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Game Marketing Seminar Reveals Girls Prefer Nintendo Switch Over PS4

One June 26, the Japan Online Game Association (JOGA) held its Online Game Marketing Seminar in Tokyo with Gameage Research Institute CEO Seiichi Mitsui and strategist Hiroya Hori. The data in the presentation is from Gameage's own investigation as of May 2018. According to their findings, Japan has approximately 34.23 million gamers between the ages of 10 and 50 years old. However, the vast majority of active gamers are playing on mobile devices like cellphones and tablets (29.58 million people) versus stationary gaming devices like consoles and Nintendo 3DS portable devices (10.28 million) for a ratio of approximately 1:3. For this data, an "active user" is defined as someone who has played games at least once in May 2018.

There's approximately 16.28 million consoles owned in Japan, 28.65 million smart devices, and 5.84 million PCs. About 3 million people own all three and would be considered a "heavy user."

The seminar also broke down data for individual consoles. Demographic information showed that while men and boys dominate console gaming in Japan, women and girls are more likely to own a Nintendo Switch than a PlayStation 4. JOGA's data shows there were approximately 2.47 million active Switch players in May 2018 with a male to female ratio 74.7: 25.3 and the majority of players were between the ages of 10-14 years old.

Japan has approximately 3.94 million PlayStation 4 gamers and 88.2 percent are male and 11.8 are female. The Nintendo 3DS handheld has 3.49 million active users and the demographics are the most evenly distributed of the three consoles. About 69.3% are male and 30.7% are female.

Mobile gaming is nearly dead even. Of the 15.27 million active players on iPhone mobile devices 52.9% are male and 47.1% are female. Android device players are similar with 10.54 million gamers and a male/female ratio of 57.0% versus 43.0%. iPhone mobile gaming is embraced by young adult players and has fewer teen and middle-aged players compared to consoles while Android players are likely to be in their 40s.

PC gaming takes up the smallest percentage. About 4.41 million people play games on their computers, 74.2% are men. The majority of male players using a computer are in their 20s.

Gameage analyzed information from 50,000 people, including players from specific games. Its data shows that Monster Strike players are mostly men and a player's average age is 41.7 years old. Demographics were similar for Final Fantasy Record Keeper, and Dragon Ball Z: Dokkan Battle. Idolm@ster Cinderella Girls: Starlight Stage player stats are 78.5: 21.5 male/female and the average age is 36.7 years old.

Source: 4Gamer.net (箭本進一)