Video game companies are overlooking potential female players, according to new research by Ampere Analysis, a London-based data and analytics firm focused on gaming, media, and sports (via VGC). According to Ampere's latest study, women make up 48% of the current gaming market, and roughly 922 million players are female.
Ampere's research states that women largely prefer narrative-driven single-player games over multiplayer games. But perhaps the most interesting bit of info to come out of the firm's latest study is the revelation that a lack of time or money isn't what's keeping women out of gaming. Instead, women were more likely to cite difficulty finding games that suit their needs and offputting player communities/behavior as the main reasons they don't spend more time (and money) on gaming.
To that I say: No shit.
I've been playing games since I was a child, and while my more formative years were relatively peaceful, things started to change when online gaming became big. I remember playing Halo 2 with my best friend in middle school. When we got sick of the constant harassment over voice chat, we'd put her older brother on the mic to avoid the endless stream of gendered slurs. Mid-match, we'd snatch the mic back, and our teammates seemed baffled that girls could be good at a video game about shooting stuff.
My career has largely been built on coverage of another shooter: Apex Legends, a game I was first drawn to after a friend pointed out that one of the characters, Wraith, looked a lot like me. I learned to play Apex Legends with voice chat off--by the time it launched in 2019, I knew better than to reveal myself as female in a live-service shooter. But interestingly, things started to change as the game's post-launch development progressed. Respawn continued adding female Legends to the roster--something not everyone was happy about--and two Respawn developers came forward to make it clear the game was for everyone.
As the years progressed, I noticed the presence of fictional female player-characters seemed to make my own presence as a woman less shocking for my randomly selected teammates. Apex players got used to calling any Bangalore, Lifeline, Wraith, or Wattson player by female pronouns, so when I finally gathered the courage to turn on my mic, I wasn't immediately met with harassment or disbelief, as I often am in shooters like Call of Duty or PUBG. This is also largely the reason I don't play a whole lot of CoD or PUBG, and why I don't find the results of Ampere's study especially surprising. Toxic, deeply sexist player communities have been a problem since the dawn of online gaming.
I can't say I'm surprised that a majority of female respondents told Ampere they struggle to find games that suit their needs, either. When study participants were presented with a list of 52 console and PC titles and asked to select which ones they played, only three titles had more female players than male players: Animal Crossing: New Horizons, Roblox, and The Sims 4.
These games all have something in common: the ability to create and customize your own character's appearance. (Ironically, The Sims creator Will Wright originally wanted to call the game Dollhouse, but was talked out of it due to corporate fears that male players would find it offputting.)
The Sims is still alive and kicking today, and its playerbase is still largely female. But playing a game targeted at women comes with its own set of downsides. For example, if you want to truly experience everything The Sims 4 has to offer, it'll cost you roughly $1,600 to purchase all of the game's 100+ DLC packs, and EA isn't stopping there--this week, the publisher announced plans to introduce paid player-made custom content. It's effectively Bethesda's Creation Club, but for a game that's already prohibitively expensive.
Similarly, the popular dress-up game Infinity Nikki has faced loads of backlash, with developer Infold Games offering a public apology after introducing more aggressive monetization to the game in last April's "Bubble Season" update. Publishers often seem to approach games aimed at women with a "minimum effort, maximum monetization" mindset.
While titles like Animal Crossing: New Horizons and Stardew Valley remain popular and well-liked due to the lack of microtransactions, their popularity has been met with an influx of "cozyslop" titles: games that make a half-hearted attempt at replicating popular cozy life-sims in the hopes of raking in profits, only to release a disappointing product, like last year's Tales of the Shire.
Ampere's research is certainly eye-opening, but for female players like me, the results aren't particularly shocking. Cozy games often position themselves as being "girl-gamer friendly" while simultaneously pushing monetization schemes and overpriced DLC packs that would make even gacha games blush. Many genres--especially live-service shooters--ignore their female playerbase entirely, leading to female players being ostracized or harassed the minute they turn their headsets on.
The tides do appear to be turning, however slowly. This year, an unsigned team coached by Rubykaster won the Apex Legends Global Series (ALGS) Championship, marking the first ALGS win by a female-coached team in Apex esports history. On the other hand, the industry still has a long way to go--as I write this, Sims 4 players on X are ripping into EA for attempting to implement the aforementioned Creation Club knock-off, and a former member of EA's Sims creator program has shared how she felt financially pressured into participating and terrified of walking away.
