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Nielsen's Top 10 PC Games and Consoles of 2008

03.01.2009
World of Warcraft, Tetris, and the PlayStation 2 make strange bedfellows, but they each topped Nielsen's of popular media trends in the U.S. World of Warcraft's a no-brainer on the PC games chart. But what about 's twenty-some-year-old Tetris for mobiles? And are people really still playing the PS2?

And then some, according to Nielsen. In fact the PS2's "usage minutes" -- 31.7% of total -- were actually double the number two console on the list. Surely the Wii, right? Think again: The Xbox 360 topped the Wii, 17.2% to 13.4%.

The PS2's lead (down from 42.2% in 2007) should surprise no one when you factor the console's mammoth install base and the increasingly vibrant secondary market for used games.

Curiouser: The old black-and-electric-green Xbox, which held 13.9% of , beat the PlayStation 3 in 2008, 9.7% to 7.3%. There's a splash of cold water to the face.

Tetris led third quarter mobile revenue shares with 7%, followed by Bejeweled (4%) and Guitar Hero III (3.6%). Nielsen didn't track mobile games in its annual 2007 report.

Bungie's original Halo beat The Sims and The Sims 2 for "average minutes played per week" in PC gaming, though Halo 2 dropped off the chart after tying its predecessor for 4th in 2007. I would've guessed Team Fortress 2 (first appearance this year), Counter-Strike, and Counter-Strike: Source (the latter were numbers 6 and 10 respectively in 2007) for top 10 contenders, but check out Blizzard's Diablo II blazing to life at number 7 after a 2007 absence. Blame ?