Driving Force in Video Gaming: Women and Baby Boomers

A new report out today claims that 38 percent of US gamers are women, the average player is 35 years old, and 24 percent are over 50. According to Los Angeles-based intelligence group IBISWorld, the percentage of female video gamers climbed from 33 to 38 percent in five years bolstered in part by Nintendo's Wii, but also "interactive group games" such as Singstar, Rock Band, and Lips, as well as The Sims, The Movies, Nintendogs and NeoPets, games IBIS says "women flock to purchase." Also: Games that target girls explicitly, like Bratz Rock Angels and Dora the Explorer.

The report boldly claims that "women and older adults -- not the proverbial nerdy teenage boys -- are the new driving force behind the success of the video games industry."

"When video game consoles began to appear in the 1980s, they were dismissed as a short-lived craze, or at the very least, the domain for awkward adolescents," said senior IBISWorld analyst George Van Horn. "How astonishingly wrong we were. Our research has revealed that the teenage boys that played Atari back then are still playing video games now, largely being drawn in to new, advanced electronic gaming that simulates real-life interaction that their kids love as well."

Van Horn also says that while IBIS doesn't mean to suggest the market for teen and young adult men isn't strong, it's the other demographics (female, older) that are showing significant growth.

IBIS's number correspond very closely to the ESA's 2008 demographics, released earlier this summer. The ESA's 2008 numbers jibe with IBIS's on the age of the average game player (35), and only vary by two points when highlighting female gamers, which the ESA lists as 40 percent of the total population (up from 38% in 2007).

Van Horn sees all the major players "frantically at work" to develop games that appeal to older adults and women of all ages:

With these games' party-style format, and innovative products, such as the phenomenally successful Wii Sports, IBISWorld believes the major market players such as Sony and Microsoft, are sitting up and taking notice that there is an untapped market which could substantially enhance the industry's current and future growth.

My two cents: We've known about these "extracurricular" markets for years now, were already assuming decades ago that they might at some point be tappable. Well here they are, we know with scientific certainty that they exist, that there's a growing appetite for digital entertainment which can address a panoply of recreational and even "serious" interests.

Question is, will the gaming press -- still largely composed of writers who think about an action-RPG like Too Human as a sprawling event, but a puzzle game like Bejeweled with over 10 million copies sold as just some daftly amusing little time sink -- get off its duff and step up to cover in proportion these other demographics as well?

Comments

I think we will eventually see an almost even distribution of video gaming across all age groups beginning at age 10 - it is just a matter of time. The older audiences are simply being exposed to gaming later in life, but, in most cases, have the benefit of free time for gaming.

Andy Williams
GameJobHunter, Inc.

Get a video game job at www.GameJobHunter.com

GameJobHunter

August 19, 2008

6:04 AM PT