I play a lot of video games. A lot. I always cringe when Xbox Live sends me an e-mail telling me exactly how many hours I’ve played the month before. I somehow manage more than 150 hours a month, and that’s not even counting the PS3. Sad, I know. So when I play video games, I just want to grab a pizza, head into my basement, turn on my television and sit on my couch with my dog for the next 14 straight hours, zoning out into some sort of pixel-induced semi-coma. It’s sort of a ritual that I’ve been cultivating for the last 24 years or so. I’m a creature of habit, and I’ve dug myself a happy little rut. It’s great. That having been said, I’m going to be honest with you fine folks: I’m strictly a console gamer. I’ve never played Angry Birds. I’ve never played Words With Friends. I’ve never played Block Breaker Deluxe. Mobile gaming is just not my thing. But I get it, I do. You’re sitting on a train, an airport, the back seat of a police cruiser, or basically anywhere your TV isn’t, and you can grab your phone and start playing. It’s convenient, it’s cheap, it’s fun, and there’s not too much brainpower involved. And basically they’ve got every type of game ever invented: first-person shooters, role-playing games, platformers, puzzle games, even old classics revamped and upgraded. How crazy is that, by the way? I can play a PSX game on my cell phone and have it actually look better than when it was on the console. That’s nuts to me. As I was saying, I get it. And so do a shitload of other people, apparently. My top-secret sources tell me the mobile-gaming industry made $8 billion last year. Yes, billion with a fucking B. That’s roughly 600 million times more that I make annually as part of Buzzbin Magazine’s crack staff. In fact, some estimates show mobile gaming as holding 60 percent of the entire gaming market and growing. I realize not all of this magazine’s readers are the sharpest knives in the drawer, so I’ll give you a little help: Mobile gaming is no longer a niche minority. If you’re a casual gamer, you’re thinking “Great. The more money these mobile games make, the more they’ll be able to pour back in to making even better games.” But if you’re a hardcore gamer, you’re thinking, “Holy sweet shit, my favorite console game makers are going to jump ship to the greener pastures of mobile gaming and leave me and my crippling gaming addiction high and dry.” You know what? You’re both right. You’re right, casual gamer, these games are going to keep getting better. Eight billion dollars annually and growing will make damn sure of that. Couple that with the fact that everyone on the planet has a smartphone, a tablet and an e-reader within four square feet of them at any given time, and mobile gaming is here to stay. You, hardcore gamer, are also correct. Many of your favorite game companies have already started devoting programmers to this mobile-gaming juggernaut. Electronic Arts is already a major player, with Ubisoft making strides as well. All is not lost, however. Console gaming isn’t going anywhere. No market making multibillions of dollars has ever just decided to say, “Fuck it, we’re done with this shit” and gone home. It just doesn’t happen. So everybody, it’s time to get used to mobile gaming. It’s as ubiquitous as porn, and it’s not going anywhere anytime soon. But fret not, fellow console nerds: You’ll still be sitting in front of your TVs playing the newest triple-A titles for years and years to come.