Gaming for a better world
Computer and video games have earned a bad rap over the course of the industry’s growth. From its beginning in the early 1970s to the multibillion-dollar industry it is today, gaming has been described as mindless and a waste of time that leads to bad outcomes for physical and mental wellbeing.
The emergence of casual, mobile and social gaming has quickly displaced these opinions by opening the doors to larger audiences and receiving the embrace of nearly everyone — individuals and families, businesses and corporations, kids, teenagers and adults — while permeating every field of human activity, from work to home. As the impact of gaming grows, it’s now seen as an essential part of popular culture and, as such, poses questions about cultural change, not least our perception of gaming and its impact on our daily lives.
Today, 68 per cent of Australians play video games and 98 per cent of homes with children have computer games, according to the 2016 report by the Interactive Games & Entertainment Association. The numbers are similar everywhere in the world — and growing exponentially. In 2015, the Entertainment Software Association reported that 155 million Americans played video games and four out of five households owned a device for game playing. Newzoo’s 2016 Global Games Market Report shows 1.53 billion active gamers in the Asia-Pacific region