The point of an MMO was always meant to be a massive game with everybody playing together in one concurrent world. Of course that seldom happens these days with the amount of instancing and so forth, and I am not bashing it or anything, personally I think its worked out well. The part that has been missed is the interaction with each other, the forming of community and just general/basic communication. Now days a lot of people treat MMOs as if they are single player games to which other players might as well be NPC's for all they care.
The point of an MMO was always meant to be a massive game with everybody playing together in one concurrent world. Of course that seldom happens these days with the amount of instancing and so forth, and I am not bashing it or anything, personally I think its worked out well. The part that has been missed is the interaction with each other, the forming of community and just general/basic communication. Now days a lot of people treat MMOs as if they are single player games to which other players might as well be NPC's for all they care.
I agree that this is happening. Even though you probably don't agree, this is the basis for a lot of anti-themepark sentiments around here. There has been a shift away from the MASSIVELY part of MMORPG. Some may like that, but it seems hard to deny that it's happening. Also a lot of us feel that it's kind of watering down the genre. When you take a genre that is very distinct from other genres and shift it more towards the middle, that's kind of a problem.
All MMO's are the descendant of the pen and paper Dungeons & Dragons which was a social outlet for a small group of role players. And pnp is a descendant of old Gentleman's Gaming Clubs. What it has become today is an electronic playground where all sexes can participate from a room in their home. Still meant to feed the social desires of people. Rubbing elbows with strangers, talking about interests shared or clashing with rival opinions. Most of which takes place on forums not during actual game play. So it does not really need to be an mmo for socializing. Console games have social forums as well. An mmo does need to be a well built game to draw in a club mentality of loyal fans. Many mmo's now are thrown together with thread and school glue to earn a quick buck. I suppose if this were an old England Gentleman's Club you might say that some clubs are in back alleys with BOOBS and some are uptown with true intellectual gaming. I think social improves when the game is well loved.
Originally posted by Holophonist Originally posted by lizardbonesI almost can't believe this is necessary, but if a literature class has taught me anything, it's that looking words up in a dictionary of some sort takes some effort, but at least you can use words correctly.
Casual adjective 1. relaxed and unconcerned, informal or laid-back2. not regular or permanent, in particular.3. happening by chance; accidental.4. without formality of style or manner, in particular (of clothing) suitable for everyday wear rather than formal occasions.noun 1. a person who does something irregularly.2. clothes or shoes suitable for everyday wear rather than formal occasions.
The level of difficulty or required level of skill when talking about "casual" isn't really a consideration.
Does SC2 have a formal set of rules, that must be followed by design? Are there informal "rules" that people follow, that are above and beyond the rules provided by developer? If so, then it's probably not a "casual" game.
However, someone can play a non-casual game in a casual manner. If someone plays SC2 when they feel like it or irregularly, even if they are very competitive when they play, they are a "casual" playing a non-casual game.
People keep bringing this up and I keep explaining the difference. Yes, people can play a non casual game casually. The question is what makes a game casual friendly. What is going to facilitate casual play? What is going to attract casual players. If a game is extremely mechanically difficult, that's not conducive to somebody playing it casually. You have to work to get good at it which means you can't get into it quickly. You can't play it sitting on the toilet as TB puts it. And the skill to play the game is something that you lose if you don't play it regularly, so the game isn't a natural fit for a casual player. It's not casual friendly.
I understand what you're saying, but "casual" in regards to video games refers to the time investment, not the skill set required to play the games. Referring to a game as "casual" because it's easy misrepresents what the game is.
Candy Crush is casual friendly because it can be played in short bursts. By your paragraph above, it's not that casual, even though it's not that mechanically complex, it can be very difficult. It requires reflexes and regular practice to stay "good" at the game if you don't want to spend tons of money on it.
Time investment as a deciding factor is definitive. Difficulty or skill as a deciding factor is not definitive. Difficulty is also very subjective. That's why it's not used.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
They are not part of the genre as that genre barely exists anymore. They would have to had played more rpg style games, possible pnp games to understand what an rpg is. Todays players were dragged in from different platforms and games to play mmos created for mass appeal.
Mass appeal DOES NOT MEAN better. It means watered down. Reduced to the lowest common denominator. By definition this means that many of the features liked by players of actual rpg games are removed.
Mmorpgs used to be our genre. Mmos of today are not our genre.
The second poster sort of touched on this but was completely wrong. The outcome of making games that appeal to a cross-genre audience is that a genre is created and the old one destroyed. On top of this the current model is failing. The "mass appeal" concept did not work (or only once). Making games for smaller audiences will always be the more successful format and creates diversity. Old school mmorpg players get what they want by getting the game they wanted and by NOT having the players they do not want. The developers get a smaller yet much more dedicated audience. It is a win win win.
This is why there are several mmos in the works that are recreating the "lost genre". It won't appeal to the new gens who have never truly played an rpg and it shouldn't.
Lamborghini does not advertise their vehicles toward the soccer mom crowd for a %$#@ing good reason. Big game manufacturers should smarten the hell up too but indie developers will always be the driving force behind innovation and it is them who we should support.
I almost can't believe this is necessary, but if a literature class has taught me anything, it's that looking words up in a dictionary of some sort takes some effort, but at least you can use words correctly.
Casual adjective 1. relaxed and unconcerned, informal or laid-back
2. not regular or permanent, in particular.
3. happening by chance; accidental.
4. without formality of style or manner, in particular (of clothing) suitable for everyday wear rather than formal occasions.
noun 1. a person who does something irregularly.
2. clothes or shoes suitable for everyday wear rather than formal occasions.
The level of difficulty or required level of skill when talking about "casual" isn't really a consideration.
Does SC2 have a formal set of rules, that must be followed by design? Are there informal "rules" that people follow, that are above and beyond the rules provided by developer? If so, then it's probably not a "casual" game.
However, someone can play a non-casual game in a casual manner. If someone plays SC2 when they feel like it or irregularly, even if they are very competitive when they play, they are a "casual" playing a non-casual game.
People keep bringing this up and I keep explaining the difference. Yes, people can play a non casual game casually. The question is what makes a game casual friendly. What is going to facilitate casual play? What is going to attract casual players. If a game is extremely mechanically difficult, that's not conducive to somebody playing it casually. You have to work to get good at it which means you can't get into it quickly. You can't play it sitting on the toilet as TB puts it. And the skill to play the game is something that you lose if you don't play it regularly, so the game isn't a natural fit for a casual player. It's not casual friendly.
I understand what you're saying, but "casual" in regards to video games refers to the time investment, not the skill set required to play the games. Referring to a game as "casual" because it's easy misrepresents what the game is.
Candy Crush is casual friendly because it can be played in short bursts. By your paragraph above, it's not that casual, even though it's not that mechanically complex, it can be very difficult. It requires reflexes and regular practice to stay "good" at the game if you don't want to spend tons of money on it.
