The following are average playing times, per Wii user, since the launch of the game through December 1, 2009.

The data is collected only from users who volunteered to share their data with the Wii's Nintendo Channel. In the case of Call of Duty, for example, that appears to cover a little over 3,700 consoles' playing history. The Mario number is from the stats collected in just under 29,000 consoles. (For more on the methodology I use in these Wii stats posts, check yesterday's article).

The Beatles Rock Band (Released Sept. 9) - 14 hours, 50 minutes

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare: Reflex Edition (Released Nov. 10) - 14 hours, 56 minutes 17 hours, 22 minutes [Figure updated. Original one was an error.]

Madden NFL10 (Released August 14) - 15 hours, 45 minutes

Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games (Released Oct. 13) - 10 hours, 50 minutes

Metroid Prime Anthology (Released Aug. 24) - 22 hours, 53 minutes

Muramasa: The Demon Blade (Released Sept. 8) - 12 hours, 48 minutes

New Super Mario Bros. Wii (Released Nov, 15) - 9 hours, 47 minutes

Wii Fit Plus (Released Oct. 4) - 9 hours, 50 minutes

Wii Sports Resort (Released July 26) - 18 hours, 39 minutes

(No data available yet for Lego Indiana Jones 2, Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles, EA Sports Active More Workouts, Dead Space Extraction and WWE Smackdown Vs. Raw 2010)

Bear in mind that these numbers do not represent sales or popularity. Many more people bought New Super Mario Bros. Wii than did Muramasa. But how much time did people who got these games spend with that? That's what is measured here. Consider it a satisfaction index, a measure of pleasure.

The order of the games hasn't changed. There's no leapfrogging, though there is still that nasty traffic jam in the mid 40-hours section. (Click the chart to enlarge it if you can't see it that well.)

You may notice that the rate of increased playtime has slowed for most of the games, likely due both to the messiness of having had to skip an October date — because the Wii stats weren't being counted properly by Nintendo then — and due, as I noticed a year ago, to the fact that playing-time growth slowing around this time of year.

This is the time of year, after all, when many new people start playing the games that are being tracked. New users usually drag average playing times down, which is one of the reasons it remains remarkable that Wii Sports has an average per-user playing time of 37 hours, 50 minutes.

Despite the lack of major changes this month, it does still look like Animal Crossing and Call of Duty: World at War have a lot of momentum.

If you're wondering about some key newcomers, New Super Mario Bros. Wii is already at 9 hours, 47 minutes, per user. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Reflex is at 17 hours, 22 minutes, per user. Let's see how those numbers hold up once more people share their data with the Nintendo Channel.

And for fun... Rune Factory Frontier vs. Rock Band 2? Which one is going to win?

Where's all this from? (AKA an explanation of the above chart for stat junkies only): In a move somewhat surprising for the generally secretive company, Nintendo makes all of this data public. Any Wii owner can download the Nintendo Channel to their Wii and begin browsing for games. Any game that has been played enough times has usage stats listed for it, contributed by anyone who chose to share their data with the channel. The sample size that the channel tracks is pretty good, though it is obviously biased toward users who hook up a Wii to the Internet. We calculate that sample size by looking at Wii Sports usage numbers, which show that more than 85 million sessions of that game have been played by Nintendo Channel users as of December 1 (up 3 million in the last month), for an average of 30.1 sessions per player. That divides to more than 2.8 million Wii Sports users whose gaming has been tracked by the channel. Since almost all Wii Sports owners in North America would be Wii users, we will venture that as many as 2.8 million people are contributing stats. That is up from the 2.7 million people when these numbers were run for November 1. (October 09 data is not included on the chart due to a problem with Nintendo's data reporting in the previous month.)

The following data was pulled from the Wii's Nintendo Channel, which has collected the playing history from more than two million gamers. Kotaku tracks these numbers monthly — with a new top 10 posted yesterday. I strive to extract at least one interesting slice as a bonus. For a full explanation of where the data comes from check yesterday's post.

