Facts and Figures 2024

Over at LadiesGamers, we love seeing facts and figures for the site. Not only are Paula and I keen on seeing statistics, but Lynne loves them, too! Years ago, I started a little tradition of publishing figures about the site’s traffic every year. This last week of 2024 is perfect for that.

Time to take a look at the year that’s behind us.

Update Google SEO Algorithms

Since I started the site in 2014, the site has been growing every year. Sadly, in this anniversary year Google updated their SEO algorithms. This means search results now show you answers to the questions you pose by giving small snippets of texts that seem to be all you need. However, they are made by AI and taken from content around the web. After that section, you’ll come to a whole slew of sponsored ads crafted to look like real results, after which the big sites and Reddit follow. So kudos to you if you search further to check in with smaller websites.

All of this means the smaller independent websites have taken a hit in views. I know of many of them who have had no option but to throw in the towel because they needed the income to stay afloat. Good sites closed their doors, and we are fortunate to stay afloat because we were always treating LadiesGamers as a hobby site and nobody gets an income from it. The support of the Patrons helps to keep the engine going, as does my daytime job.

A pity that just this year we started with ad space for games that we think are good, for which we specifically approach developers and publishers. Not a good moment when you lose 65% of your views!

Traffic at the site

In 2024, we published 635 articles, even more than last year when we had 585. Reviews, guides, our view on upcoming games each month, articles listing the best off, gaming news and editorials. They were all there, including one anniversary survey.

Amazingly, the article that had the best views in 2024 is an unlikely one: Nintendo eShop Sales January 2024. This was before the update from Google, and somehow this article was picked up by various news sites. As it’s old news of course, you might be better taking a look at the current sales article!

Like our writers, our readers are always spread all over the world, with the United States taking up half of the views. This has been consistently the case; the United States is where our main audience is. The chart below lists only the most important countries.

Rating the Reviews

We reviewed and previewed 486 games this year (in 2023, we reviewed 406 games), so quite a bit more. 149 games on Switch, 334 on Steam, and 2 on mobile. Like last year, we reviewed more on Steam than on Switch. Of course, it all depends on what’s on offer and which gaming device our writers have.

James was our most active reviewer, writing 122 of them. Kalina was in second place, writing 83 reviews. Paula came in third with 77, and Mina fourth with 68.

As we always do, we scored them in our rating system. Below, you can see how we rated them, without the 84 that were previews of demos that don’t get a rating. Like every year, we gave the verdict of “I Like it a Lot” most, and we gave just as many “Two Thumbs Up” as “I Like it”.

Variety in Articles

Even though most views go to guides, reviews, and the Best of… lists, we try to make LadiesGamers’ content pleasing to our audience, especially those who are returning visitors and maybe even support us through our Patreon page.

As I already mentioned, 2024 was our 10-year anniversary, and we celebrated by creating a collection of special articles. Not only our current team made a contribution, but we also asked the writers that had been there in the 10 years to share their thoughts in A Trip Down Memory Lane: Part 1 and A Trip Down Memory Lane: Part 2. And as we couldn’t have done it without the developers and publishers that trusted us with their review codes over the years, we also made Publishers and LadiesGamers: A 10-Year Partnership Story.

We like publishing the kind of personal stories that we are known for related to video games. Like for example, the articles we wrote about Christmas 2024 or the Summer Holidays. Or the series of YvoCaro Plays and Paula’s Game Ramblings. Most of the time, it is about video games, but sometimes it is about happenings in our lives, too.

Lastly, we also hosted several giveaways again, which publishers and developers kindly made possible. We did 7 giveaways for Meg’s Monster, Plantabi: Little Garden, Dadoo: Twists, Turns and Mischief, Shy Dogs Hidden Orchestra, Railway Islands 2, and Snow Bros. Wonderland. It may be good to know that our Patrons in Tier 2 and 3 have an advantage when it comes to winning!

Best Viewed Reviews

Let’s see what reviews and previews performed best in views in 2023. On Steam, games often go into Early Access first or release a rather extensive demo ahead of the full release. We get asked to preview these, and as it often is just as much work as reviewing a full game, these are also included in the list.

Hammerwatch II (2024)
Nora: the Wannabe Alchemist
9 R.I.P. (2024)
Dreamland Farm (2024)
The Lost Legends of Redwall: The Scout Anthology (2024)
Echoes of Plum Grove (2024)
Sprout Valley
Everafter Falls (2024)
Spirit of the Island
High Sea Saga DX

I’m not sure why, but normally we see many reviews in our top best views of earlier years. This year though most of them actually stem from 2024.

Guides, Guides and More Guides

Though reviews are the main staple on Ladiesgamers, we have found that guides work exceptionally well in views. Writing takes much more time than a review, but it’s also very satisfying. In my opinion, you can’t write a guide if you don’t really love the game you are covering. It’s not always a full walkthrough; our guides are often tips to get you started in the game. Our readers love them too, so that’s very rewarding for us.

Like last year, the Farm Tycoon guide does exceptionally well. Made in 2022, there is still a lot of attention for it, third year in a row. Others keep doing well too, like the Lucy Dreaming guide and the Season: A Letter to the Future guide. Of course, there are a lot of guides on the site, and though they might not all get constant attention, I’m sure there are readers that find them very useful.

So, that’s it for 2024, the end of our 10-year Anniversary. Thank you, all of you, for finding us, reading what we put up, and especially for all your kind comments along the way. We will once again strive to make 2025 a year as memorable as this one and keep going for another 10 years!

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