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Forums - Nintendo - Is there a misconception regarding the age range of Nintendo gamers?

MegaDrive08 on 20 March 2013
theshonen8899 said:
Nintendo is not young gamers, it's casual gamers. Young, old, in between, anyone who enjoys Wii Sports more than Call of Duty. Unfortunately for Nintendo, these people generally do not purchase as many games, they usually only buy a few fitness, party, or kids games. This is especially troublesome now that Nintendo is selling both the 3DS and the Wii U at a loss, meaning they get even less profit than they did from the DS/Wii. This is also why Nintendo is trying so hard to cater to hardcore gamers while also trying to keep the casuals. It's a delicate balance.


Don't bring on casual and hardcore into this, nintendo's core base is hardcore, and hardcore does not mean you play a particular genre of game, if you play games a lot your a hardcore gamer it doesn't matter what the game is.

 

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Ucell on 20 March 2013

I think its true cuz all Nintendo gamers I've seen are of ages 8-11. Besides, the kind of games Nintendo makes speaks for itself.
I'm 21 and most of my friends are around that age, and we are all either PlayStation, Xbox or PC gamers.



Bitfreak on 20 March 2013
Rogerioandrade said:
Bitfreak said:
I think the 'Nintendo makes games for kids' comes mostly from teenagers who own a 360/PS3 and older generations who don't really have a clue what's going on in the industry.

You mean the casuals, right ? There are a lot of people who grew up playing on Ataris and Mangavox and most of those guys know very well what the market is about.


No I just meant older generations of people who have very limited knowledge. Nintendo just gives off that family/innocent vibe that the other companies don't so I think a lot of people misinterpret the company as one that mostly targets younger age ranges.



Sharu on 20 March 2013
Ucell said:
I think its true cuz all Nintendo gamers I've seen are of ages 8-11. Besides, the kind of games Nintendo makes speaks for itself.
I'm 21 and most of my friends are around that age, and we are all either PlayStation, Xbox or PC gamers.

Well, when you'll grow up and start talking to people older than 30, I think, you'll see more and more Nintendo fans of 30+ age. that is normal. This kids of 8-11 are not Nintendo gamers, they are kids of Nintendogamers.

By the way - are your friends you talk about real people or  just Live/PSN/Steam/Battle.net so called 'friends'?



_crazy_man_ on 20 March 2013

Generalizations are generalizations.



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Ucell on 20 March 2013
Sharu said:
Ucell said:
I think its true cuz all Nintendo gamers I've seen are of ages 8-11. Besides, the kind of games Nintendo makes speaks for itself.
I'm 21 and most of my friends are around that age, and we are all either PlayStation, Xbox or PC gamers.

Well, when you'll grow up and start talking to people older than 30, I think, you'll see more and more Nintendo fans of 30+ age. that is normal. This kids of 8-11 are not Nintendo gamers, they are kids of Nintendogamers.

By the way - are your friends you talk about real people or  just Live/PSN/Steam/Battle.net so called 'friends'?


I don't think any of those kids' parents are gamers.

As for my friends, yes they are all real. I don't consider online friends as true friends.



dsgrue3 on 20 March 2013

There is no misconception. Nintendo gamers tend to be younger on average. This is a fact.

Cited at 29 years as per Nintendo themselves circa 2007:
http://www.pcworld.com/article/140575/article.html

As opposed to 360/PS3 owners at 35-44, 44+ respectively circa 2008:
http://www.joystiq.com/2008/06/23/new-study-compares-360-ps3-consumers/



VGKing on 20 March 2013

This is the wrong place to ask the question, most people on this site are core gamers, mostly adults. But people like this are in the minority. Nintendo sells its consoles to families and yes, that includes kids. This is why Nintendo stuff has trouble selling at high prices.

Even Nintendo knows who its audience is. I recall an article detailing how Nintendo came up with the Wii and it mentioned how they wanted the Wii to be small and very quiet as to not bother "Mom" since "Mom" is the one buying the thing.

So is there a misconception about Nintendo fans being kids? Yes and No. Most parents buy their kids a Nintendo console or portable. Does that make these kids fans of Nintendo? I think kids aren't really "fans" of anything. They go with what is popular.



MegaDrive08 on 20 March 2013

Well its not a fact at all obviously



 

TheLastStarFighter on 20 March 2013
theshonen8899 said:
Nintendo is not young gamers, it's casual gamers. Young, old, in between, anyone who enjoys Wii Sports more than Call of Duty. Unfortunately for Nintendo, these people generally do not purchase as many games, they usually only buy a few fitness, party, or kids games. This is especially troublesome now that Nintendo is selling both the 3DS and the Wii U at a loss, meaning they get even less profit than they did from the DS/Wii. This is also why Nintendo is trying so hard to cater to hardcore gamers while also trying to keep the casuals. It's a delicate balance.

Pretty much everything about this statement is false.  Nintendo gamers are a mix of intense fans, core gamers and casual people.  Call of Duty is about as casual a game as there is.  I know countless people that play no games except some COD and NHL...very casual.  Wii has a very similar attach rate to PS3, so Nintendo system owners buy as many games.  3DS is not selling at a loss.  WiiU may not even be selling at a loss now with the falling yen. "Even less profit" implies that DS/Wii were somehow not particularily profitable which is a joke...during the peak of those systems Nintendo made more in one year than most of the rest of the industry combined.