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The video game industry had better thank its lucky stars that hard-core gamers do what they do.

Rather, NPD’s “Games Segmentation 2008″ report explained, extreme gamers put in an average of 45 hours a week playing games, and, even better–for the video game industry’s coffers–bought a whopping 24 titles in the last three months.

According to a report issued Monday morning by industry analyst firm, The NPD Group, the most active group of players, which it termed “extreme gamers,” devote more than a full-time job’s work week to their avocation. But they don’t get insurance benefits for their efforts.

Still, Frazier reported that PCs are still the single-most popular gaming medium.

According to the report’s author, NPD analyst Anita Frazier, the largest group, the young heavy gamers, comprise a group 38 million strong. They tend to favor portable game machines like the Nintendo DS or the Sony PSP, while the extreme gamer spends most of his or her time plopped down in front of a Microsoft
Xbox 360 or
Sony PlayStation 3.

The report delved into cross-ownership, producing some interesting, if a little confusing, data.

One intriguing fact in the report is that fully 14 percent of games purchased overall were digital downloads. I would have thought that indicated a heavy degree of usage of services like Xbox Live, but the report indicates that 27 percent of that downloading activity–the largest share of any gaming medium–was done by PC gamers.

But when Electronic Arts’ Spore comes out next month, it will not be available on consoles. It will be primarily a PC game, though versions will be available for the Mac, for the DS, and for mobile phones.

What does it all mean? Well, it’s hard to tell exactly. But one thing that stands out is the idea that PC gaming is alive and well.

I think we tend to forget that in the age of massive marketing budgets for machines like the Xbox, Wii, and PS3, and the incredible hype for games made for those consoles like Halo 3, Guitar Hero III, Grand Theft Auto IV and so on.

The NPD report identified seven different segments of gamers, including our extreme friends. The others include 9 percent who are “avid PC gamers,” 17 percent who are console gamers, 14 percent who are online PC gamers, 15 percent who are offline PC gamers, 22 percent who are “young heavy gamers” and 20 percent who are “secondary” gamers.

True, these committed gamers make up just 3 percent of the 174 million that NPD said play on PCs or Macs or dedicated video game machines. Still, that means 5.22 million people out there are putting in serious amounts of time gaming away. And if you stop and think about the dollars they’re spending, if they’re buying 24 games every three months, it’s kind of breathtaking.

For example, someone who has a PS3 is more likely to also own another next-generation console, like the Xbox 360 or
Nintendo Wii, than those who started with either of the latter machines. And, 45 percent of PSP owners also have a DS, while just 21 percent of DS owners have a PSP as well. I’m not great at math, but I think that means there are a lot more DS owners out there. Perhaps I’m wrong.

NPD said its report was based on a survey of 20,000 gamers.

All told, though, the report seems to spell out that the video games industry is relatively healthy, even if those extreme gamers may not be.

Sony's prototype 0.3-millimeter OLED display.

(Credit:
Erica Ogg/CNET News)

Sony, of course, continues to press ahead its OLED research and development, showing a flexible OLED display as thin as a playing card, as well an OLED TV that’s even thinner than its current XEL-1. The prototype measures just 0.3 millimeter thick.

Click here for more stories on Ceatec 2008.

Another theme here at Ceatec is 3D displays. Sure, Panasonic is showing its 3D high-definition home theater using a giant TV, but you still need 3D glasses to get the stereoscopic effect. NEC is showing a 9-inch LCD display a 3D image without the need for those silly plastic frames. KDDI also had its own 3D LCD display measuring 3.1 inches and for use by mobile devices. Also no need for 3D glasses.

KDDI prototype 3.1-inch OLED for mobile devices.

KDDI is going in a slightly different direction, looking to take OLED smaller and mobile. The mobile phone company showed an OLED display measuring 3.1 inches and meant for mobile devices. It’s just a prototype for now.

(Credit:
Erica Ogg/CNET News)

NEC's 3D LCD display. No plastic glasses required.

Panasonic may have said earlier this week that OLED is still far from becoming a mass-produced mainstream technology for use in big-screen TVs, but other electronics makers are plowing ahead with their own research on the organic, thin film technology: NEC, Sony, and KDDI showed off what they’ve been doing with OLED in their research labs.

CHIBA, Japan–Sony has an entire wall of its 11-inch XEL-1 OLED TVs set up here at Ceatec 2008, but in contrast with past gadget shows, it’s not the only company showing off OLED prototypes.

Of course, while these are really cool concepts, they’re still in the thick of development and it will be years before we see mass production of any of them.

(Credit:
Erica Ogg/CNET News)

Note: The Hitwise data featured is based on U.S. market share of visits as defined by the IAB, which is the percentage of online traffic to the domain or category, from the Hitwise sample of 10 million U.S. Internet users.

The more research I do into online video games, the more I see that there are still very large opportunities available for those who know how to develop games and build community. When the market leader in a category has only 11.5 percent of the market that says that there is plenty of room for other challengers to take pieces of the pie.

The Hitwise data listed below for July shows an interesting split between aggregator sites like Pogo and Yahoo and specialized game sites like RuneScape and Webkinz showing that you can make money (or at least get eyeballs) via either method of gaming.

Website
Market Share of Visits Pogo
11.51% RuneScape
5.73% Yahoo! Games
4.75% Webkinz
4.03% Yahoo! Sports Fantasy Baseball
2.21% MSN Games
1.88% GameFAQs
1.65% Club Penguin
1.38% Addicting Games
1.33% Neopets
1.27%

There’s no real killer app yet for retrieving listings information on your mobile phone, but there could be soon.

