More and more gamers prefer single-player video games over multiplayer

A new survey has found the majority of the world prefers single-player games, although younger gamers enjoy multiplayer equally.

The games industry feels like it’s been dominated by live service multiplayer games for at least the past decade, with the likes of Fortnite, Minecraft, Call Of Duty, and Roblox consistently ruling the roost.

This has led many gaming companies to strive for a live service hit of their own, to land a piece of the heavily monetised pie. That ambition has come at the expense of single-player games which, while usually profitable, have a comparatively short shelf life and often no microtransactions.

However, a new survey has found that what publishers want to sell people is not necessarily what the majority of players worldwide want.

According to Ampere Analysis, which surveyed 34,000 gamers across 22 markets, 56% of players worldwide prefer single-player games over multiplayer. This marks a 4% increase in people preferring single-player titles over the last four years.

Of these different territories, 65% of US players prefer single-player, while 63% have the same preference in Japan. As for the UK, the same applies, albeit at the lower percentage of 58%.

The country least interested in single-player games is China at 47%, while the results in the Netherlands (50%) and Sweden (49%) are also considered below average.

The results are slightly different when broken down into age brackets, with the single-player preference increasing as people get older. Only 49% of 16 to to 24-year-olds prefer single-player experiences, but this rises to 56% among 25 to 34-year-olds, and 64% in gaming veterans aged 55 to 64.

While the younger skew towards multiplayer games isn’t surprising, it’s still notable how close the divide is amongst Gen Z, between single-player and multiplayer games – something which echoes a previous study in the same vein from a year ago.

Speaking about the results, Louise Wooldridge, senior research manager at Ampere, said: ‘This data reaffirms that single-player games are absolutely still viable – and sought after – in the live service-dominated landscape.

‘The market favours multiplayer games for their ongoing engagement and monetisation, but cracking a finely balanced formula for single-player games can leverage this broad audience appeal. Although most gamers prefer this content to multiplayer experiences, the friendship circle still plays a significant role in game discovery and uptake.’

The latter references other findings from the survey, with 24% of people saying they would buy or download a game because their friends were playing it.

While there have been splashes of big single-player success over recent years, like Hogwarts Legacy and Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, there’s little sign that big publishers can resist the all or nothing approach of live service success.

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