EA's Wii Games*
Average total playing time per Nintendo Channel user, since the game's launch
Rock Band 2 - 45 hours, 30 minutes
FIFA Soccer 09 All-Play - 34 hours, 21 minutes
Rock Band - 31 hours, 47 minutes
The Godfather: Blackhand Edition - 28 hours, 52 minutes
Madden NFL 08 - 28 hours, 39 minutes
MySims - 25 hours, 46 minutes
Madden NFL 09 All-Play - 24 hours, 18 minutes
MySims Kingdom - 22 hours, 9 minutes
Need for Speed: Uncover - 22 hours, 1 minute
Tiger Wood PGA Tour 08 - 21 hours, 26 minutes
Need for Speed Carbon - 20 hours, 17 minutes
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09 All-Play - 19 hours, 10 minutes
NBA Live 09 All-Play - 18 hours, 28 minutes
The Sims 2: Pets - 18 hours, 15 minutes
Need for Speed: Pro Street - 18 hours, 1 minute
NCAA Football 09 All-Play - 17 hours, 50 minutes
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10 - 16 hours, 47 minutes
Skate It - 16 hours, 22 minutes
The Sims 2: Castaway - 14 hours, 41 minutes
Boom Blox - 14 hours, 21 minutes
Boom Blox Bash Party - 13 hours, 45 minutes
Madden NFL 10 - 12 hours, 38 minutes
The Beatles: Rock Band - 12 hours, 1 minute
Boogie Superstar - 11 hours, 21 minutes
EA Sports Grand Slam Tennis - 11 hours, 50 minutes
Littlest Pet Shop - 11 hours, 25 minutes
Monopoly - 11 hours, 1 minute
SimCity Creator - 10 hours, 11 minutes
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince - 9 hours, 10 minutes
MySims Racing - 8 hours, 32 minutes
Boogie - 7 hours, 43 minutes
SimAnimals - 7 hours, 17 minutes
EA Sports Active - 7 hours, 15 minutes
MySims Party - 6 hours, 57 minutes
NASCAR Kart Racing - 6 hours, 34 minutes
AC/DC Live: Rock Band Track Pack - 6 hours, 21 minutes
Nerf N-Strike - 6 hours, 2 minutes
Rock Band Track Pack, Volume 2 - 5 hours, 43 minutes

Activision's Wii Games
Average total playing time per Nintendo Channel user, since the game's launch
Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock - 57 hours, 51 minutes
Call of Duty: World at War - 49 hours, 28 minutes
Guitar Hero: World Tour - 35 hours, 18 minutes
Guitar Hero: Metallica - 17 hours, 57 minutes
Spider-Man: Web of Shadows - 17 hours, 13 minutes
Quantum of Solace - 16 hours, 20 minutes
Little League World Series 2008 - 13 hours, 21 minutes
Guitar Hero: Aerosmith - 13 hours, 14 minutes
Call of Duty 3 - 12 hours, 28 minutes
Spider-Man 3 - 12 hours, 28 minutes
Guitar Hero: Smash Hits - 12 hours, 15 minutes
Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa - 11 hours, 29 minutes
Tony Hawk's Proving Ground - 10 hours, 45 minutes
Cabela's Big Game Hunter - 8 hours, 45 minutes
Shrek The Third - 8 hours, 27 minutes
Monsters Vs. Aliens - 8 hours, 22 minutes
Cabela's Legendary Adventures - 8 hours, 15 minutes
Kung Fu Panda - 7 hours, 35 minutes
Cabela's Dangerous Hunts 2009 - 7 hours, 26 minutes
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen - 7 hours, 17 minutes
X-Men Origins: Wolverine - 6 hours, 19 minutes
NPPL Championship Paintball 2009 - 4 hours, 56 minutes
Cabela's Trophy Bucks - 4 hours 50 minutes
Rapala's Fishing Frenzy - 4 hours, 29 minutes

*Games that are either too new or too unpopular to be played muchdon't appear in the Nintendo Channel data.

Any surprises here?

(Click the chart to enlarge)

The Nintendo Channel is properly calculating and reporting player data again and so I can provide this month's look at Wii gaming usage without last month's asterisks. The stats on the chart are up to date as of the first of November.

Smash continues to reign, but look at that graph. Animal Crossing seems bound to catch it.

Guitar Hero III has been flat for a while, which either means no one new has bought it and those who have it have stopped playing it (doubtful) or that new users' lack of time with the game is balancing out veteran users' continued use. Whatever the case may be, the game dipped slightly this month for the first time in a while. GHIII is a 2008 game. It's successor Guitar Hero World Tour is at 35:18 and rising. The 2009 edition, Guitar Hero 5, just charted for the first time this month. But it's still low. Down at 13 hours flat.

