HARDxCORE vs. Casual

[rodjoh]

To me casual or "hardcore" is not about the game itself, but how much time you actually dedicate to games as a gamer (or non-gamer). A game like Guitar Hero can be considered casual or hardcore depending on how you look at it, but let's say someone just plays it when gets invited over to parties or something, and wants to play only the easiest songs or the songs he knows/likes, while there's someone that is obssesed with GH and records himself FCing TTFAF and uploads it on youtube and all that crap... how would you label each one of them?

Then again why label people? It's just games. What happened to just having fun and forgetting bout the rest?

[tanooki141]

To me casual or "hardcore" is not about the game itself, but how much time you actually dedicate to games as a gamer (or non-gamer). A game like Guitar Hero can be considered casual or hardcore depending on how you look at it, but let's say someone just plays it when gets invited over to parties or something, and wants to play only the easiest songs or the songs he knows/likes, while there's someone that is obssesed with GH and records himself FCing TTFAF and uploads it on youtube and all that crap... how would you label each one of them?

Then again why label people? It's just games. What happened to just having fun and forgetting bout the rest?

agreed, it depends on how you play and it is more of a spectrum than a black and white comparison.

[The_Hangman]

"To me casual or "hardcore" is not about the game itself, but how much time you actually dedicate to games as a gamer (or non-gamer). A game like Guitar Hero can be considered casual or hardcore depending on how you look at it, but let's say someone just plays it when gets invited over to parties or something, and wants to play only the easiest songs or the songs he knows/likes, while there's someone that is obssesed with GH and records himself FCing TTFAF and uploads it on youtube and all that crap... how would you label each one of them?

Then again why label people? It's just games. What happened to just having fun and forgetting bout the rest?"

My thoughts exactly.
For me, a hardcore gamer is someone who truly cares about video games. A casual gamer is someone who passively enjoys video games but who does not truly care for the medium.

[SEGAsbest]

My thoughts exactly.
For me, a hardcore gamer is someone who truly cares about video games. A casual gamer is someone who passively enjoys video games but who does not truly care for the medium.

This is true. Also, the fact is they exist, I have never seen anyone but Wii owners attempt to deny it. It's a fact.

It's like saying Movie buffs don't exist and that the person who would sit down and watch Angels with Dirty Faces is the exact same person who goes to see Step up 2 the streets, or Fast and the Furious Tokyo Drift. They aren't and that's all there is too it.

There are three groups in my opinion, casual (Wii sports), mainstream (Halo, GTA) and hardcore (Street Fighter, Virtua Fighter, Half-Life, Zelda). These are just examples, and minor hybrids can exist. Also I view mainstream as the least exclusive of the three, I think hardcores can drift into those games but I know people who just play Halo, Modern Warfare and GTA, and they are not core gamers. Just younger, generally college-aged men who like the latest shooter with nice graphics.

I would also add that I believe being a true core gamer requires basic knowledge of the industry, if for example you don't know Namco makes Soul Calibur, or Square Enix makes Final Fantasy, and cannot tell the difference between 1st and 3rd party companies I wouldn't consider you a core gamer.

[amazingjanet]

My thoughts exactly.
For me, a hardcore gamer is someone who truly cares about video games. A casual gamer is someone who passively enjoys video games but who does not truly care for the medium.

This is true. Also, the fact is they exist, I have never seen anyone but Wii owners attempt to deny it. It's a fact.

If it's a fact, point to definitive research that shows this. Also, mass generalisation to dismiss opposing views.

It's like saying Movie buffs don't exist and that the person who would sit down and watch Angels with Dirty Faces is the exact same person who goes to see Step up 2 the streets, or Fast and the Furious Tokyo Drift. They aren't and that's all there is too it.

How do you know? You don't have market research to indicate anything in regards to difference in demographics, taste or anything else. People see movies based on their interested, not on their generalised label.

There are three groups in my opinion, casual (Wii sports), mainstream (Halo, GTA) and hardcore (Street Fighter, Virtua Fighter, Half-Life, Zelda). These are just examples, and minor hybrids can exist. Also I view mainstream as the least exclusive of the three, I think hardcores can drift into those games but I know people who just play Halo, Modern Warfare and GTA, and they are not core gamers. Just younger, generally college-aged men who like the latest shooter with nice graphics.

So you say that "hardcore" and "casual" are fact, then back that up with wild anecdotal speculation, like most other people, indicating no clear definition.

I would also add that I believe being a true core gamer requires basic knowledge of the industry, if for example you don't know Namco makes Soul Calibur, or Square Enix makes Final Fantasy, and cannot tell the difference between 1st and 3rd party companies I wouldn't consider you a core gamer.

More blurry distinctions that are entirely your own assumption to back up something that is fact.

