- Newzoo conducts comprehensive study into player preferences for certain FPS franchises
- CoD: Vanguard, BF 2042 and Halo Infinite are in focus of the latest consumer insight survey
- There are interesting trends revealed about demographics and player motivation to play or disengage
Newzoo has taken a look at some of the most anticipated first-person shooters that will be releasing within a month of each other. Call of Duty: Vanguard, Battlefield 2042, and Halo Infinite are all arriving in Q4 and the analytics firm wants to know what motivates their player bases. Is it allegiance to a franchise or a company, or do gamers simply appreciate games on their merits? Analyst Niklas Melcher finds out.
Newzoo Offers Comprehensive Insight into FPS Players Motivation
To conduct a proper study, Newzoo interviewed 8,024 respondents aged 10 to 65 from across the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, and France as part of the company's Game Franchise survey that collects important data for 80 of what the company calls the most relevant gaming franchises.
The company has focused on understanding many things about the player bases of those games, including their demographics, as well as what drives them to play. The F2P version of Call of Duty, Warzone has been excluded from the company's survey.
Call of Duty Inspires the Most Gamers
Newzoo began by taking a look at the hard-core fans. Those are people who would only play one of the listed franchises. The number of such players was highest among Call of Duty players with 33% only enjoying CoD.
Battlefield and Halo-only players were 8% and 9% respectively, but things got interesting when you considered how many people would play some other game as well. Newzoo found out that one in five players of these franchises has played ALL three games.
The company was able to establish that the demographics of the player base for all three games were very similar. They all skewed male and varied from 21 to 35-year-olds. Battlefield seemed to have the most male players with 72% players of the population whereas Call of Duty posted 69% male players and 31% female players.
Halo seemed to attract the most female players with 33% of the player base identifying as female. However, it was interesting to witness the broader approach towards other games. For example, 40% of CoD players confirmed that they would be interested in exploring another shooter game, such as Battlefield or Halo.
Falling Out of Live with Franchise Games
Interestingly, the survey also factored in another important factor – the motivation behind LEAVING a specific game. Newzoo created interesting metrics for the reasons why people disengaged with specific games. They cited reasons such as:
- Nothing new anymore
- Didn't have time anymore
- Friends stopped playing
- Game not challenging enough
Interestingly, even though Call of Duty is considered the most relaxed game for casual play of the three, people seemed to quit it because they didn't have time anymore – 21% of respondents said they quit because of lack of time.
Halo players found the game NOT challenging enough and for Battlefield players, the fact that friends had stopped playing (15%) proved the most discouraging fact. An equal number of BF and Halo players (16%) said that they simply had nothing new to do in the game anymore.
Understandably, the “newness” factor wasn't an issue for Call of Duty, because the game seems to have the most frequent updates when it comes to new content. Call of Duty has also drawn praises through its implementation of excellent game modes, and not least the Zombies. There are other reasons why people are disengaging of course. Battlefield 2042 won't have a single-player, which is dispiriting to some.
Who Will Be Buying and What?
Lastly, Newzoo makes great use of its data trying to determine who will buy and what. The analysis focuses on Battlefield 2042 and Halo Infinite, excluding Call of Duty Vanguard because it had not been announced when the survey began.
According to the company, 30% of surveyed gamers intend to go with Battlefield 2042 against 25% for Halo Infinite. However, BF 2042 is available across numerous platforms, including PC, PlayStation, Xbox, and so on, whereas Halo is an exclusive game that only comes with Xbox. Care to read the full survey? Visit Newzoo's consumer insight article into CoD Vanguard, BF 2042, and Halo Infinite.