Two games rose in the top 10 this month. Call of Duty, fueled likely by its online play, passed the single-player Fire Emblem. Harvest Moon passed Zelda.

No new games have entered the top 10. Tales of Symphonia is well outside at the number 11 spot with 38 hours, 43 minutes. Wii Sports follows at 37:33. Down a bit lower in the mid-teens are some games that are rising and may someday crack the top 10: Mario Kart Wii (35:06), FIFA 09 (34:21) and WWE Smackdown Vs. Raw 2009 (32:15).

Tomorrow, as usual, I'll have a closer look at a slice of some of the recent numbers.

Where's all this from? (AKA an explanation of the above chart for stat junkies only): In a move somewhat surprising for the generally secretive company, Nintendo makes all of this data public. Any Wii owner can download the Nintendo Channel to their Wii and begin browsing for games. Any game that has been played enough times has usage stats listed for it, contributed by anyone who chose to share their data with the channel. The sample size that the channel tracks is pretty good, though it is obviously biased toward users who hook up a Wii to the Internet. We calculate that sample size by looking at Wii Sports usage numbers, which show that more than 82 million sessions of that game have been played by Nintendo Channel users as of November 1 (up 4 million in the last month), for an average of 29.9 sessions per player. That divides to more than 2.7 million Wii Sports users whose gaming has been tracked by the channel. Since almost all Wii Sports owners in North America would be Wii users, we will venture that as many as 2.7 million people are contributing stats. That is up from the 2.6 million people when these numbers were run for October 1.

Stunned by the intense workouts some of you give your Wiis (you weren't making these up, were you?) I had to highlight a few slightly scary achievements.

The following stats were pulled from the comments of yesterday's post. I've listed the Kotaku commenter's username first, linking to the rest of their playing history — followed by their top game (hours, minutes, number of times they played the game).

Rudeskata: Punch Out! - 207 hrs 16 min - 13 times

GenRedLeader: Internet Channel - 627 hrs, 39 min - 692 times

Shauntu: Fire Emblem - 101 hrs, 48 min - 33 times

Blkpaladin (combining numbers from two Wiis played by multiple people in one home): Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess - 223 hrs 20 min - 69 times

Calum MacLeod: Guitar Hero III - 74 hrs, 41 min - 54 times

Lonesnipa: News Channel - 234 hours 15 minutes

My Little Metroid: Okami - 95 hrs, 00 min

Pikatwo: Super Smash Bros. Brawl - 695 hrs, 37 min

Rocci 1212: Mario Strikers Charged - 693 hrs, 33 min - 402 times

Shimage: Animal Crossing: City Folk - 244 hrs, 56 min - 198 times

Let it be known that the Nintendo Channel does keep counting even if you've left the game idling while you're sleeping. Nevertheless, I submit that the above individuals got their money's worth.

While pulling Wii gaming stats this month, I discovered a way to quickly see which games I've played the most on Nintendo's home machine. You can find your records, too, by accessing the downloadable Nintendo Channel and clicking on the "history" icon in the lower right corner.

I had 91 Wii, WiiWare and Wii channels logged in the system. Here are my top nine, followed by the necessary explanation/justification/damage-control.

1) Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn: 48h 47m (21 times)
2) Little King's Story: 42h 12m (12 times)
3) No More Heroes: 38h 26m (6 times)
4) Metroid Prime 3: Corruption 38h 07m (14 times)
5) Super Mario Galaxy: 33h 52m (13 times)
6) Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life As a Darklord: 32h 45m (8 times)
7) Super Paper Mario: 30h 27m (13 times)
8) Nintendo Channel: 29h 04m (29 times)
9) Zack and Wiki: Quest for Barbaros' Treasure: 18h 57m (7 times)

I meant to pull my top 10. But I didn't. My Wii is at home, so please settle for my top nine.

The stats were all pulled from the second Wii that I've owned. My launch unit broke, because a coin got stuck in it. So this new one doesn't show that I played through the The Legend of Zelda: The Twilight Princess, nor does it include the many sessions of Wii Sports I played with friends and family back in late 2006.

