It is official. Games are bigger than home cinema and movie-going in the UK, according to the latest sales figures.
Brits spent noticeably more money on games than DVDs, Blu-rays or cinema tickets in the year leading up to September 2009, according to GFKChart-Track
Over £1.73 billion was spent on games for the 12 months ending in September 2009, while for the same period, the UK Film Council reports that around £1 billion was spent at the box office and around £198 million on DVD and Blu-Ray titles.
Tom Watson, a former cabinet minister said: "Like anything digital, Parliament has a very narrow view of video games. Too many politicians think video games are played by teenage boys staying up all night shooting things in their bedroom.
"And yes there are plenty of those, but there also a huge range of people of many different ages who love playing games. The industry has matured over the last decade, and so too have gamers."
Conservative report
Interestingly, the news comes from The Daily Telegraph, a staunchly conservative newspaper that reports the sales stats to be the "clearest evidence yet that the video games market has come of age and transformed itself from a niche form of entertainment for teenage boys into a mainstream form of entertainment for millions of British families."
The Telegraph added that industry figures nowshow the number of games consoles being used in Britain has risen from 13.5 million in 2008 to over 25 million earlier this year.