Time investment as a deciding factor is definitive. Difficulty or skill as a deciding factor is not definitive. Difficulty is also very subjective. That's why it's not used.
I'm not so sure that a casual gamer would be defined as such. It may be the way they describe themselves, but that's kind of like saying somebody who describes themselves as an overeater isn't also fat. But either way, a casual gamer may be simply defined as how much of a time investment they want to make into a particular game, but in order to cater to that type of gamer, difficulty is a factor. If you're making a game and you want to make it so that it appeals to somebody who doesn't put that much time into games, you're going to make it easier (on average) than a game that you make that is geared towards a more hardcore player.
It isn't about being one against the other. The "Older Generation" of MMOs that started the whole thing showed us a long time ago that it's about COMBINING everything into one package that spreads the amount of activities available to you so you're never bored of feel as if you've nothing left to accomplish.
yeah umm...no.
Ultima Online, Trammel and the ensuing outrage over "protecting" players ...I should say /thread here but I want to go on.
The Internet Flame wars of 1999/2000, the flame war that was so bad it carried over to nearly a dozen sites and created all these wonderful Nazi forums rules we have on every single forum today. What was it about? Well, it STARTED out with one member of the Black Knights shooting down some new forum member for mention getting ganked and then camped by a higher level player in Asherons Call and it turned into over 100 members of that same guild posting and basing everyone...everywhere.
Its where the term "Carebear" comes from...
As for "companies" stepping in for money.
Asherons Call, made by Turbine, produced and distributed by Microsoft.
EverQuest...partly funded and distributed by SONY.
Lastly, you missed the boat. First MMOs were not a decade ago...more like TWO. Ultima Online wasn't even close to being the first, it missed that by 6 years and a half dozen games.
Trying to grasp hold of a literal definition of a word is like trying to grasp water with your bare hand. Water isn't easily caught that way. Using the dictionary is like taking a picture of a bird and saying "bird" and hoping some magical bond between the word and the picture will make it official. Well, why is it that the bird I see above me in the trees has yellow wings, whereas the picture only shows brown?
We all more or less know what is meant by "casual", and trying to fix that into some "official" definition only results in the word apparently becoming more elusive than it was at the start. Countless walls of text you fellows have created and absolutely no clarity has been achieved whatsoever. The word is not a fixed thing, it is an always moving and evolving thing. The tighter you grip, the more superficial any exploration of the word becomes, the more we find ourselves scratching our heads, "why are they arguing over this?"
We can think about the casual gamer in a million ways, the very term was constructed to allow us to think about it. For me the casual gamer is a person who will not or cannot enter as deeply into the reality of gaming as I can. Their subjective understanding of gaming is superficial because they do not love it so deeply the way I do. For them it is a distraction, for me a romance. For them it is cheap six-pack meant only to get them drunk, for me it is the magical flavor of a thousand dollar bottle of wine. For them it is jerking off to porn, for me it is making love to a beautiful woman.
(Incidentally, making love to a woman tends to be much more difficult than jerking off to porn, though I can't say the latter is more relaxing than the former.)
Originally posted by Cephus404 No, you're missing the point. It doesn't matter what the MMO genre was originally intended to be, it only matters what it is now. Intentions are like assholes, everyone has them and all of them stink. Who cares what some people playing UO or Meridian 59 wanted 15 years ago? It's entirely irrelevant to the modern day MMO which are driven by market forces and what the majority of people actually want to play now.
I think you're missing the point completely then, because an MMO is very specific in nature, and it has been bastardized by big company producers thinking they can get away with labeling their product an MMO without it actually being one.
Diablo 3 is one of these games, as is "World of Tanks" of which I play but I know it isn't an MMO.
Standards are set so that people can't just go "Oh hey, I want a cat to be a squirrel now, it's going to happen because I say so". That's the point, and MMOs recently have been failing left and right because they've strayed too far from the original intent of what an MMO is, and was. This is also why producers throwing money at new products can't seem to understand why they can't match WoW.
D3 isn't an MMO. Blizzard doesn't portray it as one. As you weren't around when it launched, the forum users here overwhelming wanted it listed on the sight. (Now whether we actually had feedback regardless of the sway of the user base or not I'm not sure, nor do I care.)
MMO's haven't been failing, unless your comparing that to WOW's numbers. Most MMO's are still somewhat successful, and few close down in few years.
MMO's are about having fun with a community of individuals enjoying the same game, conquering whatever I deem is fun to me. Whether that is a solo time, duo time, or group element depends what I'm in the mood for. Are they catered differently and not a stigmata around them as the basement dwelling scumbags that leave their kids in the car to burn up or some random other death associated with Everquest? No, they are now mainstream. If you think MMO's are only about making the most profitable game, I'd say Apps for phones are tons more profitable than any MMO will probably ever be other than maybe WOW, as those can be flyby hits with whole slews of people.
Trying to grasp hold of a literal definition of a word is like trying to grasp water with your bare hand. Water isn't easily caught that way. Using the dictionary is like taking a picture of a bird and saying "bird" and hoping some magical bond between the word and the picture will make it official. Well, why is it that the bird I see above me in the trees has yellow wings, whereas the picture only shows brown?
We all more or less know what is meant by "casual", and trying to fix that into some "official" definition only results in the word apparently becoming more elusive than it was at the start. Countless walls of text you fellows have created and absolutely no clarity has been achieved whatsoever. The word is not a fixed thing, it is an always moving and evolving thing. The tighter you grip, the more superficial any exploration of the word becomes, the more we find ourselves scratching our heads, "why are they arguing over this?"
We can think about the casual gamer in a million ways, the very term was constructed to allow us to think about it. For me the casual gamer is a person who will not or cannot enter as deeply into the reality of gaming as I can. Their subjective understanding of gaming is superficial because they do not love it so deeply the way I do. For them it is a distraction, for me a romance. For them it is cheap six-pack meant only to get them drunk, for me it is the magical flavor of a thousand dollar bottle of wine. For them it is jerking off to porn, for me it is making love to a beautiful woman.
(Incidentally, making love to a woman tends to be much more difficult than jerking off to porn, though I can't say the latter is more relaxing than the former.)
I agree that a casual gamer isn't something you can nail down. However when somebody says "a casual gamer is somebody who only cares about how long the play sessions are", I take issue with that. When you say "this is the one thing that defines a casual gamer" and that one thing isn't included in any definition of the word casual, I think that IS a situation where you can get some clarity by looking at the definition.
I've been saying from the start that there are many things that define a casual game and a casual gamer. I don't buy for a second that the only thing that they care about is being able to jump in and out of a game at will. I think that's PART of it, but not all of it.
Facts are facts and lets not re-write history that's not even a decade old.
Indeed, and only looking at a finite subset of information to reaffirm your stance is in general considered intellectual dishonesty, so please stop that.
