50 Epic Computer Gaming Facts for 2025

One of my favorite Bollywood actors, Shah Rukh Khan, once said, “Study hard. Work hard. Play harder.”

I don’t usually take life advice from celebrities, but this stuck with me. Computing gaming is one of my favorite hobbies, and while I don’t have the time to “play harder” than I work, I make sure to spend time gaming with my childhood friends on weekends.

I’m not the only one who loves computer gaming (quite obviously) — an estimated 1.86 million people worldwide share my passion.¹ I really hope you’re one of them. I’ve compiled some of the latest facts in computer gaming to create this guide, so let’s dive in!

Which PC games do you play? Football is my favorite sport and naturally, I am a huge fan of the FIFA series (now EA Sports FC)! About 1.86 million people like me play PC games.¹ I’m sure most of them spend much more time gaming than me!

There weren’t always these many gamers, you know — the number of gamers has increased by around 42% in the past decade and approximately 69% since 2008. For context, there were about 1.3 million PC gamers in 2014 and 1.1 million PC gamers in 2008.¹

I believe the rise of eSports has a lot to do with these increasing numbers.

Until now, I never knew Nintendo went by another name (or had been around for so long). Japanese video game goliath, Nintendo, was founded as Nintendo Koppai by craftsman Fusajiro Yamauchi more than 135 years ago — it initially made Japanese Hanafuda playing cards!

Nintendo’s video game history began many decades later in 1975, when it acquired the distribution rights to the Magnavox Odyssey for the Japanese market. Nintendo published its own home console, Color TV-Game 6, with six pre-programmed games in 1977.¹⁴

I wonder how many hours per week you spend gaming. I spend about 10–12 hours — I wish I had time for more! Here’s an interesting fact for you: of the approximately 205 million gamers in the U.S. in 2025, 28% spend between one and five hours playing video games per week.

A further 18% play games for 6–10 hours per week, and 11% indulge for less than an hour. Only 7% of Americans play computer games for more than 20 hours per week.

Given how my three-year-old nephew is happiest when he has my sister-in-law’s smartphone in hand, this stat is a sign of the times: the number of gamers in the USA is forecasted to increase by 13.78% by 2029 and reach a new peak of nearly 230 million.^39,40

I wonder what the average age of this new batch of gamers will be. Any thoughts?

Given the sheer number of gamers out there, I wasn’t surprised to learn global revenue in the video game market is projected to reach $691.31 billion by 2029, marking an increase of about 45.53% between 2024 and 2029 — this increase equals about $216.30 billion.³

The market includes a ton of products: console games, computer games, mobile games, and online games. You could play video games every moment for the rest of your life and only see a fraction of what’s out there.

The only Sony video game I’ve played is Marvel’s Spider-Man, and that’s just because Spider-Man is my favorite superhero.

With popular titles like Bloodborne, Final Fantasy VII, The Last of Us, and God of War, Sony raked in more than $26 billion in 2024. Not bad at all. Can you guess the next gaming company on this list?

If you’ve played games like Honor of Kings and PUBG Mobile, chances are you’ve heard of their cash cow, Tencent. The Chinese video gaming company grossed a cool $25.5 billion in gaming revenue in 2024.⁴

While Sony and Tencent earn top bucks, Nintendo has the largest market cap.

Market cap is more of a stock market thing, while revenue is all about sales. The Nintendo Switch is undoubtedly my favorite Nintendo product (ah, the memories) and a significant contributor to the Japanese multinational gaming company’s revenue.

Moving on to the market cap side of things, Nintendo has a market cap of more than $65 billion.⁵

Electronic Arts (EA) ranks second, with a market cap of roughly $43 billion.⁵ If you’re a thrill seeker and a sports fanatic, I know you’ve played some of their most popular video game series, such as FIFA (EA and FIFA split ways in May 2022), Sims, Need for Speed, and Madden NFL.

In the list of the top five video game consoles of all time in terms of sales, three Nintendo consoles stand out.

You already know the Nintendo Switch is one of them. Can you guess the other two? If you guessed the Nintendo DS and classic Game Boy, give yourself a pat on the back.

