- As the impacts of the coronavirus continue in the US, $4.
- That's especially true with people aged 35 and up, $4.
- Most notably, the demographic that reported the greatest overall increase were people between 45 and 54 years old.
In March 2020, as the coronavirus began to rapidly spread across the United States, the video game business had its best month in over 10 years.
Spurred by the wildly popular "Animal Crossing: New Horizons" from
Now, with the impacts of the pandemic stretching into month eight, we're seeing just how many people have turned to
—Mat Piscatella (@MatPiscatella) $4
Four-fifths of all US consumers "played a video game in the past six months," $4.
Though the growth in play time was spread across all demographics, it was most pronounced in a surprising demographic: people aged 35 to 54 years old. Among the groups measured, older folks saw the largest gains — with a nearly 60% spike in game playing among people 45 to 54-years-old.
Read more: $4
That increase in play time has also led to an increase in spending: The same group of 45- to 54-year-olds increased spending on video games by a whopping 76%, with similarly large gains in older demographic groups.
The increase in play time and spending was driven by an overall increase in time spent indoors, but also as a result of lower spending in other areas of entertainment:
As of Wednesday, over 266,000 people in the US have died from from the virus and over 13 million people have tested positive, $4.
Got a tip? Contact Business Insider senior correspondent Ben Gilbert via email (bgilbert@businessinsider.com), or Twitter DM ($4). We can keep sources anonymous. Use a non-work device to reach out. PR pitches by email only, please.