The word "gamers" is correct and usable in written English.
It is typically used to refer to individuals who play video games, often in a casual or competitive context.
Example: "The convention attracted thousands of gamers from around the world."
Alternatives: "video game players" or "gaming enthusiasts."
"The gamers clubbed together to buy the university a bank of 12 modems," says Bartle.
In a nod to news stories that have emerged from the country gamers can also ride Chicago Bulls basketballs, in homage to Denis Rodman, and fly giant rabbits based on reports that the North Korean embassy requested a shipment from a breeder in Germany in 2007.
It summed up every negative stereotype about hardcore gamers, as Cartman and his friends became fat, greasy-haired, acne-ridden slobs as they go through the endless hours of practice necessary to defeat an awesomely powerful player who was ruining the game for everyone.
The best estimate of how many gamers are "pathological" about the way they play is just 3%, according to a 2011 meta-analysis of 33 studies.
In a study published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B, a team of Canadian researchers compared the way a group of regular gamers learn and pay attention to a group of non-gamers.
"I wanted to provide an offline space for gamers," explains Duncan Morrison, 27, the bar's founder.
This cycle of small challenges and incremental rewards, set in a context of grander ones, is phenomenally attractive to gamers (and lucrative for their manufacturers: as of last October, WoW has 10 million paying subscribers).
They also used a technique called electroencephalography to show that a brain wave called the N2PC is different in gamers, which fits with their behavioural results.
Dr Gregory West is quoted as saying "we also found that gamers rely on the caudate nucleus to a greater degree than non-gamers".
WORLD OF WARRIORS iOS/Android (freemium) This colourful game comes from the company behind children's virtual world Moshi Monsters, but it's for gamers of all ages.
They're also more than twice as likely as the average to be business professionals (rather than parents, fitness nuts or gamers), probably from university – a demographic expanding by about seven million every year, and by 2020 will number 195 million just in China, more than is forecast for the entire US workforce.
