Telephia reports growth for mobile gaming market
Female gamers and puzzle titles continue to boost the mobile games sector
Mobile consumer measurement firm Telephia has revealed new information from its Q1 Mobile Game Report, showing a surge in popularity for puzzle and strategy titles led by a predominantly female audience.
According to the report, US mobile game sales for the first quarter were driven by Tetris, Tetris Deluxe, Bejeweled and Mahjong - with puzzle and strategy games accounting for a third of mobile games revenue generated during the period.
Telephia reports that female gamers accounted for 65 per cent of total revenue and 72 per cent of all revenue generated by puzzle and strategy games.
"The casual nature of mobile games provides tremendous appeal to women, who are not traditionally hardcore gamers by console or online gaming standards," commented Kanishka Agarwal, Telephia's VP of new products.
"The wireless industry has presented a hungry target audience willing to pay premium access to games through their cell phones."
Female gamers are reported to dominate almost all mobile game genres, with the notable exception of action/adventure titles - which show a 60 per cent gender bias towards men.
As for publishers, EA Mobile is clearly leading the pack, publishing each of the top four most popular titles by revenue share. Tetris and Tetris Deluxe accounted for 5.2 and 3.6 per cent of total revenue share respectively, followed by Bejeweled with 2.6 per cent and Mahjong with 2 per cent.
The overall market appears to be picking up pace - according to Agarwal, "Mobile game purchases continue to grow with more than 8.6 million games bought in April, increasing 60 per cent since the beginning of the year."