I’ve been playingFinal Fantasygames since 1997. Courtesy of a recent study conducted by research firm GEM Partners, Nikkei Entertainment hasskillfully assembledsurvey results which reveal, among many other interesting things, that I am hardly alone in my relatively old age.
The comprehensive deep dive into the gaming habits of a great number of Japanese enthusiasts has shed light on not only the average ages for many popular individual games and ongoing franchises, but their estimated gender ratio, as well. Some results are more eye-opening than others.
The Answer To Final Fantasy Is 42
GEM Partners' ambitious study involved a total of 180,000 people - surely, enough to form some broad-based insights into the gaming tastes of folks across every conceivable demographic. Many titles were included, including Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest,Pokemon,Mario,Kirby,Fortnite,Valorant, andMinecraft. Japan’s unabashed love for all thingsSplatoonensured its representation, too.
Both Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest have average user ages in the early 40s. Even though both franchises have mobile versions, their player bases still skew older.
My guesses heading into the data were that Final Fantasy would be around 38 to 40, and Dragon Quest would be nearer to 45. Turns out, it’s 42 apiece. This sort of information helps to shed light on one of Square Enix’s ongoing conundrums: Final Fantasy, once an unconquerable bastion of JRPG success,has in recent years seen diminishing returns.A common theory has held that, among other obstacles, some of the crowd who first showed up for favourites like Final Fantasy 7 and Final Fantasy 10 are simply aging out of the gaming medium altogether.
The gender ratio of 70:30 male-to-female for something like FF isn’t a big shocker, but I had expected a series like Mario to be a bit closer. Instead, it shares the 70:30 split; Nintendo’s all-star mascot has an average player age of 32, for the record. A little higher than I’d have thought, but a number that I would have reckoned would be far too high an estimate for something so young-skewing, like Pokemon. Nope! Pokemon’s also 32.
Nikkei does note that Nintendo is, across the board, nicely stable in gearing its catalog to a wide market. “Nintendo titles are close to the overall gaming average of 30 years old and have relatively balanced gender ratios,” the article explains. “This suggests that Nintendo develops games aimed at a broad user base.” Never a bad thing when you’re in the business of making money across generations of would-be buyers.
As for those gender divisions, Kirby is 45:55 in favour of women. Far more significantly, Animal Crossing is 25:75 female-skewing. For male-sided numbers that are impressively close, Sega’s Yakuza/Like a Dragon is only 60:40. There area lotof shirtless men in Yakuza - just saying.
