There is a tendency in any biz to take a figure like.. say.. 60%, and to turn that into 'THE MAJORITY', which usually translates in the recipient's head as say.. 99%. We see this time and time again: 40-something% (depending on who you listen to) of all gamers or so are female, so therefore "the majority of gamers are male". Ergo, games are a male thing. Big hairy male thing.
Except .. only barely, so barely that in fact it shouldn't really matter any more, except in instances where you're trying to target the hardcore of either sex. Course, it also depends on how you define gamer. And averages (averages are so boring); pick a target demographic and the picture is often quite surprising.
So, casual games. "MAINLY OLDER WOMEN", everyone yells. Because pogo.com has/had a 57% female playerbase at one point? And if you actually rummage, turns out teens are huge consumers of casual games. Of both sexes. So are older blokes. So are people in their 20s with a bit of time to kill. Or senior citizens.
Anyway. There you have it. Men like to play casual games, they (that big, hairy, amorphous mass) just don't like to admit it. Awww.
Peggle for the ultimate win!
Posted by: Mr Tom | October 30, 2007 at 19:13
hey - I'm a bloke, and I play casual games!
But then, i always was in touch with my 'casual' side..
Posted by: matlock | October 30, 2007 at 19:49
I'd say I play more "hardcore" games than casual ones, but I wouldn't be ashamed to admit I love casual games.
Puzzles Pirates is a fun time waster. :)
Posted by: Alex Taldren | October 30, 2007 at 20:09
I got totally hooked on Peggle Extreme while I was waiting for Portal to be released. I almost bought the full game, but then the rest of the Orange Box came out and I was drawn back to blowing sh*t up again. ;)
Zero Punctuation did a wonderful episode on Peggle a little while back. http://tinyurl.com/3zwuj
Posted by: Trevor | October 30, 2007 at 22:33
My brother and his flatmate love Peggle!
Posted by: dj | October 31, 2007 at 00:21
Just noticed that I tinyurl-ed the firefox search page. Oops! This is what I meant to link: http://tinyurl.com/yuhmwr
Posted by: Trevor | October 31, 2007 at 02:05
Peggle is fabulous - and PopCap were really clever to use slo-mo and stadium cheering sounds for the near misses/jackpots. Totally inspired, that.
Posted by: Alice | October 31, 2007 at 07:36
I'm completely addicted to casual games. Popcap are basically just exploiting people like me who feel compelled to have "just one more go".
Splume (http://splume.flashbangstudios.com/) is the latest to get its hooks into me.
Posted by: Seb Potter | October 31, 2007 at 11:43
It's a good point - Kongregate is about 85% male, for instance. Pogo has a lot of men on it, too. To be fair, the Pogos and Popcaps of the world focus on their female customers more because they are better customers. They pay for things at a much higher rate. Club Pogo subscribers, for instance, were over 70% women when I left (used to be Tech Director there).
Posted by: Jim Greer | October 31, 2007 at 14:29
Have you seen the new tv ad (UK) for Nintendo DS?
There is a lady having her hair done, and playing animal crossing... and the slogan: games for girls.
:-(
Posted by: Cin | November 01, 2007 at 00:24