If you’re a fan of the Nintendo DS, you may remember games like Nintendogs, Animal Crossing, and Cooking Mama (don’t anger her — if you know, you know).

The Nintendo Switch is the only current-gen console that appears in this list, with approximately 143 million units sold. The PlayStation 2, which has sold more than 160 million units, and the PlayStation 4 complete the list.^2,6

If you’re an Xbox fan, it’s worth knowing the Xbox 360 is the only Xbox console that sneaks into the top ten rankings!

My current muse, the PlayStation 5, has sold more than 60 million units globally.⁶

While Sony hasn’t technically confirmed it’s working on developing a next-gen console (likely to be named the PlayStation 6 — though a PlayStation X would be neat), I’m already buzzing about the prospect.

Let’s do the math: considering the traditional lifecycle of a PlayStation console of 6-7 years, Sony could launch a new one as “early” as 2027. I’m always up for a surprise, so hurry up already, Sony!

When I was in uni, my friends and I used to play PUBG Mobile, the mobile version of PUBG: BATTLEGROUNDS, every night.

Imagine eight grown men sitting on a large mat in a hostel yard, wielding virtual artillery on mobile screens. Yeah, that was us. If you need more context, PUBG: BATTLEGROUNDS is a multiplayer battle royale video game.

If you want to maintain the sanctity of your smartphone, you can play the game on your PC via the Steam platform. It’s one of the most popular games on Steam and had more than 781,000 concurrent players on the platform in January 2025.

The highest recorded number of concurrent PUBG: BATTLEGROUNDS players on Steam was in January 2018, at an astronomical 3.24 million!⁷

It’s simple; you’re either a PUBG: Battlegrounds fan or on the Fortnite boat. You can’t have the best of both worlds, my friend (well, you actually can in this case)! Both battle royale games were officially launched in 2017.

While PUBG: Battlegrounds has a strong following (it has my vote), I’d be foolish to deny Fortnite is nothing short of a cultural phenomenon — it has amassed a player base of more than 650 million players, of which around 250 million are active.⁸

Speaking of games I used to play with my uni mates, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO) was another favorite. When it was upgraded to Counter-Strike 2 (CS2) in September 2023, the memories came flooding back. I hope to plan a reunion with them soon!

If you’re unfamiliar with the game, it’s a multiplayer tactical first-person shooter game. It has a cult following and had a maximum of 1.59 million concurrent players in January 2025.⁹

I’ll admit, DOTA 2 never really interested me, but it’s got a wild history. It’s the sequel to Defense of the Ancients (DotA), originally a mod for Warcraft II that pioneered the multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) genre.

Dota 2 has nothing to do with Warcraft (it’s published by Valve, not Activision/Blizzard), but is still wildly popular: it had a record-high number of concurrent players on Steam way back in March 2016 at approximately 1.29 million.

The video game is viral on Steam and peaked at nearly 744,000 concurrent gamers in December 2024.¹⁰ Though some of that may have to do with the fact that Valve, the game’s publisher, created Steam. It’s a small world, after all.

CS2 was the most popular Steam title in January 2025, recording an average of more than 949,000 concurrent players per week. Dota 2 took second place with about 461,000 average concurrent gamers per week.

PUBG: BATTLEGROUNDS ranked third, with around 331,000 average concurrent players per week.¹¹

While I’m personally more of a console gamer, millions of people flock to Steam to get their gaming fix. To put it into perspective, the gaming platform and digital storefront had a peak of 40 million concurrent gamers on March 3, 2025.¹² Crazy numbers, right?

The first video game system was nowhere near as fancy as my PlayStation 5! In reading about the history of video game systems, I learned the “Brown Box,” which was the first of its kind, supported multiple games that could be played by flipping the switches along the front of the system: a golf putting game, target shooting, four different sports games, checkers, and ping-pong.

Sanders Associates, Inc. licensed the prototype to American electronics company Magnavox, which released the system as the world’s first home video game console in 1972; they named it Magnavox Odyssey.¹³

If you want to experience its magic, you can check out the Magnavody simulator on Steam!

Football is my favorite sport (please don’t call it soccer). My love affair with it began just ten years ago. Two of my closest friends at university were watching a match between Manchester United and Chelsea, and I joined them. United won 2-1, and I chose to bleed red for the rest of my life.

