Posted 07/07/2010 - 12:24pm by Julia M
The annual E3 conference for the video game industry recently took place in Los Angeles. As has been the custom at these kinds of events, lots of manufacturers of hardware, games and accessories announced new product rollouts. Here are some of the highlights, starting with Microsoft’s news:
- They introduced Kinect, a new motion-sending gaming system. The new system goes on sale in North America on November 4th.
- Microsoft’s other announcement on the hardware side was a new smaller Xbox system with a 250GB hard drive, set to retail for $299.
- Finally, they previewed several upcoming Xbox 360 games, including “Metal Gear Solid: Rising,” “Call of Duty: Black Ops,” “Gears of War 3,” “Halo: Reach,” and “Crytek: Codename Kingdoms.”
Besides the new gaming systems and titles that were rolled announced, there were other significant milestones that were discussed. A study conducted by Ipsos MediaCT for the Entertainment Software Association showed the extent of video gaming in the U.S. and how the profile of the average player has changed over the years. Here are some of the key findings:
- 67% of all U.S. households play video games.
- The average game player is 34 years old, but the average age of the video game buyer is 40.
- 40% of all video game players are female.
- 42% of Americans play video games on smart phones.
Also, market research firm NPD Group released an interesting study of the used video game market. In 2009, according to NPD, used game rentals, subscriptions and downloadable content added up to a $4.5 billion to $4.75 billion market. This compares with $10.5 billion for the new game software market. NPD Group also noted that these totals excluded social gaming.
To read the full "Tech Trends" for the week of 7/05/10, click here.
