Despite popular belief that it's teenage boys who constitute the top gaming force, it's women who spend the most time and money on mobile games, and are most loyal to the games they play.
The news comes on the heels of media attention over a new game by Kim Kardashian. That game, Kim Kardashian: Hollywood, was developed by Glu Mobile. The app gives players the ability create their own avatar that can work to achieve celebrity-like status. Players are asked to wear expensive clothes, go to photo shoots, and hang out with celebrities, among other things. The goal is to become an A-list celebrity like Kardashian. The game is currently earning some $700,000 daily, Tech Times reports.
The new insight on who's leading the gaming charge comes from online research firm Flurry. Mobile gaming was long thought to be dominated by males in general and teens and college students in particular, it says in a release.
According to Flurry's statistics, women make more than 30 percent more in-app purchases than men and also spend on average some 35 percent more time on those games. It studied games that reach 1.1 million devices on the company's platform.
"[T]he fact that females also outspend males in in-app purchases came as a surprise to us," says Flurry, which was recently acquired by Yahoo. And Glu appears to be just as shocked as the general public over the success of the Kardashian game, which has spawned parody segments on "The Colbert Report" over its simplicity.
Earlier this year, the 2014 Game Developers Choice Ambassador Award was given to Anita Sarkeesian, which created buzz online and in the gaming world. Sarkeesian is the first woman to win the award. She came to the attention of the entire tech and gaming world with her blogging, revelations about the negative comments directed her way when she started a Kickstarter campaign to examine tropes about women in gaming, and her outspoken calls on the video game culture to change.
And while Kardashian's game, which promotes shopping and spending, is unlikely to be a top choice of Sarkeesian's, it does show that women can help to develop the sector and mold it in ways they find more comfortable and appealing. With women being the top gaming users on mobile devices, it makes sense within the market that they steer games in their direction.