The list does show that, when I'm not at a save point in a game, I often leave my Wii on overnight or during the work day. That's why there is at least eight hours of padding in the playing times for Little King's Story, No More Heroes and Final Fantasy. I've played through each of those games once, and none is that long. The Wii also seems to count the time when the system is left idling while I'm, say, eating dinner.

The oddest entry on this list is the Nintendo Channel. I'm on it for a couple of hours each month, pulling stats like these.

The game I've played the most times is Fire Emblem, all for a single playthrough. Overall, however, the software I've accessed the most is the Forecast Channel (67 times, for 1 hour, 47 minutes), followed by the shopping channel (58 times, 7 hours, 17 minutes).

Things I've learned about myself: I'm a frequent shopper. I finish most games in 15 sittings or less.

What's your Wii playing history? Log onto the Nintendo Channel, pull your stats and share below.

You'll see the normal strong performance of Fire Emblem, the continued rise of Call of Duty and the crushing dominance of Super Smash Bros.

The problem is that the stats tracked by the Nintendo Channel haven't been updated by the company in a couple of weeks, possibly since the introduction of the revised version of the Channel. I'm contacting Nintendo about this issue, which appears to be a bug, since the stats are still included on the revised Channel's game listings.

For now, consider this a snapshot of maybe half of September's play time.

I'll refrain for deeper analysis on the numbers until Nintendo fixes them. I will have a more personal take on the numbers tomorrow.

Where's all this from? (AKA an explanation of the above chart for stat junkies only): In a move somewhat surprising for the generally secretive company, Nintendo makes all of this data public. Any Wii owner can download the Nintendo Channel to their Wii and begin browsing for games. Any game that has been played enough times has usage stats listed for it, contributed by anyone who chose to share their data with the channel. The sample size that the channel tracks is pretty good. We calculate it by looking at Wii Sports usage numbers, which show that more than 78 million sessions of that game have been played by Nintendo Channel users as of September 1 (up 1 million in the last month), for an average of 29.6 sessions per player. That divides to more than 2.6 million Wii Sports users whose gaming has been tracked by the channel. Since almost all Wii Sports owners would be Wii users, we will venture that as many as 2.6 million people are contributing stats. That is flat with the 2.6 million people when these numbers were run for September 1.

You'll see the normal strong performance of Fire Emblem, the continued rise of Call of Duty and the crushing dominance of Super Smash Bros.

The problem is that the stats tracked by the Nintendo Channel haven't been updated by the company in a couple of weeks, possibly since the introduction of the revised version of the Channel. I'm contacting Nintendo about this issue, which appears to be a bug, since the stats are still included on the revised Channel's game listings.

For now, consider this a snapshot of maybe half of September's play time.

I'll refrain for deeper analysis on the numbers until Nintendo fixes them. I will have a more personal take on the numbers tomorrow.

NOTE: There seems to be some extra confusion this month about what the stats show. Nothing has changed. They continue to show the hours and minutes that each charted game has been played, per user, since the game launched. These are not monthly numbers; they are cumulative numbers that are updated monthly.

Where's all this from? (AKA an explanation of the above chart for stat junkies only): In a move somewhat surprising for the generally secretive company, Nintendo makes all of this data public. Any Wii owner can download the Nintendo Channel to their Wii and begin browsing for games. Any game that has been played enough times has usage stats listed for it, contributed by anyone who chose to share their data with the channel. The sample size that the channel tracks is pretty good. We calculate it by looking at Wii Sports usage numbers, which show that more than 78 million sessions of that game have been played by Nintendo Channel users as of October 1 (up 1 million in the last month), for an average of 29.6 sessions per player. That divides to more than 2.6 million Wii Sports users whose gaming has been tracked by the channel. Since almost all Wii Sports owners would be Wii users, we will venture that as many as 2.6 million people are contributing stats. That is flat with the 2.6 million people when these numbers were run for September 1.

(click the chart to enlarge it)

An explanation of how Kotaku arrives at these figures is below, but the short version is that this chart demonstrates which games have, since their release, garnered the most playing time, per player, among a population of more than 2.6 million Wii gamers. This is less a popularity contest than one of customer satisfaction.

Call of Duty: World at War continues to rise, reaching an hours mark that vastly exceed the length of its campaign. That is likely a testament to the game's offline and online multiplayer. Since last month, Animal Crossing has advanced to the number two spot and looks like it has a shot at passing Smash Brothers.