I started playing FIFA 14 shortly after, and firmly believe it’s the best FIFA edition of all time.

The FIFA franchise (now EA Sports FC) is loved globally and especially in Europe. To put it into perspective, EA Sports FC 25 ranked first based on sales in every European country in 2024 — market dominance.¹⁵

Trust an American company (EA) to include the word “soccer” in the title of the first official game (FIFA-backed) in the FIFA franchise! FIFA International Soccer, FIFA’s first game, was released way back in 1993.¹⁶

That’s when the likes of Diego Maradona (he retired in 1997), Roberto Baggio, Paolo Maldini, George Weah, Eric Cantona, and Michael Ladrup were among the best football players in the world. Maradona was the highest-rated player in the game, with a 93 rating.

You may be wondering what a song stat is doing in a computing game piece. Well, each FIFA game has had phenomenal songs, and Avicii’s “The Nights” is memorable for so many reasons.

His song, The Nights, was included in FIFA 15, which was released in September 2014, and is widely regarded as the best FIFA soundtrack of all time.¹⁷

The song was officially released in December 2014, almost three months after the launch of FIFA 15. Since I’m a staunch FIFA 14 supporter, I prefer John Newman’s “Love Me Again” (it has been ranked 5th in the list), but oh well. The people have spoken.

Which is your favorite track from EA Sports FC 2025? We can’t be friends if you don’t vibe to Fontaines D.C.’s “Starbuster!”

The FIFA franchise has had many so-called competitors over the years, of which Sensible Soccer was one of the best (though no one could or will match the might of FIFA).

First of all, let’s have a good laugh at its name. Sensible Soccer (AKA Sensi), really? My grandma could have come up with a better franchise name! The last edition of the game, Sensible World of Soccer, was released in 2007.¹⁶ Unsurprisingly, it still has a cult following.

I am a Ronaldo fan through and through, but I was sincerely expecting Lionel Messi to top this stat. I have a wide smile on my face, so who cares? I guess it’s all about marketing.

I know what you’re thinking: “He probably thinks Ronaldo is the GOAT.” I’ll admit I’m a fanboy, but I can also acknowledge greatness. Lionel Messi is the best player of all time.

Anyway, coming back to more pressing matters, Ronaldo has appeared on FIFA video game covers six times (FIFA 07, FIFA 08, FIFA 09, FIFA 10, FIFA 18, and FIFA 19). I’d be so happy if he wins the FIFA World Cup with Portugal in 2026 and appears on the cover for one last time!

It’s time to venture into the eSports market! You’re well aware of sports betting, but have you ever heard of eSports betting? eSports betting is when you make a wager on the outcome of a computer or video game — and it’s more popular than you might think.

Though, honestly, I’d recommend you avoid both.

The global eSports market is projected to generate revenue of approximately $4.80 billion in 2025. eSports betting is its largest segment, with a forecasted revenue of about $2.80 billion in the same year (if you’re genuinely interested, explore the betting odds on Bovada).

The market is estimated to display a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 5.56% between 2025 and 2029, resulting in a healthy revenue of around $5.90 billion by 2029.¹⁸

eSports and betting are a match made in heaven in the U.S. The USA eSports market is the world’s largest in terms of revenue generated by a country.

Here’s a fact to show you just how popular eSports are in the U.S.: They’re estimated to create revenue of more than $1.2 billion in 2025!¹⁸

The eSports betting segment is the largest in both the global eSports market and in the U.S. — it’s projected to produce revenue of approximately $857 million in the same year.

Further, my research revealed the U.S. eSports market is predicted to grow at a CAGR (Compound Annual Growth Rate) of 6.58% between 2025 and 29, leading to a revenue of more than $1.6 billion by the end of the forecast period.¹⁹

If you’re considering getting in on the eSports betting action, now is the time (responsibly, of course). While I don’t indulge in it or condone it, the global eSports market is forecast to have around 900 million users by 2029, out of which approximately 72.5 million will be from the U.S.

