Ubisoft 2006 Annual Report Download - page 17

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PROFILE
content. With these two evolutions, a whole new era of web
communications is ushered in, carrying with it implications for
the world of gaming.
Public interest in various forms of online gaming has flared up
considerably over the past year. Women are among some of the
most avid online players, representing 60% of the total online
population(6). The number of subscribers on platforms such as
Xbox®Live™ has also exploded over the past year (6 million
subscribers as of March 2007(7)).
Massive Multiplayer Online Games (MMOs), which bring
together thousands of players simultaneously via the Internet,
represent one such form of online gaming. Despite the signifi-
cant personal investment of time, and sometimes money, that
MMOs and online gaming in general require, the possibility to
compete and interact with people from around the world has
converted a large number of Internet-users.
EMERGING PROFILES
Over the past 25 years, we have seen the market go from niche to
mainstream as gamer demographics continue to become more
diverse. The growing perception of video games as a mass-market
form of entertainment has allowed consoles to occupy a more
central place in the home.
Simultaneously, new gamer profiles have emerged; according to
recent studies, 40% of today’s gamers are female and 21% of
American gamers are over the age of 46(9). As they search for
more casual gaming experiences, these new consumers are lea-
ding manufacturers and developers to change their approach to
hardware and software conception and development.
HANDHELD GAMES
5 hours PC GAMES
7 hours CONSOLE GAMES
8 hours
ALL PLATFORMS COMBINED
10.5 hours
AVERAGE TIME GAMERS SPEND
PLAYING PER WEEK
The Nintendo Wii™ –
a revolution in gaming
Nintendo has been a mainstay of the video game
industry for as long as anyone can remember.
This year, with the arrival of the Wii™ and the rising
popularity of the DS™, Nintendo proved that, even
after all these years, it is a force to be reckoned with.
Innovative and intuitive, the Nintendo Wii™ and DS™,
with their promise of new opportunities for gameplay,
have managed to capture casual and hardcore gamers
alike. With the Wii™’s revolutionary controller that
detects gamers’ every movement and the DS™’s
double-screen and stylus, gamers are enjoying new
types of games in new ways. Whether standing up,
sitting down or alongside friends and family, people
are rediscovering the joys of sports or uncovering
new games, such as language learning, pet simulation
and brain teasers. Judging from the commercial
success that both of these machines have encountered
(2 million Wii™ units and 10 million DS™ units sold
as of April 2007(8) in the US), traditional gamers, as
well as people who didn’t even know they were gamers,
are embracing this change.
Source: New Platform Quantitative US, April 2007.
(4) Source: Chart Track, March 2007.
(5) Source: NPD, Fiscal Year 2006/2007.
(6) Source: New Platform Quantitative US, April 2007.
(7) Source: "Xbox (R) Live (TM) tops six million users" March 6, 2007 -
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content.page.php?aid=23295.
(8) Source: NPD, March 2007.
(9) Source: New Platform Quantitative US, April 2007.