This link has been bookmarked by 1 people . It was first bookmarked on 02 Feb 2008, by Benjamin Jörissen.
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02 Feb 08
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The image of the antisocial, sunlight-deprived game geek is enshrined in the popular consciousness as deeply as any stereotype of recent decades.
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That’s changing. Online PC games in which thousands of players gab and explore together are attracting tens of millions of subscribers.
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The list, released recently by the market research company NPD Group, highlights the soaring popularity of mass-market franchises like Guitar Hero and the Wii at the expense of critically acclaimed projects aimed at the same young-male audience the industry has relied on for years. (As recently as 2006, sales charts were covered with single-player diversions and sports games.)
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hard-core gamers and the old-school critics who represent them are becoming an ever smaller part of the audience
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Game critics and players have been closely aligned in their tastes, perhaps because the writers and buyers came from more or less the same pool of tech-savvy young men.
But judging from the Top 10 list, that paradigm may be breaking down.
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Nine of the 10 top-selling games of 2007 include a significant multiplayer component.
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If new acceptance by the masses is one pillar of gaming’s future, gaming’s emergence as a social phenomenon is the other.
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