The global user penetration rate is projected to increase from 12.5% in 2025 to 14.2% by 2029, and the average revenue per user (ARPU) is expected to be around $6.2.¹⁸

If you live in the U.S., your ARPU is estimated to be more than three times higher at ~$21.5.^18,19

It’s time to set aside boring, revenue-based eSports stats; I promise, it’s a rollercoaster ride from now on (you won’t need barf bags)! Let’s dive into some fun-filled eSports facts!

If you’re looking to make money playing eSports, try Dota 2. It’s extremely competitive, so you’ll have to put in many hours of effort to master your skills.

Dota 2 is the most lucrative eSports for gamers, with a cumulative tournament prize pool of $23.86 million in 2024.

The International, which is the leading Dota 2 eSports tournament, had an overall prize pool of about $2.6 million in the 2024 edition.⁵⁶ Counter-Strike 2 ranked second, with a cumulative tournament prize pool of $20.83 million in the period, followed by Arena of Valor at $19.82 million.²⁰

If you want to become a professional Dota 2 player, The International is the holy grail. I was stunned to learn just how much The International 2021 prize pool was worth. The 2021 edition of The International was the highest-paying in eSports history, with an overall prize pool of more than $40 million.

Six other editions of the tournament feature in my list of eSports tournaments with the highest overall prize pool: The International 2019 ($34.33 million), The International 2018 ($25.53 million), The International 2017 ($24.69 million), The International 2016 ($20.77 million), The International 2022 ($18.93 million), and The International 2015 ($18.43 million).⁵⁷

Thinking about forming your own Dota 2 team for the next tournament? Here’s who you’re up against.

OG is the world’s most successful Dota 2 eSports team, having earned $37.33 million through eSports tournaments. The professional eSports team also has Counter-Strike 2 and Rocket League contingents (though if you ask me, Rocket League is like a poor man’s FIFA).

Notably, Team OG was home to N0tail, the most successful player in Dota 2 history (he retired from playing the game professionally in 2021). If you want to “git gud,” he should be your idol (don’t be a rebel). Analyze his gameplay, take notes, and begin practicing! In second place, the Dutch eSports team, Team Liquid, has amassed prize money exceeding $31 million through Dota 2 eSports tournaments.

Team Spirit ranks third, with total career winnings of more than $28 million.²² Remember, while there’s potential to be a Dota 2 millionaire, it’s only possible through hard work. Start now.

The eSports market is booming, and an increasing number of users are tuning in to watch their favorite gamers competing in tournaments or streaming games online.

You can think of it as a guilty pleasure; I mean, why just watch? Pick up your controller/keyboard and play! Anyway, popular platforms, including my favorites, are Twitch and YouTube Gaming.

There will be an estimated 318.10 million eSports followers in 2025, representing a significant increase of roughly 47.80% since 2020 (215.20 million supporters). This makes me think the gaming boom brought about by COVID-19 is here to stay.

Additionally, more than 322 million people are predicted to occasionally watch eSports games in the same year.²³

eSports watchers, this stat is for you! The League of Legends World Championship 2024 recorded a peak viewership of 6.94 million. If you tuned in, then you made history — it’s the most-watched eSports tournament of all time.

Surprise, surprise, The League of Legends 2023 World Championship grabs second spot, with a peak viewership of about 6.4 million.⁵⁸ The game is pretty interesting — the numbers don’t lie — play it on your PC this weekend!

Mind you, winnings like these may have you second-guessing your career choice.

While OG is the king of Dota 2, Team Liquid is the emperor of the eSports kingdom. Team Liquid, which of course primarily competes in Dota 2 eSports tournaments, has won $54.47 million in total prize money.²⁵

Its most recent accomplishment in a major Dota 2 tournament was winning the 2024 edition of The International, the world’s largest Dota 2 tournament. This win alone secured a bag of more than $1.15 million!⁵⁹

In comparison, OG has earned roughly $39 million in total prize money — about $37 million is from Dota 2 tournaments. ^22,25 If you achieve just 10% of what these teams have accomplished in your career, you’d be set for life!

Here’s more on eSports as a (lucrative) career path.

Let’s take the example of 31-year-old Johan Sundstein (you may know him as N0tail), the OG professional Dota 2 player from team OG. He has amassed approximately $7.18 million in career winnings. Is it time for N0tail to make a comeback?