Here is actually verifiable research from people who should be in the know.

http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_i ... tory=19554" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Conducted with market research firm NPD, the study surveyed 2,611 gamers and determined that lines between casual and hardcore are blurry at best, and gamer demographics are broader than conventional thinking has held. As Big Fish chief strategy officer (CSO) Paul Thelen stated during a Casual Connect keynote, the traditional casual approach of "'one size fits all' doesn't work."

Rather than simply separating gamers into casual and hardcore, Big Fish created 10 casual gaming segments and four core gaming segments - when it comes to demographics, business models, and platforms, the gaming market is diverging, not converging, the company claims.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/e ... sual-label" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

"EA has learned a lot about casual entertainment in the past two years, and found that casual gaming defies a single genre and demographic," explained EA in a statement.

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3 ... gamers.php" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3 ... gamers.php" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3 ... gamers.php" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/5170.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

With few exceptions, every job people need or want to do has a social, a functional, and an emotional dimension. If marketers understand each of these dimensions, then they can design a product that's precisely targeted to the job. In other words, the job, not the customer, is the fundamental unit of analysis for a marketer who hopes to develop products that customers will buy.

[...]

By understanding the job and improving the product's social, functional, and emotional dimensions so that it did the job better, the company's milk shakes would gain share against the real competition—not just competing chains' milk shakes but bananas, boredom, and bagels. This would grow the category, which brings us to an important point: Job-defined markets are generally much larger than product category-defined markets. Marketers who are stuck in the mental trap that equates market size with product categories don't understand whom they are competing against from the customer's point of view.

Notice that knowing how to improve the product did not come from understanding the "typical" customer. It came from understanding the job. Need more evidence?

Pierre Omidyar did not design eBay for the "auction psychographic." He founded it to help people sell personal items. Google was designed for the job of finding information, not for a "search demographic." The unit of analysis in the work that led to Procter & Gamble's stunningly successful Swiffer was the job of cleaning floors, not a demographic or psychographic study of people who mop.

Why do so many marketers try to understand the consumer rather than the job? One reason may be purely historical: In some of the markets in which the tools of modern market research were formulated and tested, such as feminine hygiene or baby care, the job was so closely aligned with the customer demographic that if you understood the customer, you would also understand the job. This coincidence is rare, however. All too frequently, marketers' focus on the customer causes them to target phantom needs.

[SEGAsbest]

stuff here

So basically if we are to believe your argument, there is no difference between people who know who Yukio Futatsugi, Yu Suzuki, Shigeru Miyamoto, or Nobuo Uematsu are and those who have never even heard about them or care who they are? And there is no difference between people who know who know who Elia Kazan, Cary Grant, or Stanley Kubrick are and those who do not?

There is a difference between the people who care about gaming as an art and care about the designers and development teams behind the games they enjoy, and bother even remembering those teams/individuals in the first place. Now if you want to argue the type of games hardcore gamers play I'll agree, it's much harder to define, but the difference between those of us who remember designer names and composers is undeniable.

You either do or you don't.

[ccrankles]

stuff here

So basically if we are to believe your argument, there is no difference between people who know who Yukio Futatsugi, Yu Suzuki, Shigeru Miyamoto, or Nobuo Uematsu are and those who have never even heard about them or care who they are? And there is no difference between people who know who know who Elia Kazan, Cary Grant, or Stanley Kubrick are and those who do not?

There is a difference between the people who care about gaming as an art and care about the designers and development teams behind the games they enjoy, and bother even remembering those teams/individuals in the first place. Now if you want to argue the type of games hardcore gamers play I'll agree, it's much harder to define, but the difference between those of us who remember designer names and composers is undeniable.

You either do or you don't.

But that's not really what the hardcore vs casual debate is about as it actually plays out on blogs and forums around this internet of ours, is it? If you go to Kotaku or Joystiq and find a commentor who is posting, "The Wii is for casual gamers, it doesn't have any hardcore games, six inches of dust, etc" and try to engage him in a conversation about scores and composers, how do you think it will turn out? Do it one hundred times and what do you think the success rate will be?

Yes, you are noting an actual distinction, but it's not really getting at what real people (and/or trolls) are debating when these terms pop up in common usage.

[drew]

Smileyryder is one of my favorite people ever.

You could compare games to music, books, cars.. a multitude of things.
In other words, some choices people make I WILL certainly disagree with. But if you'd rather read Twilight than Sherlock holmes, that's your business. To extend this a bit further, the author of Twilight probably isn't going to write anything I'd consider decent anytime, ever. But.. maybe a few young readers will move on and find truly good literature. Same goes for kids and devs involved in shovelware. Perhaps they will hone their skills and move on. Sometimes they won't though, and that's okay.

I simply fail to see how a couple of senior citizens enjoying Wii Tennis is the apocalypse. Gaming isn't something you can't fence off into distinct areas; if you try you're going to miss out on a lot of good times, nevermind the fact that you sound like an immature idiot.