/snip
Whether or not one thinks old MMOs saw financial success according to modern standards is ancillary to the point the OP was making, as well as being an entirely illogical argument.
So correcting someone's assumption should be taken as a post to attack the OP?
What was that about 'subset of information / out of context' line? Oh yeah... Intellectual dishonesty.
How kind of you to demonstrate exactly what that is. Thank you! ^_^
Gdemami - Informing people about your thoughts and impressions is not a review, it's a blog.
Take your pick. The common theme among the definitions is relaxed, not short sessions.
I bet none of the definitions explain casual in the context of video games.
In the context of the debate it makes all the difference. You can transfer over most of your skill from RTS to RTS, FPS to FPS, MOBA to MOBA, and MMORPG to MMORPG. What you cannot transfer is any accumulated wealth or advancement which you need to be or stay competitive in your original game.
Noting how they're different doesnt demonstrate how it matters in the context of the debate. The context of the debate is can I pick up this game and be playing somewhat quickly. Accessibility. In a game that is mechanically difficult like SC2, Broodwar, etc. it will take longer before you're playing the game in a competent way. This is not fundamentally different from LoL's rank where it too will take a certain amount of time before you're playing at a competent level.
Ofcourse it does! Skill transfers over from game to game. Accumulated wealth and advancement does not. Ergo, practice and training is not the same as grind.
I don't think Venge said length of the play session is the sole factor to a game being casual friendly. If he did, I would disagree with him. None of what he brought up, however, didn't talk about difficulty playing a factor.
I don't care what you think, he said it. Many times. Go back and look if you like. But if you're going to defend what somebody said, you should probably familiarize yourself with what he said. If you don't know, then don't say his sources didn't disagree wth him. They did.
And yes, you would disagree wth him. I POINTED THAT OUT AS SOON AS YOU GOT INTO THIS DEBATE. You said you don't believe the ONLY factor related to how casual friendly a game is would be length of play session. To which I responded ok well then you and Venge would disagree.
To put it simply, casual friendly means minimal time investment and the ability to enjoy the game in short bursts. If you look what that means in practice, you realize accessibility (and, in part, usability) plays an important role to make that possible.
From the gamasutra article Venge linked:
Challenge. The most common assumption is that a difficult game is necessarily hardcore. This is simply not true. The confusion lies in the language: just as "hot" describes both spice and temperature, difficult describes more than one thing.
If your interface is vague, the game is "difficult", if the objectives are unclear, the game is "difficult", if your game is addictively simple yet impossible to master, it is also "difficult". Difficult describes both accessibility and challenge. Difficult accessibility is bad and is covered by all six bullets in the previous section.
Difficult challenge is good and, in fact, it's the most casual route to replayability. You want a user to feel that mastering your game is a challenge; that each session ends with a new sense of accomplishment. The real trick is in instilling challenge without devolving into one of the six pillars of hardcore design. Tetris manages to do it simply by speeding up the drop rate of the pieces, but most games don't have the luxury of such a straightforward solution.
-Tony Ventrice, Evolving the social game: Finding casual by defining hardcore, Gamasutra.com
Another piece Venge quoted:
While the term “casual gamer” is utilized a great deal in today’s market, some experienced game players dislike the term and consider it divisive. That may be because the descriptor “casual game” is often (and incorrectly) utilized to identify easy and/or childish games that are repetitive and mind-numbingly simple. A casual game can actually take a lot of skill to master: again, consider Tetris, which has very basic rules, but boasts a heck of a challenge at certain levels. Well-built casual games should appeal to everyone, regardless of their skill level.
-Nadia Oxford, Casual game, About.com
And another:
So, what is casual? Portnow believes it's hard to define, but the quick and dirty answer is: a game that can be played in short sessions, lacks finality and is "replayable ad nauseam." Now, that could mean Bejeweled, but it may also include "hardcore" darlings like Geometry Wars.
-Alexander Sliwinski, What defines a casual game, Joystiq.com
Now I am not going to list all of them, but I am curious, which one of those says that hard games cannot be casual friendly?
Kudos to Venge for scouring the Internet for some articles by the way.
Whose definition?
I said no definition of the word relates to (the length of) play sessions. You said what definition. I said the definition of the word casual. Now you're asking whose definition? I can't prove a negative. I said no definition of the word casual is giving you any indication about the length of a play session, yet it was Venge's main point. So how can I point to a definition that DOESN'T indicate that? Do you want me to just start posting every definition of the word casual? Why are you wasting my time with this definition BS?
Don't play dumb. Your definition of casual is a general definition. It does not define the word within the context of video games. The context we are talking in right now. Different contexts offer different meanings to words. Venge's articles talk about the definition within the context of video games.
You can make a game accessible through good documentation, tutorials, intuitive and informative UI. That is called usability.
The mechanical difficulty of the game is very much related to the accessibility. If a game is incredibly difficult (not confusing), it's not as accessible. As I've pointed out to you guys before, reality doesn't agree with you. The games that are considered non-casual friendly are the games that are generally mechanically difficult. Games that are considered casual friendly are generally mechanically easy.
Here's a quote FROM YOU:
"Games where you are literally just one button press away from having fun, are accessible."
Notice the key word there? FUN. If the game is too hard for you, you won't have fun. Correct? So how on earth is accessibility not related to difficulty again?
The part which you quoted I am referring to games where the game starts with just a press of a button i.e. you enter que, and the system finds you a suitable opponent(s).
Good usability design can make a difficult game accessible. Although the initial skill level of a player is relevant as it defines that starting point for usability design, it is not required to teach the player everything there is to know about the game. For example, things like metagame are frankly impossible to teach in a tutorial. Some things players have to learn themselves.
Accessibility is a broad term. You talk about accessibility in terms of first time use. Yes, if I jump into SC2 from WC3, SC2 may appear more accessible to me than to a player completely new to RTS games. But difficulty does not matter when we talk about accessibility relevant to casual friendliness. After we have both become proficient in the game, how hard the game is becomes irrelevant.
See? You yourself don't bring up difficulty when you talk about casual friendliness. Much of what you bring up is accessibility.
Is it really too much for you to read 1 whole paragraph? Again, I'm not saying the ONLY thing related to casual friendliness is difficulty, but I'm saying it is a factor.
And I am saying it is not. See above.
Dictionary definition outside the context of video games. And I am not trying to prove my definition with my definition. I am trying to explain what the definition is.
Then what definition would you like? I've tried to explain it to you guys from every different angle, that's why I'm not simply using my definition as an argument. You guys however simply keep resorting back to the same mantra about how this is what casual friendliness means so we're right. You have no argument aside from "look a few people agree with me."
And you are bringing up definitions that are not within the right context. You are doing a horrible job proving your point.
No its definitely not a binary state, but you still haven't explained why skill should be involved. A game can be casual friendly yet difficult to master.
