The ever quotable Anita Frazier of the NPD Group tells us all that, "Last year was one of the most transformative in history in terms of defining the audience for gaming."

"Even with the increased competition from mobile and social network gaming, the console gamer segment added the most new participants to its ranks in the last year."

This comes off the back of NPD's new report, 'Gamer Segmentation 2009', which showed that the percentage of female gamers compared to their male counterparts increased from 23% of the total market in 2008 to 28% in (what we've had so far of) 2009.

Now, of course, it's time for the hardcore to poo-poo this because Nintendo's Wii with 19% increase in use from 2008 was the main cause.

We'd recommend that these poo-pooers go and play with their hardcore male pals... we welcome the new female intake with open arms; oh yes we do.