Young gamers smoking the game pipe earlier

We don't need no education, we don't need no thought control. Kids are adopting gaming at younger ages according the the latest NPD group research data. The first time kids take the red pill has dropped from 8.1 years of age to 6.7 in 2007. Doesn't mean they like what they play. Just that they're indoctrinated.

Portable game systems lead the pack in child adoption rates with 39%. Console systems come in at 29%. Given the sales of the Nintendo DS and the Pokémons, that doesn't seem very surprising. Anita Frazier, industry analyst for The NPD Group, says, "[Children] appear to have no fear of technology and adopt it easily and without fanfare, making these devices a part of their everyday lives." Now if only their parents weren't so frightened of the "pokemans".

Reader Comments (16)

An Atari breast-fed me.

I still have mental scars from that.

While I'm not assuming that I was part of the statistic, I started gaming around 4-5 with the NES.

I think the big difference is the way money is spent now-a-days, versus the way it was say, twenty years ago. Kids get whatever the hell they want, and everything is put on credit. Everyone spends what they don't have and live in debt.

If you didn't have video games, what would be left? Playing with toys, making stuff, or going outside. If parents (and people in general) weren't willing to just go out and buy things on a whim to shut their children, or problems, up the numbers might not have changed as much.

I think the obvious reason for this , is the fact that gamers are now parents. When I was a kid I played with GI Joe because my dad did. You can only assume junior likes to play games just like pa (and ma) did also.

I'm not part of this statistic, but I've been playing SNES and NES since I was 2-3 years old. I have it on video.

I must have been Super Mario Bros 20 times before I was 5.

I played Pong at my mom's friend's house when I was maybe 3, and then got a NES when I was maybe 4, and I beat Super Mario Bros. 8293570 times and then I seriously learned to read (via Dr. Seuss) just so I could play Zelda II, and then I played the hell out of some Donkey Kong Jr. Math and have been a math whiz ever since. Give that to your kids when they're 4 and see what happens. It tricks them into learning. It makes them think it's fun. It happened to me.

Something must be skewing the data, or they need to differentiate results. There is no way the age was 8.1 and then suddenly dropped so precipitously. What age to kids start using computers? Was it really ever 8.1?

I started when I was about 3. Beat Sonic 2 on the Genesis when I was 4, and have been playing ever since.

"Smoking the game pipe" eh? Sounds like a back alley activity. But in all seriousness, I remember having the Sega Master System when I was like 4 and getting stuck on Alex the Kid and those damn "Rock, Paper, Scissors" matches. Thank god we switched to a Nintendo soon after and I've been hooked ever since.

Damn am i behind on that

I was 9, in 1998/99, I had really been into Comic books before that (i loved Superman, Justice League, and the Avengers), and i never liked games because they had always seemed so bland, until my cousin bought an N64, where Super Mario 64/Ocarina of Time/Mario Kart 64 lured me in with colorful, large, entertaining worlds

I've been hooked ever since

Sega master system! FTW

Safari Hunt!!!!! I was blasting endangerd species like crazy.

Anyway did anyone have those "card slot" games. I never did see one.

I think these "researchers" cant tell the difference between a "gamer" and "a kid who plays videogames"

Wow, sounds like I'm the old man commenting on this story. I started on the Atari 2600 sometime in my early teens I guess; I don't remember when exactly. Early 80s I guess. And my son, who turns 4 tomorrow, is playing Crackdown right next to me as I type this. He's really my gaming buddy. We've been co-oping on Double Dragon since it came out on XBLA as well as co-oping on Halo 1 and 2. One day he may even be able to beat his old man, but today is not that day...

Don't know whether I should be proud or reprimanded. My little girl has had her own DS (she wasn't sharing so I bought a Lite) since she was two. She isn't a pro by any means, but she can get to, and beat the first Bowser in Super Mario 64 (DS) and she can get off outset island in Windwaker. Not bad for three years old...or real bad for three years old.

I was playing the SNES when I was 4, and the GB Brick when I was 5.

I wsa raised by the Atari 2600. Then I moved over to the NES which was released when I was 5 and I have simply moved up the gaming ladder.

Nice Wall reference

I love that movie

Young gamers smoking the game pipe earlier

Reader Comments (16)

Posted: Jun 5th 2007 5:38PM Ghede said

Posted: Jun 5th 2007 5:41PM n3rrd said

Posted: Jun 5th 2007 5:44PM (Unverified) said

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Posted: Jun 5th 2007 5:57PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jun 5th 2007 6:00PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jun 5th 2007 6:15PM Railgun said

Posted: Jun 5th 2007 6:46PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jun 5th 2007 7:18PM Mr Khan said

Posted: Jun 5th 2007 8:42PM bearattack said

Posted: Jun 5th 2007 8:48PM dustandechoes91 said

Posted: Jun 5th 2007 8:51PM The Tim said

Posted: Jun 5th 2007 9:16PM mjparker75 said

Posted: Jun 6th 2007 3:22AM (Unverified) said

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Posted: Jun 6th 2007 11:59PM t0lta said

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