Yes, I have. My gosh the answer is literally a few lines up. I say SC2 is a game where you have to play regularly to keep up with your skill, so it's not a casual friendly game in that sense. And you say so what all games require that to some degree. Then I say yes but some games require it MORE. So if some games require longer and more regular play sessions because they're harder, how can you possibly say that difficulty doesn't affect how casual a game is? It doesn't make sense.
What you are talking about is "how to stay on top". You are not demonstrating how to enjoy the game. While one does not exclude the other, you don't have to try to be the best in order to enjoy the game.
Ninth, the word also means relaxing. There's nothing inherently relaxing or not relaxing about a shorter play session. You can have a game that isn't relaxing that takes 20 minutes, and you can have a game that is relaxing that takes 60 minutes.
Here we go with the general definition again.
Yeah, how dare I use the definition. Where do you think the term came from? Why do you think people are called "casual gamers." Because they play games casually. Casual indicates a number of different things, including relaxation. They don't want to play a stressful game. A really really difficult and inaccessible game like BW isn't one you can just play casually. You must understand this....
Look, those same casual players can play SC2 and enjoy it. The ladder system pits them against people with same skill level. With some practice, you can transfer what you know from WC3 to SC2. You don't need to grind for hours and hours to get gear, level up and be competitive.
It really irks you when someone says SC2 is casual friendly, does it? I feel that we could have a much more profuctive conversation the game wasn't brought up at all.
You so have to stop trying to push this idea that my ego has anything to do with this... it's getting so dull. I've mentioned a number of times other games that are MORE hardcore than the one I play. Why would I do that if this was about ego? I'm comparing SC2 to LoL because that's the best example I can think of and the comparison that I know the most about BECAUSE I play SC2 so much.
Since you didn't answer I'll ask again: Where do you think the term casual came from in this context? From the word casual, obviously. They are called casual gamers because they play casually. Maybe over the years YOU have emphasized in your mind the ability to play in short sessions or the ability to stop whenever you want and pick it up again later, but that doesn't mean that's the only thing going on. Casual gamers are gamers who play games casually. They are actual people. Games are made that are designed to target those actual people are called casual friendly games. If casual gamers on average aren't as good at games, then games targeted at them will be easier, on average. Do you think casual gamers are on average less skilled than hardcore gamers?
Lets see if you can follow this:
The term "casual game" best refers to games played on Wii, on a smartphone or in Facebook - mind you, games on these platforms do not have to be casual games, but majority of them are
The term "casual gamer" refers to someone who doesn't identify himself/herself as a "gamer" i.e. he/she rarely play video games.
Casual games are casual friendly but casual friendly games are not necessarily casual games.
Casual friendly games are designed to attract all players, not just casual ones.
These points I gathered through years of observation. This is how they are used as far as I can tell. There's a huge difference between a "casual game" and a "casual friendly game". Majority of todays games are casual friendly (SC2 included) as opposed by many of the old school MMORPGs which were not.
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been-Wayne Gretzky
I agree that a casual gamer isn't something you can nail down. However when somebody says "a casual gamer is somebody who only cares about how long the play sessions are", I take issue with that. When you say "this is the one thing that defines a casual gamer" and that one thing isn't included in any definition of the word casual, I think that IS a situation where you can get some clarity by looking at the definition.
I've been saying from the start that there are many things that define a casual game and a casual gamer. I don't buy for a second that the only thing that they care about is being able to jump in and out of a game at will. I think that's PART of it, but not all of it.
What I hear you saying is something like this (these are my own words of course): the casual gamer is looking for a more superficial gaming experience. Now, "superficial" has many facets, some may apply to this casual gamer, others to that casual gamer, but on the whole all casuals are united in their desire for a more superficial gaming experience. In many situations, that superficiality comes, in part, from short play sessions, in other situations the superficiality comes from easy game play. But overall, and this is the point, they want a less meaningful gaming experience.
To that someone might argue, "no, casual gamers WANT just as meaningful a gaming experience, they simply do not have as much time!" That is to say, someone might argue that the very definition of a casual is in their time limitations, not in the depth of gaming they wish to experience. It is the kind of 140 characters or less argument. The meaning need merely be compressed into shorter, more concise and potent messages.
For the sake of argument, let's assume it is possible to squish meaning into condensed packets of time, to be able to convey Henry David Thoreau's Walden in 140 characters or less for example. Let's say a good game discovers a way to make what previously took days to experience, now can all be had in 15 minutes. Shouldn't that make the hardcore gamer's experience -- the gamer with lots of leisure time on their hands -- even richer? Someone who can experience not one of these rich 15 minute experiences per day, but 10, 20, or 30 of them? Shouldn't they be capable of a gaming experience unlike any ever had?
Yet that is not what we hear from hardcore gamers. Instead, what we hear is that the games are exceedingly boring.
Take your pick. The common theme among the definitions is relaxed, not short sessions.
I bet none of the definitions explain casual in the context of video games.
Well as it turns out the phrase includes the word casual for a reason.
In the context of the debate it makes all the difference. You can transfer over most of your skill from RTS to RTS, FPS to FPS, MOBA to MOBA, and MMORPG to MMORPG. What you cannot transfer is any accumulated wealth or advancement which you need to be or stay competitive in your original game.
Noting how they're different doesnt demonstrate how it matters in the context of the debate. The context of the debate is can I pick up this game and be playing somewhat quickly. Accessibility. In a game that is mechanically difficult like SC2, Broodwar, etc. it will take longer before you're playing the game in a competent way. This is not fundamentally different from LoL's rank where it too will take a certain amount of time before you're playing at a competent level.
Ofcourse it does! Skill transfers over from game to game. Accumulated wealth and advancement does not. Ergo, practice and training is not the same as grind.
Dear lord.... please please please try to read and comprehend this. I'm not saying they're not different, I'm saying they're not different in the context of this debate. The fact that training can transfer into different games doesn't matter when you talk about accessibility. You put somebody in front a difficult game and he's going to have to spend time to become competent at it. The fact that his time can then be used LATER in life in a different video game doesn't change that.
I don't think Venge said length of the play session is the sole factor to a game being casual friendly. If he did, I would disagree with him. None of what he brought up, however, didn't talk about difficulty playing a factor.
I don't care what you think, he said it. Many times. Go back and look if you like. But if you're going to defend what somebody said, you should probably familiarize yourself with what he said. If you don't know, then don't say his sources didn't disagree wth him. They did.
And yes, you would disagree wth him. I POINTED THAT OUT AS SOON AS YOU GOT INTO THIS DEBATE. You said you don't believe the ONLY factor related to how casual friendly a game is would be length of play session. To which I responded ok well then you and Venge would disagree.
To put it simply, casual friendly means minimal time investment and the ability to enjoy the game in short bursts. If you look what that means in practice, you realize accessibility (and, in part, usability) plays an important role to make that possible.
From the gamasutra article Venge linked:
Challenge. The most common assumption is that a difficult game is necessarily hardcore. This is simply not true. The confusion lies in the language: just as "hot" describes both spice and temperature, difficult describes more than one thing.
