Oh, the things you do and say when you should really be working. From a conversation about the PS3 between David and Jack:
[While discussing the PS3 and it's future...]
Jack: it’s a stale system that has “potential” in 2008
David: IF they put some games out
Jack: exactly
David: MGS4 is too far away
Jack: right now, i haven’t heard of any must have games since the launch!
which is pretty amazing
David: and Assassins Creed looks way cooler than MGS4
pretty ports, that’s about it for now
Jack: my wild prediction is that MGS4 and Halo 3 are going to be considered colossal duds
comparatively speaking
then the industry will go into this huge insecure era of self retrospection
David: bah .. just look at EA .. they’re getting into new games, moving away from ports-only, and embracing Nintendo’s philosophy
there are no more “gamers”. that term is dead.
you don’t say “oh, that person is a cell phone user” .. it’s just becoming a ubiquitous term
Jack: true. i was thinking back on the 80′s and 90′s, as i am wont to do, and i remembered there was no such thing as a hardcore gamer
hardcore gamer = what you get when your audience is shrinking and becoming an obscure niche
David: hardcore, to me, is a person who plays any game they can get their hands on.
but to most people, it’s a guy who plays Halo/GTA/MGS/etc
Jack: no no, it means headshots and blood splatter
i say, half kidding of course
David: it’s the opposite in the film world, where a movie buff generally likes the smaller, independent films .. oddball stuff
a “hardcore” movie buff wouldn’t be used to describe someone who is generally interested in blockbuster movies.
I think perceptions will change soon ..
and they’ll have to
terms like “hardcore” or “gamer” no longer mean anything, at least to me
Jack: i’d call it the myth of the hardcore gamer
a marketing term drummed up by people like Microsoft to sell Xbox’s
to a certain demo
unfortunately, it was responsible for shrinking and alienating the market
What do you think, folks? We talk about it a lot, but are the lines being blurred? Do these terms mean anything anymore?
I think there is definitely a difference between a casual gamer and a “hardcore” gamer.
The term “hardcore” can have a lot of different meanings to different people, however, “casual” is generally used to describe people who only play games casually, as in not often.
The type of people who only buy one or two games A YEAR, are casual gamers.
Hardcore gamers are people who’s main hobby is gaming. The kind who buy a LOT of games and put MANY hours into them.
I think there’s most definitely a difference.
That isn’t to say the two can’t co-exist or play the same games.
As for the PS3 not having any games, that’s entirely subjective. I own a PS3 and there are at least 5 games I really want by the end of the year coming out, whereas there are only 3 I really want for my Wii.
Any Nintendo fan who denies that the game LittleBigPlanet looks AMAZING is simply lying to themselves or ignoring it.
I’ll say this: I’m cas-core!
How am I really defined, though? I buy games and play them occasionally. I haven’t turned on my Wii in 4 days, or my DS in 2, but I own games that I’m still looking forward to playing.
Or maybe it’s the style of game? I like to play games that don’t always have a story or an ending. Is that casual? Or can you be a hardcore gamer and only do puzzlers?
More thoughts, please!
I’m med-core because of limited time. My parents limit how much I can play. I would be hardcore, but……..
EVERY system out there right now has at least one “must have” game coming for it, folks!
As for the labels, some commenter right here on Infendo described it rather nicely: whether you are “hardcore” or “casual” depends solely on the number of hours you put into a game. I’m not sure how many hours would make you cross the line between “casual” and “hardcore”, though… I’m guessing it isn’t a clear line, more like a wide grayscale gradient.
But if you play just a few hours of any game, you are a “casual” gamer; if you play a LOT of hours on a particular game, you are a “hardcore” gamer for that game (as in “hardcore WoW gamer”), and if you play a lot of hours on all games you can get your hands on, you are a “hardcore gamer”.
At least that’s how I use the terms…
cas-core, FTW. Wait, since I used the term ‘ftw” — does that now make me hardcore? I’m so confused!