[D3stiny_Sm4sher]

So as indicated by my recent article about E3, I'm getting mighty fed up of this antagonism toward games designed to appeal to a market that is different from you sitting there reading this article about gaming on a gaming forum in your gaming T-shirt.

I watched some E3 vids on GameTrailers and on TWO separate occasions two different people basically said "Nintendo's conference was for REAL gamers, Microsoft's wasn't," using the term "real gamers" and putting emphasis on the word "real" and very blatantly implying that people who enjoy the Kinect are idiots. While I THINK I know what they MEANT by this, taken at literal value this term is pointless. I watch movies but not ALL of the time every day and I don't stay up-to-date on upcoming movies and I don't go on internet forums to talk about movies and I don't wear movie T-shirts. Am I not a "REAL movie fan?" If someone tried to make that argument I'd be pissed off because I rather enjoy movies, very much, when I do watch them.

So I'm asking someone, anyone, to please define for me what a "REAL" or even "hardcore" gamer is. Because this is unsettling to me. My wife plays Ocean Party and Tetris and various puzzle games all of the damned time. So you can't say "they play video games a lot." And you can't say, "They play video games that aren't on Facebook" or "they play video games that don't suck" because that's a bulls*** argument. Just because a video game isn't similar in structure or content to something from the 80's doesn't make it less "real."

So I am dead serious, some one please define what "real gamer" means because if we can't actually DEFINE this phrase then we shouldn't be using it. I admit, I'm ashamed I rely on "casual" and "hardcore" as phrases because in the gaming world those words have become USELESS. They don't even MEAN anything anymore, they just have these implications, these general FEELINGS, not anything concrete. Everyone has their own interpretation, just like the word "art." Of course, the words themselves do have real definitions, but when applied to people who play video games, those meanings seem butchered and have "good" and "bad" connotations associated with them. For example, calling someone a "casual" as a noun has become an INSULT. WHY in God's name are people who have LIVES looked at as IDIOTS now?

People like Jeff Green or John Davison have families, they don't have all of the time in the world to play games, they play Lego ____ games with their kids. But they seem to thoroughly enjoy that. Would we not consider them "real" gamers if those were the only types of games they played, even if they played them regularly and paid attention to quality of design and enjoyed their time with them very much?

I guess I'm going a bit off topic here but this is calling to mind an argument my friend has made about the "games as art" debate. He says it's rubbish. Not because games are not quality products but because "art" has become a useless word because everyone applies their own definition to it. I have to admit, I've been trying to avoid the word ever since he pointed this out.

The whole basis of language is common understanding. If a word no longer has a common understanding, it becomes practically valueless. This is happening with word slike "casual," "hardcore" and even "gamer."

WTF is a GAMER, even? I always thought it was someone who plays video games. Meaning my wife is a gamer because she plays lots of flash games. My brother is a gamer 'cuz he plays MLB video games and MLB video games alone. My other brother COLLECTS games and rarely plays them but he DOES play them.

The problem? We as the online gaming community at large, would not prescribe the term "gamer" to these people. This is because we have taken what is SUPPOSED to be a general term and applied to it a specific type of definition (which, mind you, isn't even concrete). Moviegoers watch movies. READERS read books. Gamers play games. It doesn't matter how much you do these actions or what GENRE of content you're consuming. While you are doing it, you are that noun.

So once people starting playing games that did not fit this kind of oddly specific definition that we've prescribed to the word "gamer," we felt the need to come up with a new word. That word is "hardcore." Now that other people with different tastes than ours play video games, we felt the need to segregate to maintain our "gamer culture," our "gamer pride," so we felt compelled to separate ourselves as "hardcore" and "casual."

But get this. People we classify as "casual" has their OWN word (and many still do) for what we call "hardcore." That word is "nerd." The word "nerd" for the longest time had a negative connotation, but now it's starting to get a positive one. "Hardcore" is a word than intimidates many people but now it's lost its edge. Why? Because we now apply it to everyone who likes old-fashioned formats of games. Traditional video game formats. Unfortunately that means the value of the word "hardcore" is kind of demeaned even further, because the whole purpose of the word in the first place was to describe a minuscule minority. People like Keith Apicary, who actively collect old game systems and freaking velcro them to their bodies. If we're ALL "hardcore" then the word "hardcore" has lost it's damned meaning.

