Apple made a declaration earlier today that the iPod Touch is the number one portable game player available right now. That makes it more popular than the DS, 3DS and PSP. This claim certainly isn’t doing anything to discredit the concerns that traditional gaming handhelds will be snuffed out by the likes of iPhones, iPods Android smartphones and whatever else awaits us on the horizon.

It has been nearly a week since Halo: Reach came into our lives. It has made over $200 million and broke the record for most concurrent users on Xbox Live. Most of our Xbox Live friends list was most likely littered with Halo: Reach activity. Bungie says over 700,000 players participated in Halo: Reach on day one. Those are just a few facts stemming from Bungie’s swan song. There are still 10 more that are equally, if not more impressive.

Nielson Media, the company responsible for the rating system that is the standard for judging TV viewership, released a report today (July 26, 2007) analyzing the gaming industry. The Nielson GamePlay Metrics studied aspects of the people’s gaming habits including games played, console or PC used, amount of time per day and time per session, to list only a few factors.

The report also looked at the family and individual player’s demographics, with results that suggests that, though it is the least expensive next-gen console on the market, Nintendo’s Wii is more commonly played in households with an annual income of greater than $100,000.

Another finding that may surprise the gaming layperson is that Sony’s Playstation 2 is reported to be the most played console in June 2007. Among the 33,000 respondants,…