Mark Clements Taylor Dalton Christian Preston Stats in Video Games Mark Clements Taylor Dalton Christian Preston

Video games are a very competitive market Video games are a very competitive market. This is evident in just the sheer amount of statistics that can be found. There are many different areas in video games that statistics can be run. Some of these questions are ‘how old are people who play video games’, ‘are they male or female’, ‘how often do they play’, ‘what genre do they play’, ‘how many games do they play’, and ‘do they consider themselves as a “gamer”?’ Three poles were formed, among thirty people each, to find the statistical answers to question such as these. These three poles were asked over social media, convenience, and through the phone. Perhaps the most interesting part of these surveys was finding any correlation among the questions. By combining the results of certain questions such as, ‘are you male or female’ and ‘how many hours per week do you play video games’ one might be able to concluded if a female is more like to play video games throughout the week than a male.

Among the poles these questions were asked with the following result: Among the poles these questions were asked with the following result: How old are you? Social Media Convenience Phone Total Age Range -14 1 2 15-19 11 9 29 20-24 16 7 32 25-29 10 5 15 30-34 3 35+ 6

Observing the results after tallying up the three surveys it is found the majority of the sample ranges from teenagers and adults in their twenties with the highest concentration with people in their early twenties. The importance of this question was to determine if the biasness of video games is played by children were correct or not. As we observe the results in graph (see below) it is more obvious the video games are played by more adults then than children with a right tail distortion extending to even older ages then just young adults.

Among the video game community it is also debated if video games are played by males or females. With the way many games are marketed it is generrally assumed that video games are as one might punnily say a “man’s game”. However when the question was asked “are you a male or female?”

On a pie chart we can see the percentages of the total Social Media Convenience Phone Total male 18 22 21 61 female 12 8 9 29 On a pie chart we can see the percentages of the total

With such a large percetage of video gamers being gamers it is easy to see why one might conclude video games are played by males. However the nearly one third of female video game players is hard to ignore. Concluding that video games are not just for males. Finding the results of one question doesn’t exacptly find very much relults. It is until corisponding questions are answered that even more information is revealed. For instance we now know percentage of video games are which sex among the sample. However it isn’t until we ask the question “How many hours a week do you play video game?” that we have a more detailed result. Social Media Convenience Phone Total Hours/Week 1-10 12 15 17 44 11-20 9 8 10 27 21-30 3 7 2 31-40 50+ 1

Comparing the results of the two questions doesn’t give much of the result to the corlalation. Among the twenty nine females that were questioned there was a mean 9.75 hour a week that they played video games. Among the sixty one men there was a mean of 14.583 hour per week spent playing video games. 21*9.75=204.75 61*14.583= 889.563 204.75+889.563= 1093.313 204.75/1093.313=0.187 = 18.7% After some quick calculations it is revieled that even though about one third of video game player are female it is only about an 18.7% possiblity that it is a female playing video games. All these numbers don’t mean very much however if one does not understand the importance. By taking the statistics we have learned so far and assuming that we a business the wants to make a video game then we what we have learned is that our target audience are young adult males in their early to late twenties. However that if one is looking to make video games.

Another advantage is, say for example, you have want to begin playing video games. From what we have learned the majority of the people that will be playing with or against would still be the same results, young adult males in their twenties. However say you already play video games and you want friends who also play video games with. This scenario would require a gameplay what is call player verus player, a.k.a. PvP, for competative play, or cooperative play, a.k.a. co-op. Among our sample group we also asked “Do you generally play cooperative games, player versus player games, or solo games more often?” This was our result: Social Media Convenience Phone Total Co-Op 8 9 5 22 Solo 15 16 17 48 PvP 7 19 As we see with the aid of another pie chart the majority of players prefer solo gameplay however this still shows that there is still a very good possibility of making friends to play video games with.

However not all questions have correlations with others However not all questions have correlations with others. A few of the questions that we asked was thought to lead us to better understand video game players. However the only thing we were led to was a dead end. It was believed that a person who consider themselves as a “gamer”, or people who play video games as a hobby, would most likely have more games and play more often than the sample size that didn’t consider themselves as a “gamer”. Thus the fallowing questions were asked. “Would you describe yourself as a ‘gamer’?”, “How many video games do you own?”, and as for mentioned “About how many hours a week do you play video games?” The end result was those who did not consider themselves as “gamers” had the same variations as those who did consider themselves to be “gamer”. People who did not consider themselves to be a “gamer” would play for over twenty hours a week and owned over twenty games. Whereas we also had some people who did consider themselves to a “gamer” that played for less than five hours a week and owning less than five games. In conclusion finding the right combination of questions can reveal details than any single question can. However without proper correlation what can be learned is not always what we expect. If being in a higher percentile of those whom own and play video games doesn’t make you a gamer then what does? So we leave with that question. Are you a “gamer”?