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 Post subject: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Wed Jul 09, 2014 7:19 pm 
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Last month, I posted a questionnaire to help us gain a better understanding of who uses MFGG and why. A month later, the results are in! This report explores some of the more interesting findings of the "Who's MFGG" survey... depending on what your definition of interesting is, of course! It's a long read, but I tried to keep it as concise as possible.

First of all, I was thrilled to see just how many MFGGers filled out the survey - 97, to be precise. You all did a great job, and I greatly appreciate your help and support. Of the 97 responses, only one was frivolous in nature - which was another pleasant surprise, since one of my biggest concerns was that someone would submit a bunch of joke responses, and I'd have to spend all day figuring out which ones were legit and which weren't. While not every active member filled out this survey, I believe this data is representative of the people who participate actively on MFGG.

Before we move on to the body of this report, I should note that I made a few adjustments to the data - but this was mostly limited to fixing typos. I learned that MFGGers struggle to spell the admittedly rare word "Odyssey"! For the most part, however, you all did an amazing job. Probably the best way to present the results is by breaking down each question individually:




In what country do you currently reside?

While MFGG has attracted members from a wider variety of countries in recent years, Americans still comprise a slight majority on MFGG. 57 members come from the United States, which is far ahead of the next-closest nations, including Australia (4), Britain (4), Canada (4), Austria (3), Brazil (3), and Finland (3). Other nations are represented much more sparsely, from Argentina to Vietnam. Still, it's not unreasonable to expect Americans to become a minority on the forums at some point as MFGG - and the online world in general - grows more diverse.




What is your native language?

71% of respondents are native English speakers. English is by far the most common native language among MFGGers, but there were also 6 German speakers, 4 Spanish speakers, and 3 Portuguese speakers (with all of the latter coming from Brazil).

The remaining 15% is a mixed bag - Arabic, Chinese, Dutch, Japanese, Korean, and Swedish, as well as seven from the mysterious "something else" category.

Interestingly, no one reported French as their native language. We've never had many members from France or other French-speaking nations, and among Canadian members, Francophones have always been underrepresented. Also, while video game communities sometimes attract people obsessed with Japanese culture who are convinced that they live in Japan when they actually don't, the two Japanese members seem to be actual Japanese residents.




In what year were you born?

The average MFGG user is 19 years old. The most common year of birth is 1995, when 12 MFGGers were born.

81% of respondents were born between the years of 1992 and 2002. However, we have at least one member with a birthday for every year between 1984 and 2003, so it's clear that MFGG has members with a wide range of ages. While the previous forums are inaccessible now, so I can't compare these numbers with previous unofficial surveys, the average age of MFGGers has been increasing in recent years. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, as older members are often more experienced and more mature, and it's great that we're retaining existing members. The downside, of course, is older members tend to have more real-life responsibilities and less free time.

As for outliers, one member was born in the 60's, and another old-timer was born in the 40's. (Another member claimed to be older than that, but I adjusted his numbers because I was mean and had a reasonable suspicion that he was fudging his age).




What is your gender?

Computer programming is one of the world's most male-dominated industries (aside from professional gridiron football!). In fact, research shows that the number of women entering STEM (a less-than-melodic acronym for science, technology, engineering, and math) fields has been declining since the 80's.

This somewhat unfortunate trend has been magnified on MFGG. Of the 97 people who responded to the survey, only two claimed to be female, and one of those was an obvious joke response (the only response I saw with obviously nonsensical answers). This is the one area where MFGG - and perhaps video gaming in general - has actually become less diverse over the years.

That said, if you happen to be a young (or not-so-young) lady reading this, remember that making games is a great way to get started with a career in computer science - and I can attest from my own experience that there's some pretty sweet jobs you can snag in the field!




What operating system do you use most frequently?

The vast majority of MFGGers use Microsoft Windows as their primary operating system. Windows 7, used by 55 respondents, remains the most popular OS. Windows 8 is gaining in popularity, however, with 29 members making Bill Gates happy by switching to the latest version of Windows. Since Game Maker 8 games sometimes have trouble running under Windows 8, be sure to fix the sound glitch, or else 3 out of 10 MFGGers will experience difficulty playing your game!

