I game, he games, she games, we game. You can claim otherwise, but I won’t believe you; last year Angry Birds passed one billion downloads, and those copies have to have gone somewhere. Ever swiped away at Temple Run? Fruit Ninja? Flight Control? See? You’re a gamer.

Granted, mobile games are easy to overlook, labelled for the most part – and not always unfairly – as childish frivolities of low quality. This is something of which even their publishers are guilty. Games such as Call of Duty or Skyrim are branded “core” games as a matter of course. They are self-consciously targeted at those prepared to spend £30 on a triple-A release for their living room. “Mobile” games, accurate though the tag may be, speak rather less of mainstream status and more of a fringe group; add-ons to the real business of gaming.

But let us not forget that the very concept of mobile gaming was alien less than ten years ago. Yes, you could play Snake on a Nokia the size of a small dog, but the problem was that there were an awful lot of small dogs, each with its own operating system and network rules governing available content. It was only with the advent of the iPhone in 2007 that a powerful, standardised and wildly popular device allowed mobile gaming to become a legitimate pursuit. In only five years, then, the sector has gone from non-existent to boasting a larger player-base than console gaming. This is a staggering achievement.

Mobile gamers also represent one of the most balanced groups in terms of gender, with varying reports claiming that women make up between 45 and 60% of users. Where does such broad appeal stem from? It’s not as if handheld platforms are a new concept, there are precious few among us who weren’t transfixed by a Gameboy at some point during the nineties. Portability is not the issue. Accessibility, on the other hand, is inherently tied to mobile gaming. While it’s hard to imagine someone spending £130 on a Nintendo DS to give games a little try, the entire back catalogue of iOS and Android games is sitting there in the pockets of half the nation. Many are free, and those that aren’t are rarely more than a pound – if it turns out you’re not a fan of Angry Birds' shrill squawking, you could make your money back by picking change off the street.

The physics-based puzzler may have its origins in the distant past, but 21st century platforms have afforded such games unparalleled exposure. Coupled with the uniformly inoffensive titles that make up the App Store’s top sellers, mobile games represent the pinnacle of mass-market appeal. It’s getting hard not to be a gamer.

Next time I’ll be picking up from here with a laid-back look at the world of casual gaming.

Read Angus' Re:roll - Week 1 column introducing the world of gaming.

Angus Morrison runs a YouTube channel on games and their critical reception at www.youtube.com/RErollGaming