If your interface is vague, the game is "difficult", if the objectives are unclear, the game is "difficult", if your game is addictively simple yet impossible to master, it is also "difficult". Difficult describes both accessibility and challenge. Difficult accessibility is bad and is covered by all six bullets in the previous section.
Difficult challenge is good and, in fact, it's the most casual route to replayability. You want a user to feel that mastering your game is a challenge; that each session ends with a new sense of accomplishment. The real trick is in instilling challenge without devolving into one of the six pillars of hardcore design. Tetris manages to do it simply by speeding up the drop rate of the pieces, but most games don't have the luxury of such a straightforward solution.
-Tony Ventrice, Evolving the social game: Finding casual by defining hardcore, Gamasutra.com
Another piece Venge quoted:
While the term “casual gamer” is utilized a great deal in today’s market, some experienced game players dislike the term and consider it divisive. That may be because the descriptor “casual game” is often (and incorrectly) utilized to identify easy and/or childish games that are repetitive and mind-numbingly simple. A casual game can actually take a lot of skill to master: again, consider Tetris, which has very basic rules, but boasts a heck of a challenge at certain levels. Well-built casual games should appeal to everyone, regardless of their skill level.
-Nadia Oxford, Casual game, About.com
And another:
So, what is casual? Portnow believes it's hard to define, but the quick and dirty answer is: a game that can be played in short sessions, lacks finality and is "replayable ad nauseam." Now, that could mean Bejeweled, but it may also include "hardcore" darlings like Geometry Wars.
-Alexander Sliwinski, What defines a casual game, Joystiq.com
Now I am not going to list all of them, but I am curious, which one of those says that hard games cannot be casual friendly?
Kudos to Venge for scouring the Internet for some articles by the way.
Those are terrible examples TBH. It doesn't compare casual games to hardcore games at all. Difficulty isn't an objective thing. The point is that casual friendly games are going to be easier than their hardcore peers. It doesn't mean every casual game is easy and every casual gamer is bad at games. But it does mean if you're making a game geared towards casual gamers, it's going to tend to be easier than a game that is geared towards hardcore players.
Also you're defining casual friendly incorrectly. You're describing a casual player (and even that definition I don't agree with). Casual friendly means it's designed to attract casual players. Aside from the fact that a casual player by definition is looking for a relaxing experience and difficulty is related to relaxation, you're wrong even assuming that's not the case (which it is). Even assuming your definition of a "casual player", a casual friendly game is still one where the difficulty is going to be easier than a hardcore game. Why? Because it's appealing to somebody who doesn't play games as much as more hardcore players.
Casual game:
"A casual game is a video game targeted at or used by a mass audience of casual gamers. Casual games can have any type of gameplay, and fit in any genre. They are typically distinguished by their simple rules and lack of commitment required in contrast to more complex hardcore games.[1] "
1. It says they are typically distinguished by simple rules and a lack of commitment required. If a game is more difficult, it requires more commitment.
2. They're targeted towards casual gamers. Casual gamers can be described as such:
"For this reason, games which attempt to appeal to the casual player tend to strive for simple rules and ease of game play"
I said no definition of the word relates to (the length of) play sessions. You said what definition. I said the definition of the word casual. Now you're asking whose definition? I can't prove a negative. I said no definition of the word casual is giving you any indication about the length of a play session, yet it was Venge's main point. So how can I point to a definition that DOESN'T indicate that? Do you want me to just start posting every definition of the word casual? Why are you wasting my time with this definition BS?
Don't play dumb. Your definition of casual is a general definition. It does not define the word within the context of video games. The context we are talking in right now. Different contexts offer different meanings to words. Venge's articles talk about the definition within the context of video games.
Right when they made the term for video games they completely changed the meaning of the word casual, I guess. A casual gamer is somebody who plays games casually. Casually has a definition. So does casual. You can say the definition of a casual gamer is simply somebody who doesn't want to put in the same time commitment as a hardcore player and you'd be wrong. But even assuming you're right about that, you're still wrong about what a casual friendly game means. A casual friendly game is appealing to those people. It's appealing to people who spend less time playing video games. What on earth makes you think it wouldn't be easier than a game that is appealing to people who play games MORE?
You can make a game accessible through good documentation, tutorials, intuitive and informative UI. That is called usability.
The mechanical difficulty of the game is very much related to the accessibility. If a game is incredibly difficult (not confusing), it's not as accessible. As I've pointed out to you guys before, reality doesn't agree with you. The games that are considered non-casual friendly are the games that are generally mechanically difficult. Games that are considered casual friendly are generally mechanically easy.
Here's a quote FROM YOU:
"Games where you are literally just one button press away from having fun, are accessible."
Notice the key word there? FUN. If the game is too hard for you, you won't have fun. Correct? So how on earth is accessibility not related to difficulty again?
The part which you quoted I am referring to games where the game starts with just a press of a button i.e. you enter que, and the system finds you a suitable opponent(s).
Good usability design can make a difficult game accessible. Although the initial skill level of a player is relevant as it defines that starting point for usability design, it is not required to teach the player everything there is to know about the game. For example, things like metagame are frankly impossible to teach in a tutorial. Some things players have to learn themselves.
Accessibility is a broad term. You talk about accessibility in terms of first time use. Yes, if I jump into SC2 from WC3, SC2 may appear more accessible to me than to a player completely new to RTS games. But difficulty does not matter when we talk about accessibility relevant to casual friendliness. After we have both become proficient in the game, how hard the game is becomes irrelevant.
You said accessibility is how fast you can be having fun. Having fun depends on the difficulty level.
The rest of this reply is just you rambling until you simply repeat your mantra of "Difficulty does not matter when we talk about accessibility relevant to casual friendliness." Why? Because you say so, that's it. I've explain why accessibility is related to difficulty. If you have a game that is mechanically difficult to the point of you having no idea what you're doing (Broodwar), it's not going to be as accessible as a game that is mechanically easier, a game that lets you start doing all of the cool things the game has to offer more quickly.
See? You yourself don't bring up difficulty when you talk about casual friendliness. Much of what you bring up is accessibility.
Is it really too much for you to read 1 whole paragraph? Again, I'm not saying the ONLY thing related to casual friendliness is difficulty, but I'm saying it is a factor.
And I am saying it is not. See above.
You said I myself didn't bring up difficulty in my example of SC2. I did. I highlighted it. You're clearly not even reading my responses at this point. Here it is again:
"LOL.... no. I didn't ask anybody anything. It's a known issue that LoL is more casual friendly than SC2. Like I've said, there was a massive crisis in the SC2 community about the game not being casual friendly and it wasn't able to compete with LoL for those reasons. It lead to a lot of changes in the game, including things like ranks you can level up for each race, new avatar portraits and an emphasis on the "arcade" aspect of starcraft which promotes community made custom games that are mechanically easier and less hardcore PRECISELY to attract casual players."