While Microsoft has discontinued support for Windows XP, 7% of MFGG continues to use Microsoft's longest-running operating system. Two members persist in using the much-maligned Vista, and nobody does most of their computing on a Windows operating system older than XP. While PCs are the dominant operating system on MFGG, other operating systems were represented in the survey, including a Linux fan, an iOS user, and a pair of folks who do most of their computing on Android devices.




When did you first discover MFGG?

On average, MFGG users first discovered the site in 2008. 74% of our members found MFGG between 2006 and 2012, and those seven years saw a relatively equal number of current members joining. 2006 and 2007 were especially bountiful for gaining new members. There's also two members who discovered the site in 2001, and three veterans who've been here since the beginning, way back in 2000.

If you do something called math, the average MFGG user first discovered the site at age 13. Throughout MFGG's history, members seem to find the site during their puberty years. Only three members first discovered MFGG at age 21 or older. But again, older members are cool to have, so don't let that scare you off. Several members first found MFGG when they were as young as 6 or 7, which I was also surprised to see.




How often do you check MFGG?

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Over half of our members say they check MFGG several times a day. I was quite impressed to hear that 49 of you think we're a sufficiently cool community to visit more than once per day! 21 members visit daily, 26 visit less frequently, and one member responded to the survey on their very first visit to MFGG. And that's cool too.




For what purposes do you use MFGG?

Most MFGGers - 57 - are active both making and playing fangames. That's a big improvement over the CCC era, when a huge chunk of our memberbase had little or no interest in fangaming. 7 members say they make games but don't play them, while 17 play games without making them. 16 members say they don't make or play games, and they're here for some other reason. What reason that is, I don't know.




Do you have an account on the forums?

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Almost two-thirds of the people who responded to the survey have a forum account. Not bad!




Do you have an account on the mainsite?

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The vast majority of respondents - 82% - have an account on the mainsite. Interestingly, while many mainsiters haven't registered on the forums, only one member who has a forum account lacks a mainsite account.




What's your favorite fangame on MFGG?

While not everyone selected a game in this category, a wide variety of games were nominated. Few people will be surprised to hear Psycho Waluigi was the most popular fangame, gaining 16 votes - more than twice as many as any other game. Seeing SMB Odyssey take second place ahead of Midas Machine and TSB was a bit unexpected, though.

Here's the full list:
Spoiler:


Also nominated was Super Super Barbie Bros. 346, which sounds like an amazing fangame, but it was nominated on the aforementioned "joke response" and "accidentally" disappeared from the list.




What's your favorite official Mario game?

Mario fangaming still lives in two dimensions, so it might not be a shock that Super Mario World was voted as MFGGers' favorite official Mario game. It's hard to go wrong with the game that introduced Mario's dino buddy to the world! Here's the full list, for those interested:

Note that I merged remakes, such as the Super Mario Advance games, into the original title.
Spoiler:





Timestamps: When did people fill out these surveys?

It's reasonable to assume that people would be most likely to fill out the survey when they're checking MFGG. People completed the survey during pretty much every hour of the day, although the hours between 6 and 10 P.M. were the most active for North American and South American members. Few surveys were submitted between 5 A.M. and 7:30 A.M., which makes sense, as those are typically off-peak hours for the MFGG forums as well.

Plus, here's a graph of the survey submission dates, in case you care:

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Are our most active members different from the rest of the MFGG community?

I did some additional research on the first 26 members to respond to the survey - since those are presumably the most visible and active contributors to the community. Of those, all but one had accounts on both the forums and mainsite (Black Squirrel would rejoice at that statistic), and their average age was one year older than MFGG as a whole. Interestingly, these members were no more likely to be native English speakers than the rest of MFGG.




Hey wait, that's not everything!