In the comments to these posts, some readers scoff at games such a Wii Sports and Wii Fit for not making it in. Wii Fit would indeed be far lower in the chart, having averaged 19 hours and 22 minutes per player as of September 1. But Wii Sports, a game that has logged more than 77 million sessions across all the players whose stats are being tracked here, just missed the top 10 with a superb average total playing time of 37 hours and three minutes. There are several impressive near-misses. Mario Kart Wii is at 33:51. FIFA 09 is at 31:57. WWE Smackdown Vs. Raw, in a showing that surprised me, is at 30:51. In addition to the first Rock Band, Guitar Hero World Tour, and Tales of Symphonia, those are the games that currently crack 30 hours of average playing time. They're a diverse set, full of games both high-selling and low, mostly supported by addictive multiplayer modes but a minority boasting merely one very long solo quest.

These numbers don't offer publishers a blueprint of what kind of games to make. Some of these avidly-played games are owned by just a small group of niche fans. But the numbers do show what kinds of games can hook players. That is valuable information for any game-maker that wants to consider offering add-on content, cultivate a loyal fan community or identify which kinds of multiplayer modes succeed in offering long-term value.

As always, I'll break out some more Wii numbers in the coming days. Expect the next Top 10 report in early October.

And for those who are curious, Wii Sports Resort, which was too new to chart by August 1, was averaging 14 hours and two minutes per player by the first of this month.

Where's all this from? (AKA an explanation of the above chart for stat junkies only): In a move somewhat surprising for the generally secretive company, Nintendo makes all of this data public. Any Wii owner can download the Nintendo Channel to their Wii and begin browsing for games. Any game that has been played enough times has usage stats listed for it, contributed by anyone who chose to share their data with the channel. The sample size that the channel tracks is pretty good. We calculate it by looking at Wii Sports usage numbers, which show that more than 77 million sessions of that game have been played by Nintendo Channel users as of September 1 (up 4.5 million in the last month), for an average of 29.48 sessions per player. That divides to more than 2.6 million Wii Sports users whose gaming has been tracked by the channel. Since almost all Wii Sports owners would be Wii users, we will venture that as many as 2.6 million people are contributing stats. That is up from 2.5 million people when these numbers were ran for August 1.

Yes, I'm defining "sports game" loosely. But, on the Wii, where the boundaries of gaming communities and game genres are blurred, that may be the most informative approach.

(The following stats are pulled from the usage data shared by more than two million Wii users through the system's Nintendo Channel. For more information about how we calculate these total playtimes, check out this week's earlier Wii stats post)

Average Per-Gamer Playing Time For Sports Games On The Wii (as of August 1)
(Release Dates in Parentheses)

Wii Sports (November 2006) - 36 hours, 19 minutes
FIFA Soccer 09 All-Play (October 2008) – 29 hours, 44 minutes
Madden NFL 08 (August 2007) - 28 hours, 12 minutes
Madden NFL 09 All-Play (August 2008) - 22 hours, 58 minutes
MLB Power Pros 2008 (July 2008) - 22 hours, 41 minutes
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 08 (August 2007) 20 hours, 55 minutes
Wii Fit (May 2008) - 18 hours, 47 minutes
Mario Super Sluggers (August 2008) - 18 hours, 22 minutes
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09 All-Play (August 2008) - 17 hours, 46 minutes
NBA LIVE 09 All-Play (October 2008) - 16 hours, 52 minutes
NCAA Football 09 All-Play (July 2008) - 16 hours, 45 minutes
Mario Strikers Charged (July 2007) - 16 hours, 23 minutes
Skate It (November 2008) - 14 hours, 50 minutes
Fishing Master (September 2007) - 12 hours, 42 minutes
NHL 2K9 (September 2008) - 12 hours, 27 minutes
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10 (June 2009) - 12 hours, 17 minutes
Super Swing Golf: Season 2 (December 2007) - 12 hours, 7 minutes
Major League Baseball 2K9 (March 2009) - 11 hours, 59 minutes
Little League World Series 2008 (August 2008) - 11 hours, 51 minutes
Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games (November 2007) - 11 hours, 35 minutes
We Ski & Snowboard (March 2009) - 8 hours, 28 minutes
Carnival Games Minigolf (October 2008) - 7 hours, 51 minutes
Hooked! (October 2007) - 6 hours, 20 minutes
We Ski (May 2008) - 6 hours, 4 minutes
NASCAR Kart Racing (February 2009) - 6 hours, 3 minutes
DECA Sports (May 2008) - 5 hours, 58 minutes
EA SPORTS Active (May 2009) - 5 hours, 54 minutes
My Fitness Coach (December 2008) - 5 hours, 34 minutes
Summer Sports: Paradise Island (April 2008) - 5 hours, 26 minutes
Active Life: Outdoor Challenge (September 2008) - 5 hours, 25 minutes
Shaun White Snowboarding: Road Trip (November 2008) - 5 hours, 5 minutes
Top Spin 3 (June 2008) - 4 hours, 19 minutes
AMF Bowling Pinbusters! (November 2007) - 2 hours, 40 minutes

