Online Gaming Nearly Ubiquitous among Kids, One-Third Have Email Address

Nearly eight in 10 children (78.1 percent) age 6-11 report they play online games - by far the largest percentage performing any online activity, according to the 2007 American Kids Survey from Mediamark Research and Intelligence reports MarketingCharts.

The percentage of boys and girls who play online games was virtually the same, 77.7 percent vs. 78.5 percent, respectively. Boys are more likely to go online to get tips or cheats* for gaming: One-quarter of boys (25.8 percent) reported doing so versus 5.6 percent of girls.

"Online gaming is clearly firmly entrenched as a pastime in the lives of most American kids," said Anne Marie Kelly, vice-president of Marketing & Strategic Planning at MRI.

"The wide gap between the percentage of boys and girls using cheats could suggest boys are more engaged with their games, an insight of interest to marketers targeting kids."

Other top online activities among children:

• Doing Stuff for School/Homework (34.25)
• Listening to Music (28.6 percent)
• Watching Videos (26.2 percent)

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• Visit the official Frontier 1859 Home Page
• View MMOG Market Share Chart
• View MMOG Active Subscriptions Chart

The report, based on survey of almost 2,000 online U.S. gamers, refutes the suggestion that games players can be organized into simply "hardcore" and "casual", instead suggesting six different categorizations of player, organized based on time spent gaming and motivation and attitudes – rather than revenue.

1. "Power gamers" represent 11 percent of the gamer market but account for 30 cents of every dollar spent on retail and online games.

2. "Social gamers" enjoy gaming as a way to interact with friends.

3. "Leisure gamers" spend 58 hours per month playing games but mainly on casual titles. Nevertheless they prefer challenging titles and show high interest in new gaming services.

4. "Dormant gamers" love gaming but spend little time because of family, work, or school. They like to play with friends and family and prefer complex and challenging games.

5. "Incidental gamers" lack motivation and play games mainly out of boredom. However, they spend more than 20 hours a month playing online games.

6. "Occasional gamers" play puzzle, word, and board games almost exclusively.

The report suggests that the middle market of social, leisure and dormant gamers accounts for 53 percent of the Internet gamer population and 56 percent of retail revenue.

Read the whole article on Gamasutra