Another prominent figure in Dota 2 folklore, Jesse Vainikka (also known as JerAx), won the 2018 and 2019 editions of The International with team OG and has earned nearly $6.49 million.²⁶

Let’s assume you’ve made it as a professional eSports player. If you ever get bored of competing in tournaments, you can always retire and earn a fortune like American online streamer, YouTuber, and professional gamer, Richard Tyler Blevins (also called Ninja).

He has 19.2 million followers on Twitch and nearly 24 million subscribers on his main YouTube channel. ^27,28

If you’ve never watched him play, his channel is worth checking out. The 34-year-old plays games like Fortnite, Valorant, and Warzone, and has accumulated more than 2.7 billion views on YouTube.²⁸

Spanish streamer Llanos Garatea, AKA ibai, is guaranteed to wow you — he streams games such as League of Legends and Marvel Rivals, and has the second-most followers at 17.29 million.²⁹

Grand Theft Auto was a video game staple in my teens. I mean, who didn’t play it?

Despite being released more than a decade ago in 2013, the classic action-adventure game, GTA V, is still a fan favorite in the Twitch community — it was streamed for around 101 million hours in January 2025. Yes, million. And here’s a secret. I still play it on rainy Sunday afternoons.

GTA V-related event streaming on Twitch peaked in May 2021, when the game was watched for approximately 253 million hours.³⁰

Other popular games you can stream on Twitch include Fortnite, Valorant, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II, and Apex Legends. I especially recommend Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II streams.

I play games on my smartphone, laptop, and TV. I assume you do too. According to a Statista survey I found, the global gaming penetration among internet users is roughly 84%.

It’s highest in the Philippines — 96.6% of the country’s responding internet-using population play games on a device such as a smartphone, personal computer, or tablet. Filipino parents may be facing challenges in encouraging their children to study!

The gaming reach in Indonesia (96.4%), India (94.3%), South Africa (94.2%), and Thailand (93.5%) is quite high too — all five markets are smartphone-first (PUBG Mobile much?).³¹

We carry our phones with us everywhere we go, so this fact doesn’t shock me. According to the same Statista survey, of the approximately 84% of internet users who play games on any device, more than 67% prefer smartphones.

Laptops and desktop computers are the second-most popular way to play games (~34%). Gaming is most popular amongst people in the 16-24 age bracket, with 93% of male respondents and 92.2% of female respondents stating they play games.^31,32

I got my first cellphone when I was 16, so this stat is far from a shocker!

When you hear the name “Tetris,” you probably think of vintage arcade-style gameplay. It’s certainly a pop culture phenomenon.

I’ll be honest with you, when I first heard the name, I misheard it as “tetanus,” the bacterial infection. I was like, “Why would anyone play with tetanus?” I was with my friend, Timothy, at the time and, of course, was laughed at for a good few minutes.

Anyway, Tetris is a puzzle video game that was created by Russian Alexey Pajitnov in 1985. It’s the world’s best-selling video game franchise, with more than 520 million units sold worldwide.

The franchise has more than 100 officially licensed games, the first of which was the Electronika 60 version.³⁴ The Pokémon franchise ranks second (the theme song is literally playing in my head while I type this), with more than 484 million copies sold, followed by the Activision-owned Call of Duty franchise, with more than 435 million units sold.³³

Speaking of Pokémon’s theme song, Pokémon has been a household name for decades and is still going strong. I have about 100 Pokémon cards I collected in the ‘90s, saved in a binder with card sleeves.

I also have a Pikachu toy (don’t judge me)! Now that I think of it, I haven’t actually played a Pokémon game, which says a lot about how far-reaching the franchise is. I’m adding it to my to-do list! Let’s explore some options.

The most popular games in the Pokémon series are the original Red and Blue (Green in Japan) versions, having sold a staggering 31.38 million copies worldwide. Sword and Shield, the first generation of Pokémon to debut on the Nintendo Switch, comes in second at 26.6 million, for a combined total of nearly 58 million copies sold!

Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet, released in late 2022, heralded the ninth generation of Pokémon games and have sold more than 26 million units.³⁵

The first-ever eSports World Cup, the eSports World Cup 2024 took place in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. It wrapped up in late August 2024 and usurped The International 2021 as the eSports tournament with the most prize money at $60 million.