The last three questions - how you found MFGG, what you like best about MFGG, and what you'd like to change about MFGG - are qualitative in nature rather than quantitative. This post is already longer than most of my college term papers, so I'll explore those questions next week. If you've read this document all the way to the end, congratulations! If you ever find me, I'll buy you donuts or something. And who wouldn't want donuts, especially on our birthday?

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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Wed Jul 09, 2014 8:02 pm 
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This is pretty neat to know!

Wow... 3/10ths of users are on Windows 8. I might even consider switching my current fangame project to Studio now!

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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Wed Jul 09, 2014 11:08 pm 
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Interesting.

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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Thu Jul 10, 2014 1:06 am 
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VinnyVideo wrote:
Computer programming is one of the world's most male-dominated industries (aside from professional gridiron football!). In fact, research shows that the number of women entering STEM (a less-than-melodic acronym for science, technology, engineering, and math) fields has been declining since the 80's.


Something Positive once explored this phenomenon, suggesting that things children are given to play with has an influence. Who is more likely to become an engineer: a boy with a toy that can do lots of things, or a girl with dolls that do nothing but look pretty?

For any of you parents with daughters on MFGG: give your girls a copy of Game Maker: Studio or something. Seriously, do it.

Quote:
The vast majority of MFGGers use Microsoft Windows as their primary operating system. Windows 7, used by 55 respondents, remains the most popular OS. Windows 8 is gaining in popularity, however, with 29 members making Bill Gates happy by switching to the latest version of Windows. Since Game Maker 8 games sometimes have trouble running under Windows 8, be sure to fix the sound glitch, or else 3 out of 10 MFGGers will experience difficulty playing your game!


Uuuuuuugh. I and JudgeSpear will have to rectify this in Super Mario Fusion: Revival.

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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Thu Jul 10, 2014 1:40 am 
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Pretty neat survey result. I am quite fascinated that majority of MFGGers actually contribute to the community. The sad part is that there's barely any Mac OS X and female users. Funny thing is that the first programmer in the history is a female.

Edit: I have made a right choice switching to Studio since late 2013. Not only that it gives me challenges like working with mobile OS.

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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Thu Jul 10, 2014 3:30 am 
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I'm the one who voted for Turd Feast :)

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My Ref

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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Thu Jul 10, 2014 3:38 am 
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wow , nice results , is there actually a list of the 26 first people who did the survey ?
also i did vote for Super Mario World because the graphics are so colorful/saturated haha :D

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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Thu Jul 10, 2014 3:39 am 
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Excellent post! I read it until the end and I can't wait for next week's report!

Also, I'm a 1995-born, English-speaking user with dual accounts! Cool. But I discovered MFGG in 2006, so I guess I'm a hipster in that right.

VinnyVideo wrote:
If you ever find me, I'll buy you donuts or something. And who wouldn't want donuts, especially on our birthday?

I'm open until Monday, you owe me donuts.

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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Thu Jul 10, 2014 6:23 am 
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Rage_quitter_98 wrote:
wow , nice results , is there actually a list of the 26 first people who did the survey ?

It was anonymous: you didn't have to be logged in to do it, and it didn't ask you for your name. (Well, ostensibly anonymous; most people probably didn't use Tor, so it's possible to find out most of the list by matching IP addresses. But that wouldn't be very nice.) I can tell you I didn't take the survey, though.

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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Thu Jul 10, 2014 11:16 am 
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I'm honestly confused about the people voted for "Doki Doki Panic" and "Super Mario Bros. 2"

They're literally the same game

 
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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Thu Jul 10, 2014 11:34 am 
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Hold on, more than one person chose my game as their favourite? :soveryhappy:

Pretty interesting results, though. Did Sunshine really get more votes than either Galaxy games?

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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Thu Jul 10, 2014 11:49 am 
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Thousand Year Door is my personal fave, but Sunshine is a close second. It's sad that it gets so little love, glad it got a lot of votes.

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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Thu Jul 10, 2014 2:16 pm 
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onpon4 wrote:
Rage_quitter_98 wrote:
wow , nice results , is there actually a list of the 26 first people who did the survey ?

