The PlayStation 2 received 30.2 percent of all console gaming minutes in 2008 (January to October), according to the Nielsen Media Research group. That statistic is a bit surprising until you consider that Sony has sold more than 140 million PS2s since its launch. With the largest footprint, the PS2 should have the largest usage base.

Top Console Usage (by percent of minutes played)
PlayStation 2 (30.2 percent)
Xbox 360 (18.3 percent)
Wii (13.5 percent)
Xbox (9.1 percent)
PlayStation 3 (7.7 percent)
GameCube (4.4 percent)
Other (16.9 percent)

Admittedly, these PS2 numbers are surprising and very impressive. The PS3 is still struggling against the Wii and Xbox and this data certainly doesn’t let the PS3 off the hook, but it does show that there might be a long-tail effect in place for console games.

Even more impressive data from Nielsen is the fact that World of Warcraft (WoW) users average 671 minutes (over 11 hours) per week. In any given minute, “almost 1 percent (0.723 percent) of all PC gamers are playing WoW.”