If you think that’s an astounding amount of money, you’re right — The International 2021, in comparison, had a total prize pool exceeding $40 million.^21,57

The tournament featured more than 2,500 professional gamers and gaming enthusiasts and introduced a new cross-game competition format. If you haven’t heard of Team Falcons, it’s time to brush up on your knowledge.

They won the tournament and made history. The eSports World Cup 2025 is set to be grander, so make sure you “attend” it!³⁶

You already know GTA has been a long-standing favorite of mine and has stood the test of time. Did you really think I could complete this piece without touching GTA VI?

Let’s complete the formalities first; developed and released by Rockstar Games, GTA V is one of the best-selling video games of all time — it has sold more than 210 million copies worldwide.

Released in September 2013, 2020 was the game’s best-selling year since 2013 — it sold around 20 million copies in 2020.³⁷

The next installment in the Grand Theft Auto series, GTA VI, will be released on December 31, 2025, as has been confirmed by Rockstar Games — you can watch the trailer now.³⁸

I sure don’t miss the old days of begging my parents for an advance on my allowance to buy the latest computer games! I think of them as bittersweet memories, as I didn’t get to buy all the games I wanted. While I have the money to buy my favorite games now, I just don’t have the time. But maybe you do.

U.S. gamers spent $7.54 billion on video game content, hardware, and accessories in January 2025.

These numbers will make much more sense once you read this computing gaming fact: 40% of gamers in the USA across all platforms don’t mind spending between $41 and $60 on a video game.⁴¹

Unless you’re a video game history buff, you’d probably assume that Pac-Man or Space Invaders were among the first video games, maybe Pong if you’re a little more savvy. Well, you’re more than two decades off the mark.

Interestingly, the world’s first video games were created in the research laboratories of scientists! British professor A.S. “Sandy” Douglas developed OXO, the world’s first-ever video game, in 1952.

The non-interactive game simulates tic-tac-toe and was developed by Douglas as part of his doctoral dissertation on human-computer interaction at the University of Cambridge.

The first computer-based (analog) and interactive video game, Tennis for Two, was created by William Higinbotham at the Brookhaven National Laboratory in 1958; it simulates a game of tennis and is played on an oscilloscope (I wonder if Roger Federer has played it).⁴²

Remember when I talked about the “Brown Box,” the world’s first video game system? It was, in fact, invented in 1967 (and commercially launched in 1972) by German-American engineer and gamer developer, Ralph H. Baer.

Despite the contributions of Douglas and Higinbotham to the advent of the video game industry, they were far from gaming gurus. Baer is the true “father of video games.” He envisioned playing video games on a television screen and, along with colleagues at Sanders Associates, Inc., invented the Brown Box.¹³

We’ve certainly come a long way since those days.

I play UNO with my girlfriend every day, and we turn our “bouts” into a competition with a “prize” (like the loser having to take out the trash). If only she would agree to let me stream our games online!

While our gaming history only goes back a few months, the roots of professional video gaming were established in the early 1970s.

The first-ever video game competition was based on Spacewar! and took place at Stanford University in 1972 — it was called the “Intergalactic Spacewar Olympics” (though only competitors from Earth seemed to attend) and the competition’s winner received a year’s subscription to Rolling Stone magazine.⁴³

I’ll admit, this is an odd one. In what may be deemed bizarre by “human” standards, Tokyo man “Sal 9000” — real name is unknown — married video game character Nene Anegasaki from the Nintendo DS dating simulator Love Plus in 2009.

I have to ask: Which game character would you marry? I’d pick Lara Croft or Princess Zelda (sorry, girlfriend)!

The event was streamed online and watched by thousands.⁴⁴ While the marriage isn’t legally binding, it goes to show how virtual reality can transcend into the physical world — gamers like you and I can develop a deep bond with game characters.

When’s the last time you visited an arcade? If you’re a hardcore gamer, you better pack your bags and travel to Zaragoza! Spanish gaming company, MadLab Zaragoza, created the world’s largest arcade machine in 2021; It measures 4.90 meters tall, 1.98 meters wide, and 1.11 meters deep.⁴⁵

The machine is located at MadLab’s store outlet at the La Torre Outlet shopping complex, Zaragoza, and runs a massive version of Tetris, the best-selling game franchise of all time.

