Uh, oops. Over the weekend, Forbes ran an article citing data obtained from Electronic Entertainment Design and Research (EEDAR). Forbes' article said that, according to EEDAR, only 4% of games ever make a profit. Wha? 4%? Sounded silly. Seems it was silly. Forbes mis-quoted EEDAR's data, which actually says that only 4% of all games that ever enter into production make a profit. Sounds like a case of semantics, but it's a key difference. Just like movies, most games that enter into production never actually see the light of day. Of those that do make it onto store shelves, it turns out 20% of them return a "significant profit". That sounds more like it. EEDAR's full correction follows.

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The US' Natural Resources Defence Council have released a report detailing how much money it costs the average American to run a gaming console. And, by extension, how much money gamers could save by taking those consoles and throwing them in the closet/garbage. Were you to decomission a 360, for example, you'd save yourself $11 a year. $11! Binning a PS3 would save you $15, while packing the Wii away - provided you haven't already done so - will save you...$3 a year. Best keep it around then, in case Gran comes over and wants a swing at that "computer bowling".

New Report: Video Games are Energy Drains [NRDC]

Is PC gaming giving way to today's more versatile and powerful consoles? Not according to a market study recently conducted by research group JPR, which claims that more gaming PC's have been sold over the past three years than Xbox 360s, PlayStation 3s, and Wiis combined. The study, which tracks the sales of three different classes of gaming PCs over since Q3 2005, found that 196 million units have been sold between then and Q3 2008, compared to a worldwide total of 74.7 million consoles. As Edge points out, this of course doesn't take into effect handheld gaming systems like the DS and PSP, which sold a combined 125 million units during the same period.

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Well, militaries across the world may soon have a new war game to their arsenal, and it could have a trickle down effect to retail games — British researchers have come up with a game system that incorporates a 'smell box,' in an attempt to see if they can make training stick better. In what sounds like an unpleasant experience, various smells are triggered as users 'take an authentic walk' around hostile areas. If it's determined this is making training more useful, it could be rolled out next year and be used in training actual soldiers:

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It's been a while since we've had a really good "video games make our children violent" study, and I was beginning to fear we've given up on the idea, but then the story "Violent video games linked to child aggression" showed up on CNN.com this morning and my fears were completely assuaged. The story is about a study conducted by Dr. Craig A. Anderson, Ph.D., of Iowa State University, who studied three groups of children in both the United States and Japan to gage their violence levels three to six months after playing violent video games, versus children who did not play violent video games. The results may not surprise you at all.

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As commenter Duncan raises, I understand there are serious worries that things look TOO good for gamers in the results of the Interactive Australia 2009 Report. But the report's author, Jeffrey Brand, flagged the methodologies at the outset of today's launch and also discussed during the presentation how earlier concerns of bias could now be laid to rest as the trends from past reports (2005 & 2007) to this are very similar and in fact increasingly favourable which would make sense.

That said, I think we will still have to worry about those politicians who decide based on emotional lobby efforts instead of hard statistical evidence. Numbers like these can't help but look "wrong" if you still believe that games are simply toys for kids.

The money quote from Dr. Brand after the initial discussion of the methodology:
"This is big audience research by any measure."

A more detailed run down of the methods, samples and statistical foundations after the jump. Oh, and one more sweet stat... 68% of all respondents identified as playing computer or video games. That's more the two in every three Australians.

UPDATE: Sample and methods details updated to reflect the much more detailed information supplied near the end of the report.

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The Interactive Australia 2009 report on the state of gaming in Australian culture has been launched this morning, and the stats affirm what gamers already know -- the stereotypes are complete rubbish. Here's a quick sampler that busts some myths that tie closely into our ongoing effort to get Michael Atkinson to realise his position does not reflect the reality of the modern gaming landscape. We'll try to drill a little deeper in coming days:

- Average age of gamers is now 30; average age of non-gamers is 40.
- 88% of households now have a game device, not including mobiles.
- 61% have MORE than one -- consoles are now dominant.
- 54% male, 46% female. The gender gap is disappearing fast.
- Over half of all parents play games with their kids.
- 63% of Australians still don't know there is no R18+ for games.
- 91% of ALL Australians are in favour of an R18+ classification.
- 92% of parents are aware of the games their kids are playing.

In June, Yahoo's 'lifestyle' site Shine hosted a Sony Online Entertainment survey into the gaming habits of US families.

As well as the heart-warming finding that 87% of parents regularly play videogames with their children, the survey also looked at how parents perceived their child's development being affected by gaming.

Perhaps surprisingly, the survey conducted by a major games console manufacturer found that many parents noticed improvements in their kids that they attributed directly to gaming!

75% of surveyed parents think that their children's hand/eye coordination has been improved by gaming, while 84% say that PC gaming has boosted their kid's typing skills.

Parents See Benefit of Children Playing Video Games [GameSpy]

Numbers time! Japanese game site Dengeki Online is running results of a poll that was composed of 86.3 percent men and 13.7 percent women with an average age of 25.46 years old. Questions included things like "Have you cried during gaming?" or "What game are you looking forward to?" In the poll, three of the games that made Japanese gamers cry are "adult visual novels" — two of them are erotic game ports and one is a straight up PC erotic game. That's not that surprising as many Japanese gamers do play erotic games for the story. No, really.

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Over at MTV's Multiplayer blog, they've gone a little Nintendo number crunching crazy. Based on data pulled from the Wii's Nintendo Channel, there's Wii software usages (as of October 5, 2008) for Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock, Wii Sports, Mario Kart Wii, Rock Band and many more! Interesting factoids:

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