SuperData predicts "the long-term habits formed during lockdown are here to stay."
Sad (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Sad (Score:4, Interesting)
These people doing exactly what they normally didn't have to. I, for one, have finally played several games I've bought years ago - prey was among these, so literally zapping virtual aliens.
Re:Sad (Score:4, Interesting)
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For all we know it's a perfectly normal and healthy coping mechanism as long as it in itself isn't the cause of further problems.
So what I'm seeing, in our Western world at least, that is we live in a society that has been conditioned to seek 'escape' through consumerism. Consumerism like watching series, movies, playing video games, doing recreational drugs in combination with those other things, and so forth. You shouldn't be surprised if a good
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How dare people... (looks at notes)... spend their free time doing whatever the fuck they want?
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How dare people... (looks at notes)... spend their free time doing whatever the fuck they want?
If there's a problem here, it's not that people spend time doing whatever they want; it's that the "whatever they want" they spend time doing, doesn't do much for their development as members of society.
So what? (Score:3)
There is no moral obligation to spend one's free time on tasks that further "their development as members of society." In fact, I find this to be a very marketable spin on a very selfish attitude. It amounts to "if YOU aren't spending all of YOUR time fulfilling MY needs, then YOU are a waste of flesh."
Other people don't exist to build a world for you, and they don't need to justify their hobbies based on how well those hobbies satisfy your priorities.
AND FURTHERMORE....
Video games can provide much-needed
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Nice rant. Too bad it went off on a tangent unrelated to what I said.
First, I didn't say I thought it was a problem; I said, "If there's a problem here...". I suppose you missed that while bringing your self-righteous outrage to a boil. Personally, I don't care how you spend your free time.
I really don't know how you managed to equate "work on your development as a member of society", to "I think you should spend all your time fulfilling my needs". The truth is, it doesn't affect me if you don't care to be
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Honestly though, how do you know they aren't ALSO doing things to help their development as members of society. I've gamed more this paist year than I have in decades, but I've also read more, written more, played more guitar, built more models and baked more than I have in decades. It's a balancing act that I'm sure I'm not alone in.
A life devoid of non-productive recreation is a life of despair.
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How dare people... (looks at notes)... spend their free time doing whatever the fuck they want?
If there's a problem here, it's not that people spend time doing whatever they want; it's that the "whatever they want" they spend time doing, doesn't do much for their development as members of society.
Tell us pray tell what "development" means? Many people are checked out because they know people like you are clueless. As someone who was a "Do gooder" as a kid, I realized very quickly the world does not appreciate "developed members". People don't know what the fuck they want and are annoyed when people interfere in their daily lives for god knows what reason.
Many of us tried many things in our youths and it didn't work out, it's all dependent on where you are and the quality of the people around you
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Your very long screed could be summed up as, "Nobody appreciates my efforts, so I'm giving up."
Do the right thing because it's the right thing to do. Doing the right thing in an effort to gain the appreciation of others is futile, and leads to destruction of self-esteem. And please don't ask, "The right thing according to whom?" It's not that difficult to figure out if you're not a sociopath.
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Your very long screed could be summed up as, .
Or it could be that they are much more intelligent then you are and are in a sea of dunces, it's not a matter of "giving up". People don't have unlimited health and energy in their short little economically stressed out lives. The average person barely has enough money to feed and cloth themselves if you look at the stats. They are under severe economic duress, especially with covid 19.
You live in a ruthless rapacious exploitative society under a lawless oligarchy stealing videogames from kids and a mass
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Re:Sad (Score:4)
It truly is amazing how much time people waste in such utterly fruitless activities as:
1) Watching other people chase a ball around a field.
2) Watching entirely made-up stories that never even happened.
3) Reading books that contain made-up stories.
4) Talking to each other about anything that isn't educational or a debate.
5) Picking up heavy things and putting them back down again.
6) Running through their neighborhood in a big circle, winding up right back at home!
7) Sticking their tongues into each other's mouths!
8) Filtering their diets to only include healthy food, even though they are just going to die anyway!