On Aptil 11, FreeMobile411 launches the consumer version of its carrier-offered services. Visting FreeMobile411.com from your
mobile browser gets you a decent-looking ad-supported WAP site that simplifies directory search and helps you avoid long waits while listening to ads from dial-in services like 1-800-FREE-411.

(Credit:
CNET Networks)

Enter the search term–it can be a business name (”Blockbuster”), business type (”video store”), or person (”Bill Blockbuster”). Then select the search type, and fill in either the city or zip to search or browse listings. From there you’ll have a spectrum of choices to plot on a map, get directions to, dial with a click, or use as an anchor while searching for nearby gap pumps, hotels, banks, and so on. You’ll still be able to connect to the operator at the usual carrier rate, but with this useful, easily navigable app, it’s doubtful you’ll ever need to. P.S. It even looks decent on the RAZR!

(Credit:
Stephen Shankland/CNET News)

Google's Chrome overpowers the other browsers on the five subtests by which Google measures its browser's JavaScript performance.

Second, my apologies here to Opera, whose browser I don’t have installed.

Click here for full coverage of the Google Chrome launch.

• DeltaBlue: One-way constraint solver, originally written in Smalltalk by John Maloney and Mario Wolczko (880 lines).

(Credit:
Stephen Shankland/CNET News)

• Crypto: Encryption and decryption benchmark based on code by Tom Wu (1,689 lines).

A few notes: First, your mileage may vary; I ran these tests on my dual-core Windows XP machine.

But when pressed for specifics, he told me to try them out. So I did.

Google offers a site with five JavaScript benchmarks. On each one of these tests, Chrome clearly trounced the competition. I hope benchmarking experts and developers will weigh in with comments about how well these tests represent true JavaScript performance on the Web–either for ordinary sites or for rich Web apps.

Lars Bak, the Google engineer who was the technical leader for Chrome’s V8 JavaScript engine, said at the launch event Tuesday he’s confident Chrome is “many times faster” than the rivals at running JavaScript, the programming language that powers Google Docs, Gmail, and many other Web applications.

Third, I tried to run the SunSpider benchmark tests as well, but perhaps because a lot of other curious people had the same idea on the day Chrome launched, I couldn’t get to the site.

Google's overall score is head and shoulders above the competition for executing JavaScript.

• Richards: OS kernel simulation benchmark, originally written in BCPL by Martin Richards (539 lines).

Here’s the site description of the speed tests:

• EarleyBoyer: Classic Scheme benchmarks, translated to JavaScript by Florian Loitsch’s Scheme2Js compiler (4,682 lines).

Google introduced Chrome in part because it wants faster browsing and the richer Web applications that speed will unlock. So how does Chrome actually stack up?

• RayTrace: Ray tracer benchmark based on code by Adam Burmister (3,418 lines).

Qwest also reached a tentative agreement with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, which represents employees in Montana.

Qwest, based in Denver, is providing communication services for the Democratic National Convention, which will be held there in a little more than a week. Qwest also is providing service for the Republican National Convention, which begins September 1 in St. Paul, Minn.

Qwest Communications International has reached a tentative agreement with two labor unions averting a potential strike that could have disrupted service for the Democratic and Republican national conventions to be held in the next few weeks.

Qwest’s union workers had authorized a strike if a settlement was not reached between the two sides starting when their contracts expired at 11:59 p.m. Saturday. But a deal was reached, averting the strike. Details of the plan were not released, and the general membership of the unions still must approve it.

Officials had worried that a strike would disrupt the conventions. Now that a tentative agreement has been reached, an organizer for the CWA told the Associated Press that he does not expect any disruptions from his union members during the conventions.

On Monday, Qwest and its largest labor union, the Communications Workers of America, said that they had agreed on a three-year deal that will cover some 20,000 Qwest employees in 13 states who are represented by the union.

However, Gmail Labs is limited to Gmail. The Gmail text-messaging feature doesn’t work with Google’s other instant-messaging options, including the chat gadget that can run on iGoogle or the Google Talk software that can be downloaded and installed on a computer.

To use the feature, people can click on a chat window’s settings to send a text message with SMS or type a contact’s phone number in the chat contact search box, Gmail Product Manager Keith Coleman said in an interview. The feature is experimental, available only to those who opt to use it through the Gmail Labs settings, and Google will begin offering it Thursday.

The phone numbers are recycled, Coleman said; the system works because each person probably won’t need more than 1,000 text-message chat contacts.

Gmail Labs has let Google offer a wide variety of experimental features to those who want them–27 so far since the feature launched in June. None has graduated to full-fledged features or options, but Google clearly is eyeing candidates.

Keith Coleman, Gmail product manager

(Credit:
Stephen Shankland/CNET News)

Behind the scenes, Gmail Chat sends text messages to people’s phones from a specific Google phone number–one of about 1,000 the company reserved for the purpose–and each pair of people communicating gets to keep that number for future use. That’s handy, Coleman said, because the person who receives the text message can store the Google phone number in his or her address book as a conduit to reach the sender’s computer-based Google chat.

Google on Thursday will begin expanding the instant-messaging feature built into Gmail so people can use it to send text messages to their contacts’ phones.

However, Google still has interface refinement and testing work to do before any feature becomes part of the standard Gmail application, Coleman said. Gmail Labs is intended to be a proving ground where new features can be tried sooner rather than later, even if they’re still immature.

Among the most popular Gmail Labs features, according to Coleman: a reminder that makes sure you really have attached an attachment you promised; “Superstars” that let people flag messages not just with yellow stars but with a variety of other colors; pictures in chat to show the face of your instant-messaging contact; and QuickLinks that let people bookmark Gmail interactions such as a search for all unread messages from your mother.