We asked U.S. adults if they’d ever engaged in game design: 31% had, though this was often just adding house rules (15% of all adults). The most widely created new games were, with multiple responses permitted, board games (10%), card games (also 10%), RPGs (6%), video games (5%), mobile games (also 5%), interactive fiction (2%), and gamebooks (also 2%).

Younger generations are more likely to create games than older generations: 22% of Gen Z have made their own house rules, compared to just 8% of Baby Boomers; 16% of Gen Z have made their own board game, compared to 14% of Millennials, 6% of Gen X, and 3% of Boomers.

Men were twice as likely to create computer games (video and mobile games) than women, and women were more likely to create board games (12% vs. 7%).

Creating games is an activity that people of all incomes can and do engage in.

game-design-question-table

In the table, arrows indicate that the difference is statistically significant when compared to the average of all other cells under its banner.

This newsmaker survey of 1,411 U.S. adults aged 18 and up was conducted from May 19 to 24, 2023, by Researchscape International. The data were weighted to the U.S. population by nine demographic questions. The credibility interval for questions answered by all respondents is plus or minus 4 percentage points.