You have to admire EA’s strategy. They have the official chick game, The Sims. Then they’ve got all the sports games; pretty much any national or international sports ball league has a perpetual contract with them, and sports bros who play Madden or FIFA just…can’t understand not buying sports branded stuff. They’re more secure in their market than Gold Bond Foot Powder.
Over 60% of players of The Sims are women aged 18-24. Only 48% of women in the United States will claim to have ever played a video game in their lives and only 6% call themselves a “gamer.” I can’t think of an original IP game franchise more successful than The Sims in terms of revenue or copies sold that can claim a female supermajority audience.
It is the official game of chicks.
Exists projects similar to The sims that maybe can take the monopoly of this genre, just to show how absurd The Sims is: if you sum all stupid DLC and expansions you probably can buy all current consoles for that money. The problem is the sports games, like you said the perpetual contract just kill any competition.
