Hey, lady gamers: your ranks are increasing. A study by the NPD Group has revealed that the number of female console gamers is on the rise, reaching 28% of the console userbase earlier this year.

That mark represents a 5% increase over 2008, and was helped along by a 19% increase in Wii use across the board. "Last year was one of the most transformative in history in terms of defining the audience for gaming, says Anita Frazier, from the NPD Group. "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."

If you're wondering how they came across these numbers, they were drawn from a survey group of 20,000 people, aged 2-65.