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Ampere's research states that women largely prefer narrative-driven single-player games over multiplayer games. But perhaps the most interesting bit of info to come out of the firm's latest study is the revelation that a lack of time or money isn't what's keeping women out of gaming. Instead, women were more likely to cite difficulty finding games that suit their needs and offputting player communities/behavior as the main reasons they don't spend more time (and money) on gaming.
To that I say: No shit.
I've been playing games since I was a child, and while my more formative years were relatively peaceful, things started to change when online gaming became big. I remember playing Halo 2 with my best friend in middle school. When we got sick of the constant harassment over voice chat, we'd put her older brother on the mic to avoid the endless stream of gendered slurs. Mid-match, we'd snatch the mic back, and our teammates seemed baffled that girls could be good at a video game about shooting stuff.
My career has largely been built on coverage of another shooter: Apex Legends, a game I was first drawn to after a friend pointed out that one of the characters, Wraith, looked a lot like me. I learned to play Apex Legends with voice chat off--by the time it launched in 2019, I knew better than to reveal myself as female in a live-service shooter. But interestingly, things started to change as the game's post-launch development progressed. Respawn continued adding female Legends to the roster--something not everyone was happy about--and two Respawn developers came forward to make it clear the game was for everyone.
As the years progressed, I noticed the presence of fictional female player-characters seemed to make my own presence as a woman less shocking for my randomly selected teammates. Apex players got used to calling any Bangalore, Lifeline, Wraith, or Wattson player by female pronouns, so when I finally gathered the courage to turn on my mic, I wasn't immediately met with harassment or disbelief, as I often am in shooters like Call of Duty or PUBG. This is also largely the reason I don't play a whole lot of CoD or PUBG, and why I don't find the results of Ampere's study especially surprising. Toxic, deeply sexist player communities have been a problem since the dawn of online gaming.
I can't say I'm surprised that a majority of female respondents told Ampere they struggle to find games that suit their needs, either. When study participants were presented with a list of 52 console and PC titles and asked to select which ones they played, only three titles had more female players than male players: Animal Crossing: New Horizons, Roblox, and The Sims 4.
These games all have something in common: the ability to create and customize your own character's appearance. (Ironically, The Sims creator Will Wright originally wanted to call the game Dollhouse, but was talked out of it due to corporate fears that male players would find it offputting.)
The Sims is still alive and kicking today, and its playerbase is still largely female. But playing a game targeted at women comes with its own set of downsides. For example, if you want to truly experience everything The Sims 4 has to offer, it'll cost you roughly $1,600 to purchase all of the game's 100+ DLC packs, and EA isn't stopping there--this week, the publisher announced plans to introduce paid player-made custom content. It's effectively Bethesda's Creation Club, but for a game that's already prohibitively expensive.
Similarly, the popular dress-up game Infinity Nikki has faced loads of backlash, with developer Infold Games offering a public apology after introducing more aggressive monetization to the game in last April's "Bubble Season" update. Publishers often seem to approach games aimed at women with a "minimum effort, maximum monetization" mindset.
While titles like Animal Crossing: New Horizons and Stardew Valley remain popular and well-liked due to the lack of microtransactions, their popularity has been met with an influx of "cozyslop" titles: games that make a half-hearted attempt at replicating popular cozy life-sims in the hopes of raking in profits, only to release a disappointing product, like last year's Tales of the Shire.
Ampere's research is certainly eye-opening, but for female players like me, the results aren't particularly shocking. Cozy games often position themselves as being "girl-gamer friendly" while simultaneously pushing monetization schemes and overpriced DLC packs that would make even gacha games blush. Many genres--especially live-service shooters--ignore their female playerbase entirely, leading to female players being ostracized or harassed the minute they turn their headsets on.
The tides do appear to be turning, however slowly. This year, an unsigned team coached by Rubykaster won the Apex Legends Global Series (ALGS) Championship, marking the first ALGS win by a female-coached team in Apex esports history. On the other hand, the industry still has a long way to go--as I write this, Sims 4 players on X are ripping into EA for attempting to implement the aforementioned Creation Club knock-off, and a former member of EA's Sims creator program has shared how she felt financially pressured into participating and terrified of walking away.
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