The way games are delivered and paid for by gamers is changing, for the better. In 2008, according to Parks Associates, only 7% of U.S. gamer downloaded games or gaming apps to their mobile devices. That grew to 18% in 2011 partly due to better, stronger smartphones and tablets.

Among tablet owners, 71% of adults and 79% of teens play games on the device at least one hour per month says a new whitepaper from the research firm. 135 million people play at least one hour of games per month (compared to 56 million in 2008).

The Parks Associate research, Online Gaming and Digital Distribution, is a survey of U.S. gamers that quantifies their gaming and spending habits and determines their gamingpreferences and future intentions. They didn’t give the exact methodology which is poor form for anyone doing research so there’s no telling what the margin of error is or how many actual gamers they are tracking or surveying. We don’t even know if it was a survey or based on other data in fact.

Overall, they say, about 80% of U.S. gamers play either free-to-play online games or Facebook games.

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