With new handheld devices from Sony and Nintendo either out or on the horizon, it's understandable (if a little puzzling) that execs from both companies insist that tablets won't affect the prospects of the Nintendo 3DS or PlayStation Vita. People still want gadgets that are primarily about games, the suits say. Buttons matter!

But new findings from market research firm GfK MRI tell a different story. Their iPanel initiative polled a pool of 3,000 tablet and eReader owners and found that 59% of them say they play games less on a home or a handheld console. It's noted that they're not doing less gaming; they're just doing it elsewhere. And games stand out as the most popular kind of content on tablets, too, besting other categories like social networking and entertainment.

This kind of news may be bad for Nintendo, which doesn't operate in the tablet sector, but there might be hope for Sony. With PlayStation-branded tablets as part of their product roadmap, there may be hope that they might be able to recoup the fingertips lost by shifting gaming habits. Can Nintendo's Slide Pad add-on for the 3DS entice all those tablet gamers away? Based on Ashcraft's last hands-on report, all signs point to... maybe? Well, there's always the Wii U. That's tablet-y, right?.


For Tablet Owners, Tablets Are Displacing Consoles/Handhelds for Gaming [MarketWatch]

(Top photo credit | pedrosek/Shutterstock)
