A common question asked by role-players and non-role-players alike is: who are role-players generally? For example, what is the demographic profile of people who play RPGs? This is difficult to answer in general, but I will try to provide some pointers to some data.
The best known survey done of gamers was conducted by Wizards of the Coast in the summer of 1998. A short post-card questionnaire was sent to over 20,000 households. Based on results of this, a more detailed followup survey was sent to 1000 respondents. A summary of the results of this have been made publically available as the "Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary", available at the RPGnet website among other places.
A shorter web-based survey was done by James Kittock in 2001, which was described in his "D20 System Product Interest Market Research Report". Unfortunately, the full article is no longer publically available. However, I provide the demographics results below with comparison to the Wizards data. Note that the Wizards survey was done only of gamers in the U.S. between the ages of 12 and 35. However, the Wizards data is far more reliable because of more controlled sampling and greater statistics.
| Wizards | Kittock | |
|---|---|---|
| Age Category | ||
| 12-15 | 23% | 1% |
| 16-18 | 18% | 5% |
| 19-24 | 25% | 18% |
| 25-35 | 34% | 63% |
| 36+ | * | 13% |
| Gender | ||
| Male | 81% | 91% |
| Female | 19% | 9% |
| Region | ||
| North America | 100% | 85% |
| Europe | * | 10% |
| Australia & New Zealand | * | 3% |
| Other | * | 2% |
There are many differences between these surveys. In general, the Wizards survey is much more reliable, but it only covers U.S. gamers between 12 and 35. (It was a marketing survey, and that was the target market they were interested in.) Thus, the Kittock survey is interesting as a different view. There are some basic conclusions which are clear. Tabletop role-playing is definitely an adult hobby at this point, although it is played by many children as well. It is male-dominated although not totally so. Kittock adds in a comment on the female presence in his survey:
Although 9% of the respondents were female overall, just 4% of the respondents classified as DMs were female. Furthermore, 30% of female respondents indicated that they never DM, while just 7% of male respondents indicated this. For the most part, DMing currently seems to be a male occupation. However, it is not obvious that females do not want to DM; it is possible that a niche could be created for products aimed at encouraging female DMs.
Internationally, RPGs are present throughout the U.S., Canada, and most of Western Europe -- notably England, France, Germany, and Sweden which have produced a number of RPGs which have influenced the U.S. market. There is also a significant gaming scene in Brazil, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand. There is limited play in other countries which is harder to estimate. As far as the total number of role-players, Ryan S. Dancey (an ex-vice-president of Wizards of the Coast) reported the following additional information in a UseNet post:
In 1998, there were 2.5 million people who played a tabletop RPG monthly in the U.S. between the ages of 12 and 35. I suspect that figure has grown a little since that point and D&D has revived. Of that 2.5 million, 1.5 million played D&D monthly. We have some stats on the frequency of other games played -- I think they're in the market research study I released in '99. The GPA has a copy of it on their web site.
We do not have a good number for Europe. The market research that WotC conducted in Europe came back with crazy figures like 2 million RPG player in Germany alone. Since we don't trust the data, we've not released it and we don't base any business plans on it.
For comparison, GenCon SoCal reported a survey of its attendance for 2004 in its packet for exhibitors. This is a high-profile but newly-formed gaming convention in Anaheim, California. You can download the GenCon SoCal packet as a 0.5MB PDF file. The data was reported in several places, notably a thread on "Indianapolis Monthly Article on Gen Con/ Gamers", and the Gamasutra Announcement for GenCon SoCal.
| Demographics (Tabulated in 2004) | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Gender Male 77% Female 23% |
Age 13 to 17 3% 18 to 24 5% 25 to 34 44% 35 to 44 37% 45 to 54 8% 55 or over 4% |
Education Some high school or less 6% High school graduate 0% Some college 25% Vocational or technical school 4% College graduate 49% Postgraduate degree 20% |
Annual Household Income Under $15,000 13% $15,000 6% $25,000 6% $35,000 12% $50,000 22% $75,000 or more 40% |
| Types of Games Played Roleplaying games 68% Computer games 48% Board games 48% Online computer games 20% Trading card games 15% Miniatures 19% Console games 14% |
Own or Have Access to a Computer Own 99% Have access 100% No access 0% |
Have Access to the Internet Have access 100% Do not have access 0% |
Amount Spent in the Exhibit Hall Under $10 16% $11-30 12% $31-50 12% $51-100 29% $101-200 26% $201-350 6% |
Another view into the number of role-players is in the size of print runs, especially for popular RPG magazines such as The Dragon. Since this is sold regularly, it gives some insight into changing over time.
