Turkey spends 39 million hours screen time per day on e-games: Report

Bülent Sarıoğlu - ANKARA

Twenty-five million Turkish gamers spend a total of 39 million hours per day in front of screens playing e-games, the Youth and Sports Ministry stated on June 18.

During a presentation at parliament, the ministry said the economic volume of digital games in Turkey had reached $600 million,

“The [digital games] sector had $76.5 billion in business volume in 2013 and has now surpassed $100 billion. Massive multiplayer online games, referred to as ‘MMO’ games, grow around 10 percent each year,” said Huzeyfe Yılmaz, head of the ministry’s Culture and Research Commission in parliament.

E-sports had 747 million dollars in business volume in Turkey, Yılmaz added.

“There is a game named ‘League of Legends’ that came out on Aug. 8, 2015 in Turkey. This e-sports league’s tickets sold out faster than the Fenerbahçe–Galatasaray derby match,” he said.

Yılmaz also said 20 percent of game lovers were using multiplayer platforms, 17 percent were using smartphones, 10 percent were using computers and 37 percent were using game consoles for playing.

In 2014, the global research firm Newzoo announced economic data for e-games in Turkey, stating that 22.5 million internet users were actively playing games in Turkey. According to the data, 61 percent of Turkish game players were spending money on playing games.

The report revealed that Turkey was third place in the world market for screen time spent on e-games.