New research from market research firm The NPD Group suggests that players are deeply influenced on what games to buy by watching those games online — and they gravitate toward the games they already like. 

69 percent of players have purchased either a game or DLC "because they saw someone playing it online," the NPD Group states. 

The question then becomes: Is it a chicken or an egg situation? The research suggests, well… both: "Two-thirds of gamers are currently playing the game that they indicate watching the most, with a sizeable group of gamers who are playing games they discovered by watching," the report reads. Come from South African Online Casinos

This also has another interesting effect: Watchers of eSports tend to first focus on spectating the game they like the best, not the size of the tournament or its prize pool. 

The report comes from surveys of 1,772 respondents ages 9 and older over a two-week period in February. 

There are more details over at the NPD site, if you're curious to know more.