(NOTE: Many Wii sports games, new and old, were not listed on the Nintendo Channel as of August 1, including Wii Sports Resort. Games typically aren't listed until they've been played by a set number of people, meaning unpopular games and new games often don't make the cut.)

(click the chart to enlarge it)

As always, note that this is NOT a list of the most popular games on the Wii. It's neither a rank of the best-reviewed games nor the biggest-selling.

Nope.

This monthly report is a study of the games that — once they are owned or rented — get played the most. Think of this as a way of finding out which games prove to be most worth the money spent on them. Or think of is as a chart of the games that most pleased those who popped them into their Wii.

And when you look at it that way, you've got to respect the impressive rise of Call of Duty: World At War. Some readers of this site thought it strange that I kept asking Activision what the plans would be for the CoD franchise on Wii this year. Earlier this week we broke the news of what those Call of Duty Wii 2009 plans are. And do you see why I was asking? That million-seller, powered by online multiplayer, continues to average a high number of hours for its users.

Other stand-outs on this chart are:

-The flattening of Guitar Hero play times vs. the rising play times of Rock Band 2.
-The impending rise of Animal Crossing to the second most-played game on the system... Can it catch Smash Bros?
-The, in my mind, inexplicable continued rise of Fire Emblem. I get that people like this solo-only game. I do too. But other solo-only games, like Zelda aren't rising at the same rate. Any theories?

No new titles cracked the top 10 this month.

Where's all this from? (AKA an explanation of the above chart for stat junkies only): In a move somewhat surprising for the generally secretive company, Nintendo makes all of this data public. Any Wii owner can download the Nintendo Channel to their Wii and begin browsing for games. Any game that has been played enough times has usage stats listed for it, contributed by anyone who chose to share their data with the channel. The sample size that the channel tracks is pretty good. We calculate it by looking at Wii Sports usage numbers, which show that more than 72.5 million sessions of that game have been played by Nintendo Channel users (up 3.5 million in the last month), for an average of 28.92 sessions per player. That divides to more than 2.5 million Wii Sports users whose gaming has been tracked by the channel. Since almost all Wii Sports owners would be Wii users, we will venture that as many as 2.5 million people are contributing stats. That is up from 2.4 million people when these numbers were ran for July 1.

(The following stats are pulled from the usage data shared by more than two million Wii users through the system's Nintendo Channel. For more information about how we calculate these total playtimes, check out this week's earlier Wii stats post)

