Market research firm the NPD Group announced in their "Gamer Segmentation 2009" report that female gamers are on the rise once again in 2009.According to NPD Group's latest press release, 28 percent of the console gamers are female.
This is a 5 percent increase from 23 percent in 2008 according to the report.
The NPD Group is attributing this increase to the growing popularity of the Nintendo Wii which saw a 19 percent increase in usage as compared to last year:
This underscores the finding that more females are using console systems, especially the Wii.
NPD Group analyst Anita Frazier noted perseverance of console gaming in the competitive era of web 2.0:
Last year was one of the most transformative in history in terms of defining the audience for gaming. Even with the increased competition from mobile and social network gaming, the console gamer segment added the most new participants to its ranks in the last year.
The report also noted that 16 percent of video game purchases occurred digitally. This is no doubt representative of purchases made in online stores such as the Xbox Live Marketplace, Playstation Network, and Wii Shop Channel.
However, a decreasing number of gamers are willing to pay for these transactions according to NPD.
Why would gamers want to pay for some of these transactions?
A majority of the content that can be purchased on these online store are add-on content for disc-based games in which the consumer has already paid upwards to $60.
Many gamers, myself included, feel it is ridiculous to pay an additional $10 to $15 for maps, levels, costumes, and other extras which should be free for download as a supplement to the initial $60 investment.
Why would someone pay $60 for 10 levels or missions and another $15 for only one downloadable level/mission?
It simply is a rip off.