You can play a game on the arcade machine for just $5 per game (though your travel expenses will cost a lot more).⁴⁶

I certainly couldn’t have guessed the youngest professional gamer’s age.

In 2005, American gamer Victor De Leon III, also known as Lil Poison (got to love that name), signed a Major League Gaming (MLG) contract at the tender age of seven, becoming the youngest-ever signed professional video gamer.

I was shooting kid-sized hoops at that age. He competed in his first competition, a Halo tournament in New York, at age four!⁴⁷

Now an adult, Lil Poison has stepped away from professional gaming. He occasionally streams his Halo gameplay on Twitch and has more than 2,000 followers.⁴⁸

Super Mario Bros. was another favorite of mine growing up (I had a lot of favorites, shush) — a sentiment I’m sure a lot of you share.

Nintendo’s iconic console video game, Super Mario Bros., has sold more than 40 million copies worldwide. It’s the Mario franchise’s second-most popular game after Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, which has sold approximately 62 million units globally.⁴⁹

Super Mario Bros. is more than just a game — released in 1985, it saved the gaming industry, which was struggling in the early 1980s, from collapsing.⁵⁰ It also features one of the world’s most recognizable theme songs! I bet you’re humming it now!

Here’s another kid who made it big. Japanese gamer Ryota Wada, age nine, achieved a perfect “AAA” rating on a Dance Dance Revolution (DDR) game set to the expert level in 2010.

He performed this feat to the song “Hyper Eurobeat” and had been practicing for four years.⁵¹ Interestingly, he could have achieved this feat earlier had he had a non-slip surface at his disposal (the more friction, the better?).

Super Mario Bros. is a historic game, so I’m not surprised a copy of it sold for $2 million at an auction on the Rally website in 2021, making it the world’s most expensive video game unit ever sold.

It was a sealed test copy with a WATA 9.8 A+ grade, indicating it was in exceptional condition.⁵² If you have a couple million dollars to spare, you can acquire your own rare test copy of Super Mario Bros. Or you can just play it on your Switch. Probably cheaper that way.

A copy of another game from the Mario franchise, Super Mario 64, was sold for $1.56 million at an auction on the Heritage Auctions website in 2021, making it the world’s second-most expensive video game copy ever sold. That’s a lot of gold coins!

The condition of the Nintendo 64 unit was even better than the table-topper — it had a WATA 9.8 A++ grade, specifying it was in pristine condition.⁵³

After reading this stat, you’ll wish you had a Pikachu and Charizard plush toy by your bedside! British Pokémon fanatic Lisa Courtney has more than 21,000 items of Pokémon memorabilia — she’s the world record holder for the largest collection.⁵⁴

She set the record, verified by the Guinness World Records organization, in 2016, with 17,127 items.⁵⁵

She began assembling her collection at the age of nine — it includes Pokémon trading cards, posters, books, plush toys, action figures, and even toilet paper!⁵⁴ My childhood self is oozing with jealousy. I bet her collection is north of 25,000 now (she had 21,000 items in 2021)!

If you haven’t watched the Black Mirror episode “Striking Vipers” rated TV-MA, I highly recommend streaming it on Netflix; It portrays the concept of a metaverse-style video game environment where the virtual world, “Striking Vipers”, blends effortlessly with reality — this is what the gaming industry strives for (if only I could get my hands on that game!).

While we aren’t quite there yet, and it may take more than a decade to achieve fully immersive virtual reality technology (VR), there are several promising breakthroughs you should be excited about.

The application of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) algorithms in gaming, in particular, is worth talking about. AI/ML technology is expected to fuel game design and make it possible for you to have believable conversations with in-game characters.

They could remember your backstory, for example, and interact like real humans (an ironic breath of fresh air in this increasingly mechanical world) — this will enable an element of uniqueness and depth to games. Gaming is all about having fun, and the industry’s future promises many thrilling adventures. So pick up your controller, call a friend over, and have a blast!

1. https://www.statista.com/statistics/420621/number-of-pc-gamers/
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