Video games are increasingly popular.
Nearly 3 in 4 French people (73%) are occasional or regular gamers, according to an internet survey conducted by the Médiamétrie institute for the union of leisure software publishers (Sell).
The proportion of people who have gambled at least once in the year thus increases by two points over one year, which represents some 38 million individuals.
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"
The year 2021 is even better than 2020
", a year when the rise of video games had been favored by the Covid-19 pandemic and the confinements, summarizes with AFP the general delegate of Sell, Nicolas Vignolles.
“
Not only are more of them playing, but the people who are playing are spending more and more time,
” he continues.
The share of regular players, who practice at least once a week, jumped 6 points to 58%.
In particular, children see their weekly playing time (calculated over the 7 rolling days preceding the survey) rise to 7.1 hours.
This remains stable for adults at 5.4 hours.
More and more collective leisure
“
It's a media that is exploding, with a strong community aspect. We connect to find friends and play with them,
”emphasizes Nicolas Vignolles. Thus, 61% of gamers say that video games allow them to create social links and a third, especially the youngest, feel they belong to a community. This aspect is set to develop with the expected arrival of the metaverse, the virtual universes promoted by Facebook and other web giants. The family dimension is also present, since 77% of parents now say they play with their children, or 11 points more compared to 2020.
However, video games are still for the moment mainly an activity of individual relaxation, even solitary.
As proof, so-called "
casual
" games (boards, cards, puzzles) on mobile devices and platform games, where an avatar must move in a two-dimensional environment while avoiding obstacles, are the most popular, especially by women.
