Nielsen Survey Investigates Gamer Choices

Gamasutra reports on findings from a large Nielsen survey on gaming and consumer choices. From the article: "The survey also revealed that 57% of active gamers have played online, with free casual online games the most used, and a notable 21% having played MMO games. While online-enabled console, MMO and gambling gamers are disproportionately male -- 76% vs. 24% -- casual gamers who play free online games such as puzzles are just as likely to be women as men, 49% vs. 51% respectively."

Comments

Only 57% play online?

[bergeron76]

The survey also revealed that 57% of active gamers have played online

Wow, I remember when 80% of computers weren't on the internet. Now, an PC that isn't connected to the internet isn't really useful. I think the same trend will happen with games - it's just going to take time for grandma to discover Yahoo! solitaire instead of her Windows one. I think that's where the numbers are getting skewed.

How not to run a survey

[Targon]

Considering that these things can often be done by computer, a 2000 person survey means NOTHING and opening the survey to a LARGE audience wouldn't make for more work yet would increase the accuracy of any survey.

So, games....

There are many good reasons why women don't play certain types of games in the first place.

MMO: Besides the hordes of teenage boys who are trying to get into cyber-sex encounters with anything even remotely female, there is the focus on super-thin women with large breasts as the female "avatars". There isn't anything like an average looking female in the MMO world, though there are always the "super ugly" types like trolls and ogres that are deliberately supposed to be that way. But there's nothing in the middle.

There is also the idea of needing to grind you way to the top without making the game good enough where the game has enough variety to make every dungeon or set encounter be a single pass only. What I mean by this is that an MMO could be done using instancing where each encounter is only done by a given character ONCE. You go in with your party, and if you manage to get through it, that encounter is completed by all the players and if they return, the encounter isn't reset, but MAY evolve. If a given room in a dungeon isn't touched though, these adventurers can go back later. Or the situation can change in time. In this way, a normally "static" dungeon can appear to evolve over time for those players. Consider it to be a multi-player game that feels more like a single-player game.

Next up, the World War 2 games. Women generally arn't into "playing war", so most of these games won't appeal to women in the first place. With so many World War 2 games out there right now, it's no surprise that women are turned off of gaming by the focus on war games. Tactical or strategy games may be a little better for women, but the subject of war doesn't appeal to most women, so won't attract and may even be a reason for women to think they just don't like games at all as a result. It doesn't matter how good or bad a game is if the subject matter doesn't draw a particular audience.

Which leads to this: If you don't think most heterosexual males would be interested in a game where the main character is a homosexual, no matter how good the game may be, then don't be surprised why women arn't into most of the computer games out there. Games based on certain topics will draw one type of player and turn off others. Right now, the focus seems to be on boys and men age 13 to 25. The game industry has seen what a good gender-neutral game like "The Sims" can do in terms of sales. The problem is that most game developers don't seem to understand WHY a given game does well or doesn't do well, so it's no wonder all we see are new game titles that try to emulate the popularity of the good innovative game titles.

Re:How not to run a survey

[raygundan]

Since we're just going ignore the "ugly" races like trolls and so forth, I don't think that the unrealistic female avatars are dramatically different than the unrealistic male avatars. I mean, seriously-- I'm a triathlete and I don't have a snowball's chance in hell of ending up like the 6'5" bodybuilder tanks most games drop in as male avatars. There isn't anything like your average-looking male in the games either, but that hasn't slowed the guys down.

The original Super Mario Brothers, a game which stars a pair of overweight male plumbers, has a better draw among female gamers than a lot of games. Does this mean that girls prefer playing obese men in games?

I agree with the rest of your points, but this one always drives me nuts. There aren't any more realistic men in games than there are realistic women.

Re:How not to run a survey

[Red Flayer]

"Considering that these things can often be done by computer, a 2000 person survey means NOTHING and opening the survey to a LARGE audience wouldn't make for more work yet would increase the accuracy of any survey."

Not necessarily. If you have a random sample, then 2000 people is just fine, as long as you pay attention to the margin of error. You'll be more precise with a larger sample, yes.

But, if you get a larger sample by, say, posting the survey online, then you've just gotten yourself a severely skewed sample -- and it is less accurate.

Please don't conflate precision with accuracy.

"There is also the idea of needing to grind you way to the top without making the game good enough where the game has enough variety to make every dungeon or set encounter be a single pass only."

Hope you're willing to seriously upgrade your hardware, as well as severely reduce the number of people allowed on a server (for big changes in instances). Also, one of the reaosn people can spend 10 hours playing an MMO is because the grind is mindless. It's actually good to have repetitive action.

"Right now, the focus seems to be on boys and men age 13 to 25."

Where are you pulling this from? I can find no supporting evidence of this. Seems to me that the male 25-49 demo is being targeted pretty hard. Or were you just referring to consoles and handhelds? Furthermore, there's been a ton of press about hitting the non-traditional videogame demographic classes recently.