It was anonymous: you didn't have to be logged in to do it, and it didn't ask you for your name. (Well, ostensibly anonymous; most people probably didn't use Tor, so it's possible to find out most of the list by matching IP addresses. But that wouldn't be very nice.) I can tell you I didn't take the survey, though.

I did the survey , also i awnsered all questions honestly cause i was bored and had nothing else to do.
(i just forgot that it is anonymous.)

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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Thu Jul 10, 2014 2:28 pm 
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Holy smoke I never expected my game to be so high on this list. Thanks y'all C:

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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Fri Jul 11, 2014 4:41 pm 
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VinnyVideo wrote:
Also nominated was Super Super Barbie Bros. 346, which sounds like an amazing fangame, but it was nominated on the aforementioned "joke response" and "accidentally" disappeared from the list.


Someone really should make this fan game. There are too many joke games that depend too much on being awful for kicks.

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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Fri Jul 11, 2014 5:58 pm 
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Yes, please give us a fully fleshed out 2D platformer starring Barbie and Ken.

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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Fri Jul 11, 2014 7:41 pm 
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Willsaber wrote:
Wow... 3/10ths of users are on Windows 8. I might even consider switching my current fangame project to Studio now!

As Windows 8 grows more widespread, I'd recommend switching to Studio, or else testing GM 8 games thoroughly to ensure that they run under Windows 8.

Cap'n Coconuts wrote:
...suggesting that things children are given to play with has an influence.

Yeah, that's a huge part of how people learn the skills they'd use in their careers. Even if it's subtle, toys have a big impact on kids' development and their interests later in life. It's important for young people to be exposed to a wide variety of activities, instead of being pigeonholed into a specific role just because of their gender.

Cap'n Coconuts wrote:
For any of you parents with daughters on MFGG: give your girls a copy of Game Maker: Studio or something.

If I ever had kids - or if I had any younger siblings, for that matter - I'd do exactly that.

Rage_quitter_98 wrote:
is there actually a list of the 26 first people who did the survey?

No. I told people I'd keep individual responses anonymous, and besides that, many of the responses would be impossible to link to an individual user. I can view individual responses in a big spreadsheet, but looking at individual responses wasn't really the point of the survey anyway.

HylianDev wrote:
I'm open until Monday, you owe me donuts.

Uh-oh! The big question, however: Dunkin' Donuts or Krispy Kreme?

SuperMuppet wrote:
"Doki Doki Panic" and "Super Mario Bros. 2"

Yeah, those games are basically the same thing, although the characters are different. Either way, the only person who voted for Doki Doki Panic was the same prankster who said she lived in the Central African Republic and was the Prince of Bel Air.

LangtonSoft wrote:
Did Sunshine really get more votes than either Galaxy games?

Yep! However, having two different Galaxy games cannibalized the voting.

Cap'n Coconuts wrote:
Someone really should make [Super Super Barbie Bros. 346].

Do it!

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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Sat Jul 12, 2014 2:22 am 
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Interesting results! Glad to see SMB Odyssey was so high on the list! And, in my personal opinion, it deserves the current spot on the list (as I'm not that big of a fan of Midas Machine OR Toad Strikes Back, in all honesty. Not saying they're bad; I just like Odyssey a lot better).

@smbmaster99: Congrats on having your game make the #2 slot on the list!
@VinnyVideo: You can just get the donuts to me whenever you want. Preferably Dunkin' Donuts.

And could you maybe throw in a coffee?

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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Sun Jul 13, 2014 10:50 pm 
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The age and join date sections are screaming for some line charts or something.

And speaking of charts, here's the MFGG traffic statistics from 2005 - 2010, when I stopped tracking the data. The sharp drop in forum traffic marks the transition to the first phpBB, and the data ends with the community split.

Maybe you can find some correlation with your data.

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 Post subject: Re: Who's MFGG? The results are in - Part One
PostPosted: Tue Jul 15, 2014 9:49 pm 
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Interesting results!
Also,

Quote:
Also nominated was Super Super Barbie Bros. 346, which sounds like an amazing fangame,
Laughed out lout at this.

 
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