Some Statistics...

After today’s rather enlightening lecture on representations of a ‘gamer’, I felt compelled to search up some recent statistics. Here are the results from http://www.onlineeducation.net/videogame (the site provides graphs and charts):

“Video games have become quite popular over the last 30 years, so popular in fact that that fully 65% of American households play video games and this number is growing. Video games are now more portable than ever with handhelds and even phones becoming commonplace for gamers. The term “gamer” to refer to those that play video games is quickly becoming a misnomer because so many people fit this categorically. Let’s have a look at some statistics about the proliferation of video games and the distribution of this population segment.

Of that 65% of the US population, 18-49 year olds make up the largest percentage of gamers at 49%. In times past, it was assumed that the gaming population was children under 18 but today they only make up 25%, perhaps more surprising is the fact that there are more people over 50 that play that children at 26%. The average age of a gamer is actually 32 years old. It was also a common stereotype that men predominated in video game consumption but the numbers are now evening out as 2 out of 5 gamers are female. The average Gamer spends about 18 hours a week playing video games.

Gamer is broad term so let us look at the breakdown of gender versus console preference. Females just love Nintendo’s Wii with 80% saying that it is their primary console, or console of choice. Just 11% play Microsoft’s Xbox360 and even fewer (9%) play Sony’s Playstation3. Males are more divided in terms of console preference. 41% still play the Wii primarily but fully 38% prefer Xbox and 21% like the Playstation3.”

Although these findings are only focussed on the American populace, I was still quite surprised by the large percentage of households who play video games as well as the fact that almost 40% of gamers are female. If this is the case, then it definitely highlights the changing gender demographic and reinforces the need for game designers to consider this change – especially in regard to the other fact, that the majority of females prefer Wii (which has been discussed in class as a console that disregards skill to play). In this light, are most female gamers then considered less skilled when it comes to skill-based gaming, or is there simply not enough effort in promoting skill-based games (aimed at men and women)? Of course, because video games are considered B-grade entertainment, it figures that stereotyping of any kind (gender/culture/class) is expected. However considering the industry’s intensive and rapid growth over the years, I truly agree with today’s lecture discussion that there needs to be a definite shift on the marketer’s end of the spectrum – particularly if one day we wake up and find the whole world hooked to a console/computer/game device shooting down zombified black people as an avatar in skin-tight bikinis.