Most Played Console List 2008 Throws Up A Surprise

The Playstation 2 is eight years old, but it's still the most-played console in America. The news comes with figures that also show the 23-year-old game Tetris continuing to succeed in the mobile age.

The new stats come from Nielsen Media, the firm best known for producing television ratings. As well as asking panel participants to provide details of programs they watch (both through diaries and automatic metering equipment), the firm measures activity across a range of entertainment.

The games console figures are based on how long users spend playing games. The figures for 2008 show that of all the time spent gaming (across all panel members), a whopping 31.7% was spent on the PlayStation 2. That's more than the second and third place Xbox 360 and Wii put together. (Source: pcworld.com)

Surprisingly, the Playstation 3 only made it to fifth place with 7.3%, behind even the original Xbox. To some extent that's simply down to fewer people owning the PS3, but it may also be a sign that many owners see the device as a relatively cheap Blu-ray player as much as a game machine.

World of Warcraft topped Nielson's PC rankings. According to the figures, at any one moment, a PC gamer is more than four times as likely to be playing WOW than the next most popular title, Call of Duty 4. WOW is also the game which players are most devoted (or addicted) to: on average, people owning it play for more than 11 hours a week.

In a separate Nielsen study published at the same time, the firm looked at revenues from the sales of games on mobile devices such as smartphones by the four largest network carriers. Tetris topped the list, making up seven per cent of all revenues. That's an amazing figure given many of the people buying the game weren't born when it was first released in 1985. (Source: nielsen.com)