Average Per-Gamer Playing Time For Nintendo's First-Party Wii Games (as of July 1)
(Release Dates in Parentheses)
Super Smash Bros. Brawl (March 2008) — 68 hours, 51 minutes
Animal Crossing: City Folk (November 2008) — 54 hours, 16 minutes
Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn (November 2007) – 46 hours, 40 minutes
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (November 2006) — 46 hours, 9 minutes
Wii Sports (November 2006) — 35 hours, 47 minutes
Mario Kart Wii (April 2008) – 31 hours, 40 minutes
Super Mario Galaxy (November 2007) — 27 hours, 37 minutes
Super Paper Mario (April 2007) — 24 hours, 13 minutes
Metroid Prime 3: Corruption (August 2007) 21 hours, 37 minutes
Mario Party 8 (May 2007) — 20 hours, 39 minutes
Pokemon Battle Revolution (June 2007) — 20 hours, 2 minutes
Wii Fit (May 2008) — 18 hours, 18 minutes
Mario Super Sluggers (August 2008) — 17 hours, 39 minutes
Excite Truck – (November 2006) 12 hours, 39 minutes
Battalion Wars 2 (October 2007) — 12 hours, 23 minutes
WarioWare: Smooth Moves (January 2007) — 11 hours, 39 minutes
Excitebots: Trick Racing (April 2009) – 10 hours 56 minutes
Wii Play (February 2007) — 10 hours, 7 minutes
New Play Control! Pikmin (March 2009) – 9 hours, 44 minutes
Endless Ocean (January 2008) — 9 hours, 41 minutes
Wii Music (October 2008) — 9 hours, 17 minutes
Wario Land: Shake It! (September 2008) — 8 hours, 47 minutes
Punch-Out!! (May 2009) – 7 hours, 55 minutes
Big Brain Academy: Wii Degree (June 2007) — 6 hours, 56 minutes
Mario Strikers Charged (July 2007) — 6 hours, 18 minutes
New Play Control! Mario Power Tennis (March 2009) – 6 hours, 14 minutes
Link's Crossbow Training (November 2007) - 4 hours, 55 minutes
Donkey Kong: Barrel Blast (October 2007) — 4 hours, 41 minutes
New Play Control! Donkey Kong Jungle Beat (May 2009) – No Data Listed

(The following stats are pulled from the usage data shared by more than two million Wii users through the system's Nintendo Channel. For more information about how we calculate these total playtimes, check out yesterday's Wii stats post)

Average Per-Gamer Playing Time For Wii Sonic Games (as of July 1)
(Release Dates in Parentheses)
Sonic Unleashed (November 2008) – 14 hours, 16 minutes
Sonic and the Black Knight (March 2009) – 12 hours, 3 minutes
Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games (November 2007): 11 hours, 25 minutes
Sonic Riders: Zero Gravity (January 2008) – 11 hours, 1 minute
Sonic and the Secret Rings (February 2007) – 10 hours, 24 minutes

Average Per-Gamer Playing Time For Wii Music Games (as of July 1)
Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock (October 2007) — 57 hours, 42 minutes
Rock Band 2 (December 2008) — 39 hours, 6 minutes
Guitar Hero: World Tour (October 2008) — 31 hours, 41 minutes
Rock Band (June 2008) — 30 hours, 23 minutes
Guitar Hero Metallica (March 2009) — 14 hours, 38 minutes
Guitar Hero Aersomith (June 2008) — 12 hours, 50 minutes
Wii Music (October 2008) — 9 hours, 17 minutes
Karaoke Revolution Presents: American Idol Encore 2 (November 2008) — 8 hours, 54 minutes
High School Musical 3 Senior Year: Sing It! (February 2009) — 7 hours, 28 minutes
Disney: Sing It (October 2008) — 5 hours, 54 minutes
Samba De Amigo (September 2008) – 4 hours, 2 minutes

Make way for Rune Factory Frontier and Rock Band 2 in our (theoretically) monthly study of which Nintendo Wii games are getting played the most, per user.

We're not tracking sales here. Any game can get bought. We're tracking how much time these games get used by the people who own and rent them as tabulated by the Nintendo Channel's indexing of play time by two million Wii owners. The results should tell us how much people who wind up with these games like them. That's more interesting, no?

Rune Factory: Frontier, a March-released RPG with a deep farming and dating system, was no big seller. But the lengthy FAQs for it are proof that there's more than enough content in the game to justify the playing times reported here by the '09 release. Wii gamers love their virtual farming and dating.

Rock Band 2's appearance is no surprise, as it surges toward Guitar Hero III. Notably, Rock Band 2 has passed the average playing time of its predecessor, while Guitar Hero World Tour has not passed its predecessor, Guitar Hero III.

What's the lesson from July? Hardcore RPGs get a lot of playing time. So do games that are fun at parties. And so do games with strong online multiplayer. Hear that, Wii developers? Strong. Online. Multiplayer.

We'll have a closer look at the playing times of some other Wii games in the next couple of days.

I tracked these numbers for the first of the month since September of 2008 and will continue to here for Kotaku. These stats are through July 1. We skipped the June report due to E3, but Kotaku's newest intern, Andrew Freedman did a great job catching those numbers for our records early last month.