So sad that people don't spend every waking moment of their lives on activities that directly contribute to my own personal vision of what the human race should be.
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But how can I unlock a new character... (Score:3)
...when I can't unlock myself. :(
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Did you buy the sports car DLC?
The innocent side of the lockdown coin. (Score:5, Insightful)
SuperData predicts "the long-term habits formed during lockdown are here to stay."
Addictive behavior is rather easy to model these days, but video games are merely the innocent side of the coin being shown.
Alcoholism, drug abuse, sex addiction/rape, divorce, suicide, crime...all of it will continue to bubble up as we bring society back together to dig through the hollowed-out carcass that was small business, and out from behind closed doors after one of the most stressful and deadly events in modern history.
We should seek out understanding and compassion and focus on helping all get back up and move forward. This takes a toll on everyone, and it will continue to be difficult for some time.
Re:The innocent side of the lockdown coin. (Score:5, Informative)
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The market will contract but inertia will probably at least keep it going. The number of delivery drivers will decrease but people will enjoy continuing to have alcohol delivered.
American alcohol consumption after prohibition was literally 25% of what it was before. If covid nudges the needle in the other direction, it will probably stay that way until another external force acts upon it. It may not be Newtonian, but inertia is clearly still the right word.
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Has your state legalized marijuana yet? Melting to dub reggae is better than raging.
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That assumes the rational calculation that the alcoholic will want to save the delivery fee. Which isn't likely - alcohol delivery will likely stay purely because the benefits are plenty to the alcoholic - no risk of getting caught drinking and driving, a lot less hassle from people from repeated trips to the store, etc.
Think of it this way - drive to the s
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Ah yes, the usual fucked-up psychologist assuming everyone else is fucked-up like they are and needs treatment from fucked-up psychologists.
We don't.
It's going to be a huge problem for Hollywood (Score:2)
Is that a AAA game and an equivalent movie are roughly the same price. The former is relatively immune to pandemics unless they torch the whole economy. It's also much easier to justify $60-$70 for a new game that gets 8-20 hours of game play easily than $25 for a movie you'll probably watch once or twice the whole quarantine.
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You forget the huge amount of "smaller" games for $10-$30.
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It's already been a huge problem for Hollywood [slashdot.org]. I for one barely watch anything any more, TV or movies. It's pretty much just stand-up, and the comedy news pundits. Hollywood has shit on my imagination too many times. For every David Lynch Dune there's four or five shittier ones ;)
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Everyone gets to play the narcissist on social media, but Kim Kardashian still has the most followers. Passé? Of course. So are most of the people walking Earth. The upper bound of fame is going to shrink, as some subset of the population devotes more of their attention somewhere else. But Hollywood's not going away. Chop their income in half, and their begucci'd beds are still quite comfortable. It's the people on the fringes of the industry who will get hit by the drop most, the movie theater operato
Various things but no games (Score:2, Redundant)
So what did I do during my extra free time since no daily commute needed and little social contact:
- more time spent with my young twins, that is always well spent
- more reading
- more often baking bread
- more exercising, forcing myself to daily “close the activity rings” on my smartwatch.
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"- more often baking bread "
Only 155 more banana-breads to go before the end of the pandemic.
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To be frank I donâ(TM)t like computer games. I like strategic boardgames but there was no occasion this year due to distancing.
You know you can play such games on computers, right? Many of them have official digital versions now, and even more have been recreated by fans.
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The newer incarnations of Civilization have a very board-game feel, best described as "chess on crack", because it has a lot of mechanics going on that'd be too impossibly cumbersome to implement with pen & paper.
Also because once you take your first hit, you'll end up putting thousands of hours into it. I've been hooked for 10 years already. Sid Meier, my supplier.
More than half were already playing (Score:4, Informative)
It seems like years ago that we discussed here on Slashdot that more than half of Americans play video games. Can't find that discussion rn tho so here's a related link from last year [venturebeat.com].
So let's see. More than half of Americans were already playing games, and they continued to play games during lockdown.
Complete. Non. Story. Thank you.
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Re:More than half were already playing (Score:5, Interesting)