I agree with InvisibleMan on this one. However, I’m a long-time gamer — I played Colecovision for Pete’s sake — but can no longer dedicate huge chunks of time to gaming (I probably would if I could, though). Still, I think most would still consider me to be a “hardcore” gamer, although I dislike the term because it sounds stupid. I play both casual games as well as titles with a little more depth, such as RPGs, so I guess it’s hard to stick a label on someone like me.
I also agree that the term “gamer” is probably on it’s last legs. Cell phone games, in particular, have helped eliminate this classification. Most everyone under the age of 70 plays some form of electronic game or another — they’re just too prevelant. However, there’s still a definitive line between the obsessive WoW player and someone who enjoys playing Bejeweled on their Motorola…so, I guess I can’t really come to any conclusions. Sorry everybody.
Bottom line to me: Games are games, and there are a lot of good games coming out for everybody. So everybody should be happy right?
Little Big Planet looks good, but other that customizing your character, there seems to be no real plot to follow, It’s kind of like that Line Rider game, pretty cool to look at, but It really needs a point to keep people glued to their seat… It might be way to how games will evolve to have user content, but it really needs something to tie it all together.
Ps3 has games coming out, but most of them are not the ones that people want. Gran Turismo 5 Prologue is just a taste of what’s to come in 2009, MGS fans are getting tired of just trailers, they wanna play it already, before in launches in march 2008. Final Fantasy… yeah, where’s FF?? Namco, Capcom, Bandai, Konami, Ubisoft, Activision and EA already said they wanna avoid exclusive titles, since they wanna make money of every console. People seem to be waiting to buy a Ps3 but, it needs something to pull you to it. without it, you really just see the $500 entry price.
Microsoft seems to expect that Halo 3 will make them sell another 5,000,000 consoles. yeah right. It’s selling because all the sequels they are buying, if they can pay Rockstar 50 million for exclusive downloads, how much can Capcom expect for resident evil 5 extras? maybe 30? microsoft is buying their share, they are the Paris Hilton of gaming.
what was the question again? Oh yeah, no, the lines have been put forth as never before. Diving the gaming market more than it was already divided has brought companies to stop and rethink their strategies. Right now it stand like this:
1. Nintendo vs Sony/Microsoft: Casual or hardcore?
2. Microsoft vs Sony: many hardcore online games or few hardcore with semi-online games
3. Sony vs SOME third parties: Exclusive titles not possible anymore or too expensive hardware.
4.Microsoft vs gamers: Red lights can’t be fixed, fix it for free.
5. Nintendo vs Nintendo hardcore fans: are we getting left out of your plan for casual gaming?
6. Nintendo vs SOME third party Managements: Is the Wii going to be a fad?
7. Portables vs consoles: Are consoles getting replaced by the high tech portables?
Before it was just problems like Nintendo wants too much royalties, Sega has too many formats, Playstation has tons of piracy, Xbox has no exclusive titles, portable have low batteries (ok, the PSP is still suffering that problem), etc, etc… Gamers have a voice now that thanks to infendo and website and online communities, and have added a lot to a messed up industry, screaming for change.
I only get 2hrs a week to play Wii and work lunchtimes to play DS yet I still finish games like nsmb and mariokart DS with 3star ratings. I read more about games and the industry than I play. What does that make me? In the end, who really cares? Only the minority that think they’re the majority and are kidding themselves.
I’ve been in the habit for a while now of referring to myself as an ‘old-school’ gamer.
I like older games, yes…but more importantly, my tastes tend to gravitate towards games that have old-school concepts and sensibilities.
New Super Mario Brothers, Viewtiful Joe, Godhand, Sonic & The Secret Rings, Shoot ‘em ups like Raiden and Ikaruga, Light Gun-style games, Hack-n-slashers (to a certain extent, at least) Okami, Mario Kart, 2D fighters, Zelda games, etc.
I think that’s why I’ve stuck so firmly with Nintendo after all these years. Their games tend to focus on the fun factor, rather than some sort of…experience.