Dictionary definition outside the context of video games. And I am not trying to prove my definition with my definition. I am trying to explain what the definition is.
Then what definition would you like? I've tried to explain it to you guys from every different angle, that's why I'm not simply using my definition as an argument. You guys however simply keep resorting back to the same mantra about how this is what casual friendliness means so we're right. You have no argument aside from "look a few people agree with me."
And you are bringing up definitions that are not within the right context. You are doing a horrible job proving your point.
I'm bringing up definitions that are what this term is based on. Casual players want a casual experience. I've explained so many times that difficulty is related to accessibilty and that a casual gamer is obviously not going to be as skilled, on average, as somebody who plays games more often and for longer. Yet you just kind of ignore it when I say these things and go back to saying "difficulty is not related to accessibility."
No its definitely not a binary state, but you still haven't explained why skill should be involved. A game can be casual friendly yet difficult to master.
Yes, I have. My gosh the answer is literally a few lines up. I say SC2 is a game where you have to play regularly to keep up with your skill, so it's not a casual friendly game in that sense. And you say so what all games require that to some degree. Then I say yes but some games require it MORE. So if some games require longer and more regular play sessions because they're harder, how can you possibly say that difficulty doesn't affect how casual a game is? It doesn't make sense.
What you are talking about is "how to stay on top". You are not demonstrating how to enjoy the game. While one does not exclude the other, you don't have to try to be the best in order to enjoy the game.
If you're getting worse at the game over time because it's so mechanically difficult that you have to play often to maintain your skill level, that's probably not going to be very fun for a lot of casual gamers. It's not about staying on top, it's about accessibility. You can't come right into the game and start having fun, you can't leave and come back and be right where you were. Lots and lots and lots of people quit SC2 for this very reason and switch to more casual friendly games like LoL and DOTA.
In fact that makes me realize how wrong you are about the SC2 skill compared to LoL rank thing from above. Having a rank that isn't based on personal skill is probably MORE casual friendly because you can leave and come back and still have that benefit. A game that requires a lot of consistent training isn't going to be as casual friendly because you don't have that same ability to leave and come back.
Ninth, the word also means relaxing. There's nothing inherently relaxing or not relaxing about a shorter play session. You can have a game that isn't relaxing that takes 20 minutes, and you can have a game that is relaxing that takes 60 minutes.
Here we go with the general definition again.
Yeah, how dare I use the definition. Where do you think the term came from? Why do you think people are called "casual gamers." Because they play games casually. Casual indicates a number of different things, including relaxation. They don't want to play a stressful game. A really really difficult and inaccessible game like BW isn't one you can just play casually. You must understand this....
Look, those same casual players can play SC2 and enjoy it. The ladder system pits them against people with same skill level. With some practice, you can transfer what you know from WC3 to SC2. You don't need to grind for hours and hours to get gear, level up and be competitive.
It really irks you when someone says SC2 is casual friendly, does it? I feel that we could have a much more profuctive conversation the game wasn't brought up at all.
You so have to stop trying to push this idea that my ego has anything to do with this... it's getting so dull. I've mentioned a number of times other games that are MORE hardcore than the one I play. Why would I do that if this was about ego? I'm comparing SC2 to LoL because that's the best example I can think of and the comparison that I know the most about BECAUSE I play SC2 so much.
Since you didn't answer I'll ask again: Where do you think the term casual came from in this context? From the word casual, obviously. They are called casual gamers because they play casually. Maybe over the years YOU have emphasized in your mind the ability to play in short sessions or the ability to stop whenever you want and pick it up again later, but that doesn't mean that's the only thing going on. Casual gamers are gamers who play games casually. They are actual people. Games are made that are designed to target those actual people are called casual friendly games. If casual gamers on average aren't as good at games, then games targeted at them will be easier, on average. Do you think casual gamers are on average less skilled than hardcore gamers?
Lets see if you can follow this:
The term "casual game" best refers to games played on Wii, on a smartphone or in Facebook - mind you, games on these platforms do not have to be casual games, but majority of them are
The term "casual gamer" refers to someone who doesn't identify himself/herself as a "gamer" i.e. he/she rarely play video games.
Casual games are casual friendly but casual friendly games are not necessarily casual games.
Casual friendly games are designed to attract all players, not just casual ones.
These points I gathered through years of observation. This is how they are used as far as I can tell. There's a huge difference between a "casual game" and a "casual friendly game". Majority of todays games are casual friendly (SC2 included) as opposed by many of the old school MMORPGs which were not.
Wow you are so incredibly wrong. How can a casual game... hell, how can ANY game attract all players? There are conflicting types of players.
The degree to which a game is casual friendly is the degree to which it attracts casual players. Why would they be called CASUAL friendly games? Why not hardcore friendly? Are you serious right now?
And if they're designed to attract casual gamers (they are, btw), then you need look no further than your second bullet point: casual gamers don't play video games that often. If they don't play video games that often, they're not going to be as skill, on average. If they're not as skilled on average, making a game accessible to them is going to have to be easier than a game that is designed to appeal to more hardcore players. Game. Set. Match. Stop wasting my time.
I agree that a casual gamer isn't something you can nail down. However when somebody says "a casual gamer is somebody who only cares about how long the play sessions are", I take issue with that. When you say "this is the one thing that defines a casual gamer" and that one thing isn't included in any definition of the word casual, I think that IS a situation where you can get some clarity by looking at the definition.
I've been saying from the start that there are many things that define a casual game and a casual gamer. I don't buy for a second that the only thing that they care about is being able to jump in and out of a game at will. I think that's PART of it, but not all of it.
What I hear you saying is something like this (these are my own words of course): the casual gamer is looking for a more superficial gaming experience. Now, "superficial" has many facets, some may apply to this casual gamer, others to that casual gamer, but on the whole all casuals are united in their desire for a more superficial gaming experience. In many situations, that superficiality comes, in part, from short play sessions, in other situations the superficiality comes from easy game play. But overall, and this is the point, they want a less meaningful gaming experience.
To that someone might argue, "no, casual gamers WANT just as meaningful a gaming experience, they simply do not have as much time!" That is to say, someone might argue that the very definition of a casual is in their time limitations, not in the depth of gaming they wish to experience. It is the kind of 140 characters or less argument. The meaning need merely be compressed into shorter, more concise and potent messages.
For the sake of argument, let's assume it is possible to squish meaning into condensed packets of time, to be able to convey Henry David Thoreau's Walden in 140 characters or less for example. Let's say a good game discovers a way to make what previously took days to experience, now can all be had in 15 minutes. Shouldn't that make the hardcore gamer's experience -- the gamer with lots of leisure time on their hands -- even richer? Someone who can experience not one of these rich 15 minute experiences per day, but 10, 20, or 30 of them? Shouldn't they be capable of a gaming experience unlike any ever had?