| Dragon Magazine | Dungeon Magazine | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Date(Issue) | Subscriptions | Paid Circulation | Date(Issue) | Paid Circulation |
| Sept 1977 (#12) | 1164 | 7381 | ||
| Sept 1978 (#22) | 1144 | 7859 | ||
| Oct 1979 (#33) | 1951 | 10885 | ||
| Oct 1980 (#44) | 4558 | 20155 | ||
| Sept 1981 (#55) | 11531 | 48119 | ||
| Sept 1982 (#67) | 19029 | 60387 | ||
| Sept 1984 (#91) | 36974 | 118021 | ||
| Sept 1985 (#104) | 36200 | 107200 | ||
| Sept 1986 (#115) | 29589 | 88758 | ||
| Sept 1987 (#127) | 25003 | 73008 | ||
| Sept 1989 (#151) | 26800 | 99628 | ||
| Oct 1990 (#163) | 27912 | 91956 | ||
| Sept 1992 (#188) | 23685 | 89985 | ||
| Oct 1993 (#200) | 21116 | 77534 | ||
| Sept 1994 (#212) | 20105 | 74753 | ||
| Oct 1996 (#236) | 14357 | 54812 | ||
| Oct 1997 (#242) | 12435 | 44163 | ||
| Oct 1999 (#266) | 13224 | 31536 | ||
| Oct 2000 (#278) | 38214 | Oct 2000 (#84) | 23672 | |
| Oct 2001 (#290) | 49627 | Oct 2001 (#90) | 24663 | |
| Oct 2002 (#302) | 51831 | Sep 2002 (#96) | 36572 | |
| Oct 2003 (#314) | 68585 | Dec 2003 (#107) | 48238 | |
| Oct 2004 (#327) | 62725 | Oct 2004 (#118) | 37141 | |
| 2005 (#339) Jan 06 | 14762 | 54637 | 2005 (#130) (jan 2006 issue) | 32195 |
| 2006 (#351) Jan 07 | 13438 | 46250 | Oct 2006 (#142) | 31408 |
| January 2007 | 32391 | |||
Another question is what is the RPG industry (as opposed to players) like. The important question here is, who are the industry leaders? Ken Hite, a professional writer for several RPG companies, compared the reach of various companies in his April 2002 Out of the Box column. He reported the 2001 market share for companies as:
Wizards of the Coast: 45% White Wolf: 19% Palladium Books: 8.8% Alderac Entertainment Group: 7.8% Steve Jackson Games: 5% FanPro: 4% Everyone else: ramen
Note that this is market share: i.e. percentage of sales of commercial material. This is not the same as people playing the various games. This can be compared with the 1999 WotC survey, which asked tabletop RPG player what games they played monthly, where multiple choices were allowed. The answers were:
Dungeons & Dragons (WotC/TSR) fantasy 66% Vampire: The Masquerade (White Wolf) horror 25% Star Wars (West End Games) sci-fi 21% Palladium (Palladium Books) fantasy 16% Werewolf: The Apocalypse (White Wolf) horror 15% Shadowrun (FASA) fantasy / sci-fi (cyberpunk) 15% Star Trek (Last Unicorn Games) sci-fi 12% Call of Cthulhu (Chaosium) horror 8% Legend of the Five Rings (Alderac) fantasy 8% Deadlands (Pinnacle) horror / western 5% Alternity (WotC/TSR) sci-fi 4% GURPS (SJG) mixed 3%
These numbers are out of sync, since the Wizards survey is in 1999 prior to the release of D&D3, while the data that Ken Hite mentions is for 2001. Still, comparison is interesting. For example, the Lovecraftian horror game Call of Cthulhu is squarely on the map for play despite essentially zero market share. The same applies to a lesser degree to the Star Wars RPG and the fantasy cyberpunk RPG Shadowrun, which had been supported earlier in the 90's but whose support and marketing had essentially dried up by the time of the survey.
The notable thing is that swords-and-sorcery fantasy is dominant due to D&D, while science fiction and horror are the dominant genres among the rest. The share for other genres is minimal. A few genres such as superheroes, western, and espionage have occaisionally made inroads into RPGs, but they are overall quite minor, it seems.