New figures from the NPD group make rather encouraging or depressing reading, depending which side of the cultural fence you sit on.

Here goes, then. Approximately two-thirds of Americans (63%) have played a video game within the last six months. That’s a lot by any measure, but, significantly, it’s greater than the 53% who said they’d visited the cinema during the same time-frame.

As the cracks in Western civilisation widen further figures emerge. Casual games are on the up, for starters - 10% of US gamers say they’ve played on social networking sites, while 5% have paid to download such games. Mobile games are increasing in popularity too, with 19% of owners playing games that came bundled with their handset and 11% actively purchasing extra content. Mindful of the iPhone’s success in the US we’re surprised it’s not higher.

But back to harder-core gamers, and among those who claim to play console or handheld games some 31% reckon to have done so on a gaming website (whatever that actually means – Xbox LIVE, PSN etc?) and 12% have done so via the aforementioned social networking sites.

So there you have it. Not especially shocking, we suppose. Although as the Hollywood studios look to plug their dwindling revenue streams more dodgy movie tie-ins are bound to follow as a result. In which case heaven help us all...