The third annual release of the Nielsen “Active Gamer Benchmark” study is out, and it contains some surprises. The study looked at so-called “Active Gamers” (those who play video games on a consistent basis) and found that there were currently 117 million such gamers in the United States. While the majority of gamers (70 percent) are male, the balance shifts dramatically when limited to online gamers, which comprised more than half of the total. The study found that nearly two-thirds (62%) of online gamers were women. This statistic challenges an earlier study issued by ComScore that had pegged the latter figure at 52 percent.
This isn’t the first time that the industry has considered the presence of female gamers. In the 1990s, studies showed that more women than expected were playing video games, and a few companies attempted to fill an untapped market by coming out with “girl games” that were deliberately targeted at a female audience. Most of these companies were unsuccessful, and their failure was typically used as an argument against any further targeting of a female demographic, rather than a reflection of the quality of the games themselves.
In addition to the presence of so many female gamers online, there have been some other demographic shifts as well. While teenagers still make up the largest proportion of Active Gamers (40 percent), there is a solid body of gamers who started when the industry was young and continue to play in their middle years. Over 8 percent of Active Gamers were 45 or older.
Platform preference was also measured by the study. While console ownership broke down as expected based on known sales of the various systems—PS2 at 59 percent, Xbox at 33 percent, GameCube at 30 percent, and Xbox 360 at 15 percent—the surprising figure was the gaming PC, leading the pack at 64 percent. The rise of MMORPGs, particularly the runaway success of World of Warcraft, has kept the gaming PC ahead. Whereas some had expressed doubts about the viability of the PC gaming market in the wake of the next generation of consoles, these statistics show that such fears have yet to be realized.
Who’d a thunk it? Actually, I would. The only really dedicated gamers on my side of the family are my niece and her daughter. Online gamers at that.
So all those female toons aren’t guys? I gotta log back into Everquest post haste and try to pick a few up!
I find this hard to believe, but if it is true it must be on MMOs such as WOW. I’ve been playing a lot of Xbox 360 and the ratio is about 1 girl to every thousand guys, but maybe that is just because the ladies don’t enjoy Tom Clancey games.
After reading this:
http://www.dvorak.org/blog/?p=6706
How many females are playing Sims Online vice World Of WarCrack? 😉
Everyone’s fleeing reality… Just imagine the impact on families in the future… everyone’s entertaining themselves in the clean digital world, while the shit is piling up in the house and the pre-made food makes everyone fatter.
I suppose they must be counting online Solitaire games again.
World of Warcraft players… don’t get your hopes up. And X-box players, forget about it.
WoW has the largest market share on online gaming around the world. this study didn’t indicate where this 2/3rds of these women live. My guess is more than half of them aren’t from north America. So all you guys out there looking for a hookup will be disappointed.
And another point to make.. who gives a rats ass who’s playing these games? Advertisers.. that’s all.
I don’t know why girls would want to play killing video games. That cutie pie, julieb from the forums is a video player… what ever happened to her?
Women or girls?
All my nieces seem to be playing these on-line social games where they chat and buy stuff. I’ve had them show me the sites but I couldn’t name them.
My mom plays online poker, does that count?
Could someone please give me a link to the raw stats. It would be interesting to see how they came to their conclusion.
Wow! The next time I’m tea-bagged I gotta remember to open my eyes and look up.
It appears these statistics don’t add up.
117 million gamers * .30 female = 35 million female gamers
117 million gamers * .50 online * .62 female = 36 million females online
Attributing the stat difference to rounding error, you must conclude that all female gamers only play online. Now I find it a bit odd that all women gamers only play in social environments.
Yes, “these stats” don’t add up. Too bad they don’t match the article.
Come on guys…..some of the most vicious, diabolical people are woman……the hard core gaming is perfect for them.
The female of almost any species are very aggressive, especially if they have young. Don’t mess with a female moma bear or lion.
I’m betting that most of the female online gamers are Asian and European.
I dunno, as a female gamer who has never been on pogo.com and only plays console games (xbox, xbox360, gamecube, ps2, and soon wii) I am willing to bet those numbers aren’t that far off. I would venture a guess that this study takes into account mobile gaming (handheld and cellphone) which is extremely popular with women these days in addition to console and pc gaming.
Lots of females are gamers, playing games like the Sims, Halo, DOA (my personal fav right now), and more and are playing these games online. The reason why many gamers have a hard time finding “girl gamers” online may be because many female gamers go out of their way to make sure they don’t identify themselves as females to avoid being verbally harrassed, cyber stalked, or basically to not be bothered. Nothing ruins a good frag session than some guy that keeps begging for your number, or asking how big your boobs are.
#16….NinJa….lmao….and those are the other reasons.
#14 Golly, woodie, just how did I fuck up such a simple calculation?
Let’s see: “The study looked at so-called ‘Active Gamers’ (those who play video games on a consistent basis) and found that there were currently 117 million such gamers in the United States.”
Ok, 117 million gamers. Correct?
“While the majority of gamers (70 percent) are male. . .” — hmm, 100% minus 70% male leaves 30% as female, correct?
So, 117 million gamers times 30% female is 35 million female gamers. (I know this is complicated for today’s graduates, but are you with me so far?)
“. . .the balance shifts dramatically when limited to online gamers, which comprised more than half of the total.”
Now if the author actually wrote what he or she meant, then that means that at least 58.5 million of the 117 million gamers play online. Follow?
“The study found that nearly two-thirds (62%) of online gamers were women.”
Ok, now think real hard here: 62% of the online gamers are women, so 58.5 million online gamers times 62% female equals 36 million female online gamers.
So, one stat says there are 35 million female gamers, but the other stat says that 36 million females play online games. (Now ignoring the difference as a simple rounding error, some of us, who have been exposed to statistics, question why all female gamers are online gamers — that kind of distribution just isn’t reasonable in a population size that large . . . but that concept is well beyond your understanding, woodie, so I’ll drop it.)
I hope you could follow the math. If not, then I suggest you go back to the public school district that gave you your diploma and insist that they refund your parent’s school taxes.