So let's look this crap up, a la http://www.merriam-webster.com/

Hardcore:
1 : a central or fundamental and usually enduring group or part: as a : a relatively small enduring core of society marked by apparent resistance to change or inability to escape a persistent wretched condition (as poverty or chronic unemployment) b : a militant or fiercely loyal faction
(haha, I love that bit about "wretched condition," as I think there are many many jaded people out there)

Casual:
1 : subject to, resulting from, or occurring by chance <a casual meeting>
2 a : occurring without regularity : occasional <casual employment> b : employed for irregular periods <a casual worker> c : met with on occasion and known only superficially <a casual friend>
3 a (1) : feeling or showing little concern : nonchalant <a casual approach to cooking> (2) : lacking a high degree of interest or devotion <casual sports fans> <casual readers> (3) : done without serious intent or commitment <casual sex> b (1) : informal, natural <a casual conversation> (2) : designed for informal use <casual clothing>

If we're actually using the LITERAL definitions of these words, I am not a hardcore OR a casual gamer. I am neither. But I am NOT inbetween, either. I am NOT resistant to change, I embrace it. I play video games with great regularity and not by chance.

My wife probably plays almost as much video games as I do. They just happen to be flash games. Implying that she's some idiot or retard and treating her like she's a "poison that is killing the industry" is immature and rude.

ANYWAY. Sorry, I know I'm rambling. Helps to process thoughts in my own head I guess. Hopefully SOMETHING from that stream of consciousness made some sense.

Point is, it's not even the technical literal meaning of these words that's the issue, it's the fact that we take a word that means one thing and twist it and give it a negative connotation that we use to put ourselves above others.

When people talk about "casual crap" they imply that something like Nintendogs is worthless even though it's very well made.

What a word technically means and the meaning we end up twisting it into can be a big deal. The words "MODS BAN ME PLEASE" and "gay" say "hello."

Anyway, he whole reason I even give a damn about any of this is:
If we as the community that is passionate about this medium, WHATEVER we want to call ourselves, actively resist change and insult and demean anyone or anything that comes along that is different and TREAT it like it's inherently worthless, we are robbing ourselves of a future where the medium we love is enjoyed by everyone of all tastes.

We are also robbing ourselves of future non-traditional experiences like REZ, Flower, and Shadow of the Colossus.

[AndyTheZombie]

I hate the word casual and hardcore when it comes to games I'm a Gamer and that is it!!


That's like saying a hardcore movie goer Vs a casual movie goer lol it doesn't make any sense to me.

[NY Gamer]

While I haven't read the entire thread, I can agree with most here that the terms Casual and Hardcore should've never existed in gaming!

Gaming has evolved from the Atari and NES days by far! Graphics, story, mechanics, sounds. Most, if not All parts of gaming have evolved, but 1. The Goal! Solve a puzzle, beat a baddie, get a high score, rescue the damsel, partner, villain... w/e! If i may, Kingdom Hearts is the same as Gauntlet... essentially!!!

Games are either easy, hard, or just right. Easy games help newcomers into gaming adjust to play harder games once they grasp the concepts of the easy... in a way, Newcomers evolve.

We play what we play. From the easy to the ridiculous! We are all gamers no matter what! Some people love the simplicity of Tetris, Pac-Man, Galaga... hell, I like me a nice game of Galaga! Then we got the simple surface, complex internals games like Kingdom Hearts, Call of Duty, Mario & Luigi, Castle Crashers, Etc. All can be cleared by simple means, but then there under the surface lies a few tricks to improve your style of play.

It's funny though, cause it's a bit ridiculous that the "Hardcore" bash the "Casual" scene. The thing is WE ALL were casual in the beginning! Playing Tetris or Super Mario on the NES or Pong on an Atari, it doesn't matter! We just chose to pursuit gaming a bit further than others!

In short, We should adopt new terms (Beginners, Veteran, w/e) or just drop them in the long run. We all are what we are. We just need to show a bit more respect to one another.

[beez1717]

What I hate is how the media seems to just say "if it's on wii then it CAN'T be hardcore" and leave it at that. I find that this just isn't good for the industry as a whole. I wish that people finally realized that the hardcore gamers are the people who play lots of games, know what they are talking about, like completing a game 100% or work to get the highest score possible. Where the "latest and greatest graphics and/or blood and/or sexy girl and/or Guns = hardcore game" come from? I don't think anyone would doubt that Super Mario World or Mario 3 is a hardcore game but yet the media is saying that it ISN'T. Sigh.... With the media going down this road it's no wonder we have tons of WWII FPS games telling you "be a bro, and play our game!" and we also have tons of games where some character is a large breasted woman kicking ass just to try and make her look more sexy.

Heck I like character like Estelle from Tales of Vesparia. I also happen to not like Judith as much but then again It might be personality or it might be the pink hair or maybe it's because Estelle looks more normally proportioned, but for whatever reason I've always thought Estelle was cute and Judith was not...

For those of you who don't know what i'm talking about:

This is the best picture of Estelle I can find


And this is the best picture of Judith I can find:

[dlf]

I'll play what ever the hell I want to play, if it's entertaining. Why refuse to play something because "OMG THESE GRAPHICS SUCK".