Part of it is that so many games these days feel like all you do is play for a few minutes, watch a cut scene, play for a few more minutes, watch another cut scene…I find that rather boring.
There’s nothing really wrong with that, and there are exceptions to the rule, of course. It’s just generally not to my tastes, is all.
The other part of is is just the nitty gritty game mechanics at work. NSMB and Viewtiful Joe are just modern platformers, in a way. Godhand kept all the simplicity and fun of older beat ‘em up games, Sonic had old-school level memorization, among other things…I could go on, I’m sure!
But Nintendo’s games have clearly always been about being a fun game first and (for better or worse) and being an “experience” second, I feel. Unfortunately, not many games that appeal to my tastes come out very often.
So yeah…I don’t know if that makes me “casual” or “hardcore”. I don’t buy all that many games (until or unless they’re wicked cheap), but when I do I quite literally play the ever-lovin’ shit out of them!
Doesn’t really matter, I suppose. Labels are fairly stupid, anyway.
I have to address Little Big Planet now that it’s been brought up. I have to agree with rokerovakero that it looks like little more than a sandbox game. And I don’t deny that it looks good and is very cute, and therein lies my gripe. What happened to all those Nintendo nay-sayers who denounced Nintendo for being “kiddy” and “too cutesy”? Oh, that’s right. Now they’re saying that Little Big Planet is sooo great. I specifically recall reading one account that it was “adorable”. What the hell happened? When Nintendo is cute, it’s an atrocimacy. But when Sony does it, it’s the wave of the future? I can’t stand that kind of hypocracy.
“it’s the opposite in the film world, where a movie buff generally likes the smaller, independent films .. oddball stuff
a “hardcore†movie buff wouldn’t be used to describe someone who is generally interested in blockbuster movies.”
So true. So true.
If games were movies, Halo would be the love child of Michael Bay and Jerry Bruckheimer.
“I specifically recall reading one account that it was “adorableâ€. What the hell happened? When Nintendo is cute, it’s an atrocimacy. But when Sony does it, it’s the wave of the future? I can’t stand that kind of hypocracy.”
You do realize that it’s likely not the SAME people saying those things, right?
Don’t lump every person who owns a non-nintendo console into some “I hate kiddy” pool. You’re being rather ignorant, talking like that.
I’m a Nintendo fan, but I’m also a Sony fan, MS fan… basically a GAME fan. I’ve never called a Nintendo game “kiddy”… EVER. So don’t lump me in with some imaginary group of people that you just made up.
Like Doofus J, I can no longer game as much as I used to – a pesky thing called life. I don’t associate myself with any of these labels. It seems to boil down to elitism – people that are deep into games want to keep the industry to themselves, not realizing that a growing industry is good for us all.
Get rid of the labels, and lets play some damn games.
Yesss!! Dead for the “gaming culture”!! Games for everyone!!
UnderHero5 – you sound like you’re taking that comment personally. Nobody said you’d lambasted Nintendo for being cutesy and then about-faced on Sony’s LBP; but like it or not, there are people that have. Even if it’s not the same people saying it, it’s still “popular opinion”, (such as it is), and it’s still hypocrisy.
Labels are, of course, generalizations… no one should take a label personally, be it in the gaming world or anywhere else. When it comes to your particular situation, no label will suffice.
I don’t have much time for games either these days… But when I do, I’ve found that I’m being pulled more and more towards game genres that I haven’t tried before. For example, right now I’m into RPGs, and especifically, into Japanese-style RPGs. So I had to buy a PS2! I’m playing the Disgaea series and I’ve reserved Persona 3. I’m also getting some of the RPGs that are coming out for DS… those are the ones I play the most because I have more time to play on-the-run!
Before that, I was big into FPS, especially Halo. And before that, I was mostly into 3D platformers, like Metal Arms and Super Mario Sunshine. All great games, but eventually I get bored and I need to move on.
So, I don’t feel like either label applies to me either, but they are useful to describe a momentary trend in consumer’s tastes.