Yet that is not what we hear from hardcore gamers. Instead, what we hear is that the games are exceedingly boring.
Assuming the definition of a casual gamer IS simply their time limitations, a game that is designed to attract a person who doesn't have as much time to play video games is going to be easier than a game that is designed to attract a person who has more time to play video games. That seems pretty intuitive to me. Assuming no other differences between the people, if one group plays games more than the other group, they're going to be better at games. Since enjoyment for the majority of people is going to include the CORRECT amount of challenge (not too much, not too little, for each given person), then a game that is geared towards the lesser skilled group should be easier. Correct?
Assuming the definition of a casual gamer IS simply their time limitations, a game that is designed to attract a person who doesn't have as much time to play video games is going to be easier than a game that is designed to attract a person who has more time to play video games. That seems pretty intuitive to me. Assuming no other differences between the people, if one group plays games more than the other group, they're going to be better at games. Since enjoyment for the majority of people is going to include the CORRECT amount of challenge (not too much, not too little, for each given person), then a game that is geared towards the lesser skilled group should be easier. Correct?
Yes, seems straight forward to me. A book written for a mass audience is not going to be as complicated as one written for an academic. And?
Assuming the definition of a casual gamer IS simply their time limitations, a game that is designed to attract a person who doesn't have as much time to play video games is going to be easier than a game that is designed to attract a person who has more time to play video games. That seems pretty intuitive to me. Assuming no other differences between the people, if one group plays games more than the other group, they're going to be better at games. Since enjoyment for the majority of people is going to include the CORRECT amount of challenge (not too much, not too little, for each given person), then a game that is geared towards the lesser skilled group should be easier. Correct?
Yes, seems straight forward to me. A book written for a mass audience is not going to be as complicated as one written for an academic. And?
Uhhh annd that's my whole point? This has been about whether or not the term casual friendly includes information about difficulty of the game.
Uhhh annd that's my whole point? This has been about whether or not the term casual friendly includes information about difficulty of the game.
Yes, and clearly it does. However, one might object to what is implied, namely that a game that is casual friendly is necessarily boring to the hardcore gamer -- by appealing to the fact that difficulty occurs at different stages in the learning process of a game, and that a game can in principle be easy to learn (i.e., casual), yet difficult to master (i.e., hardcore).
Chess is a perfect example. It is a relatively easy game to learn, but it is extremely difficult to master, and its difficulty ranges quite a bit depending on your opponent's skill level. A game can be very easy and engaging right from the start, drawing you in and providing you with fun in a relaxed and casual manner, and yet simultaneously contain so much potential that it keeps you enthralled for a lifetime.
Interesting to note, that was actually my experience with my first MMORPG, DAoC. I suspect this was many of our experiences. We didn't start out hardcore. The game was simple enough to jump into and have fun right from the start, and yet the amount of fun I was having drew me in deeper and deeper, eventually turning me into a hardcore gamer. The key, however, was that when I wanted to go deeper, the game let me go deeper, there was more there there. Modern MMOs sometimes feel like they are simple and let you jump in, but they don't let you go any deeper.
Originally posted by Holophonist Assuming the definition of a casual gamer IS simply their time limitations, a game that is designed to attract a person who doesn't have as much time to play video games is going to be easier than a game that is designed to attract a person who has more time to play video games. That seems pretty intuitive to me. Assuming no other differences between the people, if one group plays games more than the other group, they're going to be better at games. Since enjoyment for the majority of people is going to include the CORRECT amount of challenge (not too much, not too little, for each given person), then a game that is geared towards the lesser skilled group should be easier. Correct?
You keep coming back to the idea that casual games are easier, but there's nothing to support the idea as being generally true. It seems intuitive, but looking around at the games being offered results in many examples that do not support the idea.
Team Fortress 2 is designed with a very low time investment needed, but it is nearly 100% skill based. Left 4 Dead 2 can be played in short, ten minute bursts but again, it's nearly 100% skill based. It no longer exists but Picaroon was a game designed to be played in short bursts, but required a good bit of strategy and luck to be successful. There are mobile games designed around the idea of players spending as little as ten minutes at a time playing, but those games require strategic skill to be successful. Especially since action takes place without player input. If advanced planning and strategy skills are absent, the player will have little fun and have little progress.
I'm sure with a little bit of research we could compile a longer list of games with a low time investment, skill dependent games. The idea that casual games are generally easier may seem intuitive, but it doesn't work in practice. This is probably why the terms "Casual" and "Hardcore", when applied to games and people generally revolve around the time investments rather than the difficulty.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
Originally posted by Holophonist Assuming the definition of a casual gamer IS simply their time limitations, a game that is designed to attract a person who doesn't have as much time to play video games is going to be easier than a game that is designed to attract a person who has more time to play video games. That seems pretty intuitive to me. Assuming no other differences between the people, if one group plays games more than the other group, they're going to be better at games. Since enjoyment for the majority of people is going to include the CORRECT amount of challenge (not too much, not too little, for each given person), then a game that is geared towards the lesser skilled group should be easier. Correct?
You keep coming back to the idea that casual games are easier, but there's nothing to support the idea as being generally true. It seems intuitive, but looking around at the games being offered results in many examples that do not support the idea.
Team Fortress 2 is designed with a very low time investment needed, but it is nearly 100% skill based. Left 4 Dead 2 can be played in short, ten minute bursts but again, it's nearly 100% skill based. It no longer exists but Picaroon was a game designed to be played in short bursts, but required a good bit of strategy and luck to be successful. There are mobile games designed around the idea of players spending as little as ten minutes at a time playing, but those games require strategic skill to be successful. Especially since action takes place without player input. If advanced planning and strategy skills are absent, the player will have little fun and have little progress.
I'm sure with a little bit of research we could compile a longer list of games with a low time investment, skill dependent games. The idea that casual games are generally easier may seem intuitive, but it doesn't work in practice. This is probably why the terms "Casual" and "Hardcore", when applied to games and people generally revolve around the time investments rather than the difficulty.
A game being nearly 100% skill based doesn't mean it's 100% difficult. You're quite suddenly using how "skill based" a game is as an analog for difficulty, it isn't. Using your example of TF2: its predecessor, TFC, is equally skill based but mechanically more difficult. It also happens to be far less casual friendly than TF2. TF2 was designed to be more casual friendly than TFC and it's not a coincidence that in designing that game, they made it considerably easier.
You seem to agree that on paper casual friendly games seem like they should be easier. Like I've pointed out before, a game that is targeting a lesser skilled group of players is obviously going to be easier than a game targeting a more skillful group of players. But you say that it doesn't work in practice. I totally disagree. It seems like observing what actually happens is the strongest indicator that I'm right. The only examples you're giving are example of games that are "skill-based", but as I've pointed out, skill based doesn't mean difficult. It simply means the outcome of the game is going to be dependent on the player's skill rather than some other variable like luck, theory, etc. You can have a 100% skill-based game that is relatively easy.
