MCV/DEVELOP News, events, research and jobs from the games industry
A survey recently conducted by research firm EEDAR shows nearly 60 per cent of mobile gamers are women.
The survey contained 2,491 respondents ages 15 to 64 who qualified as ‘active’ mobile gamers. The findings, reported by USA Today, revealed women are more likely to play mobile titles than men, especially when it comes to socially-driven multiplayer games.
"What we are finding is tapping into that female client is more important than ever before. It really is changing the face of gaming," EEDAR analyst Jesse Divinich said.
63 per cent of female mobile users play social multiplayer titles, versus 52 per cent of male gamers. Publishers have also come out to reveal titles such as Draw Something, Words With Friends, and Big Fish Casino have userbases comprised of much more women than men.
The findings are a complete flip-flop from what companies are used to seeing on the console side.
"Maybe it was because of the nature of the adoption of technology … what you saw was the growth of a big base of male players. The games catered to them," said Travis Boatman, senior vice president of mobile at Zynga. "But what has changed with these new touch-screen devices is that it has made (games) much more accessible to everybody."
"If you are building for mobile and you want to scale to the broadest possible audience of purchasers, you do need to absolutely focus on [women]," said Big Fish Games CEO Paul Thelen. "You would think Texas Hold ‘Em would skew [towards men], but we are seeing 65 per cent of the revenue coming from [women]."