Where's all this from? (AKA an explanation of the above chart for stat junkies only): In a move somewhat surprising for the generally secretive company, Nintendo makes all of this data public. Any Wii owner can download the Nintendo Channel to their Wii and begin browsing for games. Any game that has been played enough times has usage stats listed for it, contributed by anyone who chose to share their data with the channel. The sample size that the channel tracks is pretty good. We calculate it by looking at Wii Sports usage numbers, which show that almost 69 million sessions of that game have been played by Nintendo Channel users (up seven million in two months), for an average of 28.52 sessions per player. That divides to more than 2.4 million Wii Sports users whose gaming has been tracked by the channel. Since almost all Wii Sports owners would be Wii users, we will venture that as many as 2.4 million people are contributing stats. That is up from 2.2 million people when these numbers were ran for May 1.

Last week, we showed you the 10 most-played gamers, per gamer, on the Wii.

Few people could have been surprised that there was just one M-rated game on the list. M-rated games just aren't the Wii's big thing.

But there are M titles on the Wii. And, even if they don't sell a ton or get played a lot, people do play them.

The chart above pulls data from the Wii's Nintendo Channel (full explanation of our methodology below) and shows the current average total playing time of all of the M-rated games listed. Yes, that's all of them. For some reason, the Nintendo Channel does not list Resident Evil 4 or Manhunt 2, both of which would have been nice to include on the list.

It shouldn't be hard to figure out why Call of Duty: World at War takes top honors. The game has online multiplayer. The other games listed here do not. Will MadWorld creep up on this list the longer it is out? Only if it provides reason for those who own it to return to it. The same is true for all these games.

Note the amount of playing time commanded by the two most GTA-like games on the list. Wii gamers dig into the Godfathers and Scarfaces. Should that matter to Rockstar? Or is sales potential — not the amount of time a game would be played — the only metric worth reacting to?

Where's all this from? (AKA an explanation of the above chart for stat junkies only): In a move somewhat surprising for the generally secretive company, Nintendo makes all of this data public. Any Wii owner can download the Nintendo Channel to their Wii and begin browsing for games. Any game that has been played enough times has usage stats listed for it, contributed by anyone who chose to share their data with the channel. The sample size that the channel tracks is pretty good. We calculate it by looking at Wii Sports usage numbers, which show that more than 62 million sessions of that game have been played by Nintendo Channel users, for an average of 27.84 sessions per player. That divides to more than 2.2 million Wii Sports users whose gaming has been tracked by the channel. Since almost all Wii Sports owners would be Wii users, we will venture that as many as 2.2 million people are contributing stats. That is up from 2.1 million people when these numbers were ran for April 1.

Since September of last year I've been tracking the usage stats for top Wii games. Earlier reporters are at MTV Multiplayer. Today, I bring the concept to Kotaku, with some tweaks.

The chart shows Super Smash Brothers Brawl on top, commanding about 66 hours and 32 minutes per person who has owned or rented the game since they first popped it into their Wii.

Guitar Hero III is second but trailing off as its successor picks up steam. (Just off this top 10 list is Rock Band 2).

The games to watch, though, are Animal Crossing City Folk and Call of Duty: World at War, which are both on the rise. Also, note the time sinks of some of the more hardcore games here like Fire Emblem which sell a fraction of Lego games or Wii Ft.

But can anything catch Smash?

I tracked these numbers for the first of the month since September of 2008 and will continue to here for Kotaku. These stats are through May 1. Look for another report in early June and maybe some other slices of the data I've been pulling sooner than that.

Where's all this from? (AKA an explanation of the above chart for stat junkies only): In a move somewhat surprising for the generally secretive company, Nintendo makes all of this data public. Any Wii owner can download the Nintendo Channel to their Wii and begin browsing for games. Any game that has been played enough times has usage stats listed for it, contributed by anyone who chose to share their data with the channel. The sample size that the channel tracks is pretty good. We calculate it by looking at Wii Sports usage numbers, which show that more than 62 million sessions of that game have been played by Nintendo Channel users, for an average of 27.84 sessions per player. That divides to more than 2.2 million Wii Sports users whose gaming has been tracked by the channel. Since almost all Wii Sports owners would be Wii users, we will venture that as many as 2.2 million people are contributing stats. That is up from 2.1 million people when these numbers were ran for April 1.