Casual gamers and games by Gezegond

I decide to post up comment from Gezegond because what he said has some truth. 


"Casual Games" like all other things has its ups and downs. Ups, as you mentioned above is that less skilled players can easily play them, and it opens a way for independent developers to sell their games.

However the downs of it, is what scares me. You see, in these times, when casual game's sales are high, they become an illusion.
why? because people start to think: "casual games are cheaper to develop, and sell more. so why even bother a developing a hardcore game?"

That's obviously bad, because casual gamers can learn to play more satisfying, more complex games in time. However, hardcore gamers, who have tasted the joy of hardcore games, can't go back and play casual games. At least not as their main games. To me, casual games are just a relaxing break after a tense hardcore gaming experience.

So right now, casual games are a designer's best bet. We hardcore gamers take one or two of the best games out there (World of Warcraft, Call of Duty, Halo, Battlefield, etc.) and practice on those, therefore we won't care about less valuable games. These games are bought by people who have less experience and skills, and therefore won't care about the game's different aspects that much. These people won't really care about the amount of time and money spent when the game is being developed, as long as the game can entertain them for some time.
These people are called casual gamers, and games designed specifically for these people are called casual games. So casual games, are games that are easy and cheap to develop, yet they can entertain people for quite a time.

So what's bad about these "casual games"? Since they're cheap to develop, yet sell a lot, they become a designer's first priority. NDS becomes full of simple games, Wii is built specifically for casual gamers, apple believes that iphone is the best handheld console, since it has so many casual games, simple facebook games are played more than million dollar budget games, PSP creates a section dedicated to casual games called "Minis", and most recently we have Natal and Move, both aimed at casual gamers. (Move is less casual oriented though)


Now let's fast forward some years later, your 10 year old niece have been playing facebook games for a couple of years, now he has become a "skilled player" at these games, he knows everything about them, and he's itching to play a game that's a little more complex. He has now become a "hardcore gamer". However all developer's care about is simple casual games, because in these times, they have proven to be more profitable. What is happening is that these casual gamers are becoming less and less, because no hardcore gamer will ever become a casual gamer. suddenly people will get tired of these "casual games". they want something more complex to do, suddenly casual games stop to sell, so will the casual hardware, and all that money and attention that is put into the casual games will go to waste, and guess what? the video game industry will crash.

Why am I so sure that this will happen? because it has happened before, in the only other generation besides this generation that lasted more that five year, the second generation of video games. Just replace "Atari 2600 cartridges" with "casual games", and you'll find out that this situation has been happened before. And what do they say? History repeats itself.
More Info here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_video_game_crash_of_1983

So what is the answer here? I believe it's simple, yet for some reason forgotten.
The answer is: quality level design, plus balanced difficulty levels.

In a game like "Half-Life", player can choose the difficulty in the beginning, so casual gamers can easily choose "beginner skill levels", while skilled players can choose harder difficulties.
Now if the level design is done well, even a player with no previous experience can learn to play the game, and in time, become skilled at it.
As an example, in Half-Life 2, when you first receive your first handgun, the very first opponent you'll see is at an obvious disadvantage, he won't shoot you a lot, and won't move a lot. so the player gets to learn "how to aim". that's an easy task. next opponents are much farther and they move a lot. so the player now needs to learn to "aim better". In time, the non-experienced player will become experienced, just like how you become more skilled the more you play a specific sport.

If a game excels at these, it can be played by both the "hardcore gamers", AND the "casual gamers". These games sell really well (Half-Life and Half-Life 2 are 5th and 6th top selling games on PC), and push the video game industry farther (instead of holding it, like casual games do).
Developers should focus on creating quality games that are easily played by everyone, instead of focusing on a specific group of gamers.

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