We’re entering uncharted territory here.

Thanks to everyone that contributed to our little demographics survey. We surveyed 100 people, and now have some actual data about your fellow LD folk.

Lets look at some charts.

Students, hobbiests, game jobs, ex mainsteam, full-time indies

This is one we’ve been wondering about for a while. Students covering about 25%, with nearly 30% being those with game jobs or enough entrepreneurial spirit to make their own.

I’m not sure what to take away from the “spare time” stat, other than to think more about my choice of words. For example, does a self employed game maker make games in their spare time anymore? Also, some people do contract game work, so wordings again could be problematic.

Games you've made (and own all right to), the cool things they've done

This data was crammed in to the 1st question. A set of questions on about how stuff you’ve made has done. This makes me realize a good question may have been weather you’ve released a game before (freeware, web, shareware, retail, etc). None the less, we can see nearly 20% of those surveyed have have had some notable successes with things they’ve created.

You and the game making community

This is what was left in the first question. I wasn’t expecting “the book one” to be on top, and only get a single vote (cough…). I know for a fact we’ve had other authors enter before, and I have a book on my shelf with an article written by Geoff (who obviously now didn’t do the survey). None the less, the subject of writing can certainly be expanded on. Articles for Gamasutra, the Escapist, gamedev.net, or other publications are certainly worth wording a question around. Whitepapers and tutorials too.

The last 3 refer to various compo styles, edited on the graph text so not to eat up all the space. The first being your Ludum Dare’s, PyWeek’s, and TIGSourc’esc compos. Glad to see a good turn out for that. The second being attended events like Game Jam’s (TIGJam, TOJam, …). The final being your Independent Games Festivals, Sense of Wonder Nights, GAMMA’s, PAX 10′s, Indiecade’s, and similar exhibitions. In other words, a real venue demoing your game.

Platforms: PC's, Mobile, Consoles

Next the platforms question. Windows rating, we expected something nice and high. It’s also good to have some Mac and Linux numbers too. And whomever it was that added the single vote for non big-3 PC OS, pat yourself on the back for being the only one. Keeping the dream alive.

Web made a good showing. Flash, Unity, and those crazy PHP game makers. Nice.

I did neglect PDA’s, but I’d imagine (hope) most people wanting to mention that put a note down for Mobile. iPhone could probably be given it’s own section next time, since I suspect it’s pushing up most of that mobile score.

Consoles, that’s always good to see. With a pair of 13′s though, I do wonder how many are distinctly A or B, or both. Also there’s the question of homebrew. Being an “indie” event, I’d expect a decent split here.

Classic computers, also keeping the dream alive. From that stat we know we have at least 6 really old people here.

Physical games, I’m glad someone suggested this. I imagine the majority don’t do a lot of board/card game development these days, but physical stuff is great for prototyping ideas.

The survey'ish question

Yes, finally the more traditional survey’esc question. I’m proud to report we have a 10% scandal ratio going on here at Ludum Dare. I’d expect no less.

Thanks again everyone for taking survey. I hope you enjoy these colorful charts.

Tags: press

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 3rd, 2009 at 9:36 pm and is filed under LD - Misc. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.