About 1,231 British gamers took part in the study designed to discover more about their playing habits. Just under two thirds of those surveyed claimed to feel “addicted” to playing video games. When asked to elaborate on how video games fit into their everyday life, 42 percent admitted they often miss out on social occasions in order to play video games, while 82 percent admitted they regularly missed out on sleep as a direct result of their gaming.
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Playr2 founder Simon Kilby, a gamer himself, can empathize with the study’s findings. He admits he’s often put important things off to continue playing his favorite titles and, although it may not count as an addiction in a medical sense, he feels with certain titles that he couldn’t wait to finish what he was doing to get back to playing. “I’m only surprised that Skyrim didn’t top the list, because I don’t know a single player who hasn’t become entirely engrossed with the game,” he said.
According to the study, the top 10 “most addictive console video games” are:
1) Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 – 73 percent of gamers who said they’d played said they felt “addicted” to it
2) The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim – 70 percent
3) Halo 3 – 68 percent
4) Final Fantasy VII – 63 percent
5) Grand Theft Auto IV – 58 percent
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6) The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion – 56 percent
7) The Sims – 55 percent
8) Red Dead Redemption – 46 percent
9) FIFA 2012 – 42 percent
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10) Tetris – 39 percent
“Looking over the list of console games, it’s not hard to see how people are so easily drawn into them,” Kilby said. “Although a number of the top ten have open-ended multiplayer modes that could keep you playing for hours on end, it’s great to see titles like Final Fantasy VII and Tetris in there, which are clearly loved for other reasons.”