comScore, Inc. has released an overview of the online gaming category among U.S. Internet users, which showed a significant increase in the size of its audience during the past year as consumers increasingly opt for cheaper entertainment alternatives, driven in part by the reality of economic challenges. The category attracted 87 million U.S. visitors in May 2009, up 22 percent versus year ago.

Yahoo! Games ranked #1 in the category with 19.4 million visitors, representing a 6-percent increase over the past year, followed by EA Online with 18 million visitors (up 34 percent), Nickelodeon Casual Games with 14.8 million visitors, and WildTangent Network with 13.8 million (up 16 percent). GSN Games Networks achieved particularly strong gains in the past year, growing 563 percent to 6 million visitors, due primarily to the additions of entities such as WorldWinner.com and CrazyMonkeyGames.com.