Uhhh annd that's my whole point? This has been about whether or not the term casual friendly includes information about difficulty of the game.
Yes, and clearly it does. However, one might object to what is implied, namely that a game that is casual friendly is necessarily boring to the hardcore gamer -- by appealing to the fact that difficulty occurs at different stages in the learning process of a game, and that a game can in principle be easy to learn (i.e., casual), yet difficult to master (i.e., hardcore).
Chess is a perfect example. It is a relatively easy game to learn, but it is extremely difficult to master, and its difficulty ranges quite a bit depending on your opponent's skill level. A game can be very easy and engaging right from the start, drawing you in and providing you with fun in a relaxed and casual manner, and yet simultaneously contain so much potential that it keeps you enthralled for a lifetime.
Interesting to note, that was actually my experience with my first MMORPG, DAoC. I suspect this was many of our experiences. We didn't start out hardcore. The game was simple enough to jump into and have fun right from the start, and yet the amount of fun I was having drew me in deeper and deeper, eventually turning me into a hardcore gamer. The key, however, was that when I wanted to go deeper, the game let me go deeper, there was more there there. Modern MMOs sometimes feel like they are simple and let you jump in, but they don't let you go any deeper.
Tetris is another example that people here have brought up about a videogame that starts out casual friendly but can be appealing to hardcore gamers. I don't have any qualms with that. In the context of my claim (casual friendly implies on average less difficulty), and you break these examples down you'll see that the casual friendy aspect of these games is the easy beginnings and then as you become more hardcore about the game, that's when you get into the more difficult aspects of it.
For example, let's say Tetris started out at the max difficulty. That wouldn't be very casual friendly. However, to make it more casual friendly you could have the difficulty start out relatively easy and work up from there.
I think you're missing the point completely then, because an MMO is very specific in nature, and it has been bastardized by big company producers thinking they can get away with labeling their product an MMO without it actually being one.
I think you are getting the term MMO and MMORPG confused. MMO is generic for any massively multiplayer online game. MMORPG is a subset of the MMO genre.
Originally posted by kartool Originally posted by BearKnight
I think you're missing the point completely then, because an MMO is very specific in nature, and it has been bastardized by big company producers thinking they can get away with labeling their product an MMO without it actually being one.I think you are getting the term MMO and MMORPG confused. MMO is generic for any massively multiplayer online game. MMORPG is a subset of the MMO genre.
The colloquial use of "MMO" is to mean "MMORPG"*. It's a perfectly legit usage. The speaker needs to make it clear through context what they truly mean though, or it can create some confusion.
Oh, what the h3ll. We've strayed so far from the topic, we may as well argue about the meaning of "MMO" and "MMORPG".
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
You keep coming back to the idea that casual games are easier, but there's nothing to support the idea as being generally true. It seems intuitive, but looking around at the games being offered results in many examples that do not support the idea.
Team Fortress 2 is designed with a very low time investment needed, but it is nearly 100% skill based. Left 4 Dead 2 can be played in short, ten minute bursts but again, it's nearly 100% skill based. It no longer exists but Picaroon was a game designed to be played in short bursts, but required a good bit of strategy and luck to be successful. There are mobile games designed around the idea of players spending as little as ten minutes at a time playing, but those games require strategic skill to be successful. Especially since action takes place without player input. If advanced planning and strategy skills are absent, the player will have little fun and have little progress.
I'm sure with a little bit of research we could compile a longer list of games with a low time investment, skill dependent games. The idea that casual games are generally easier may seem intuitive, but it doesn't work in practice. This is probably why the terms "Casual" and "Hardcore", when applied to games and people generally revolve around the time investments rather than the difficulty.
I think you are correct to say time investment is central to the common meaning of 'casual' and 'hardcore', and twitch skill isn't. But then, why bring up twitch skill at all?
It seems to me that twitch is the ultimate expression of casual gaming. It is simple, even a 3 year-old can do it, yet mastery can be difficult. It is like throwing a football, anyone can do it, it is casual . . . not everyone can be a professional quarterback.
Nevertheless, it isn't precise to say "casual" -- understood in terms of time investment -- has no connection to difficulty. If you threw an average person who can throw a football into a professional game, it would be EXTREMELY difficult for them.
Originally posted by Jjix Originally posted by lizardbonesOriginally posted by Holophonist
You keep coming back to the idea that casual games are easier, but there's nothing to support the idea as being generally true. It seems intuitive, but looking around at the games being offered results in many examples that do not support the idea. Team Fortress 2 is designed with a very low time investment needed, but it is nearly 100% skill based. Left 4 Dead 2 can be played in short, ten minute bursts but again, it's nearly 100% skill based. It no longer exists but Picaroon was a game designed to be played in short bursts, but required a good bit of strategy and luck to be successful. There are mobile games designed around the idea of players spending as little as ten minutes at a time playing, but those games require strategic skill to be successful. Especially since action takes place without player input. If advanced planning and strategy skills are absent, the player will have little fun and have little progress. I'm sure with a little bit of research we could compile a longer list of games with a low time investment, skill dependent games. The idea that casual games are generally easier may seem intuitive, but it doesn't work in practice. This is probably why the terms "Casual" and "Hardcore", when applied to games and people generally revolve around the time investments rather than the difficulty. I think you are correct to say time investment is central to the common meaning of 'casual' and 'hardcore', and twitch skill isn't. But then, why bring up twitch skill at all?
It seems to me that twitch is the ultimate expression of casual gaming. It is simple, even a 3 year-old can do it, yet mastery can be difficult. It is like throwing a football, anyone can do it, it is casual . . . not everyone can be a professional quarterback.
Nevertheless, it isn't precise to say "casual" -- understood in terms of time investment -- has no connection to difficulty. If you threw an average person who can throw a football into a professional game, it would be EXTREMELY difficult for them.
I think that's a marketing thing. Team Fortress isn't going to advertise itself as a "casual" game, no matter how little time investment is needed to play the game and have fun.
Also, "casual" doesn't refer to the total time invested in a game. A person could play the same game casually for years, becoming very skilled at the game. This doesn't change their status as a casual player and it doesn't change the game itself either.
Professional football isn't a casual sport. For that matter, neither is high school or college football. The time investment is significant.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
Comments
The point of an MMO was always meant to be a massive game with everybody playing together in one concurrent world. Of course that seldom happens these days with the amount of instancing and so forth, and I am not bashing it or anything, personally I think its worked out well. The part that has been missed is the interaction with each other, the forming of community and just general/basic communication. Now days a lot of people treat MMOs as if they are single player games to which other players might as well be NPC's for all they care.
I agree that this is happening. Even though you probably don't agree, this is the basis for a lot of anti-themepark sentiments around here. There has been a shift away from the MASSIVELY part of MMORPG. Some may like that, but it seems hard to deny that it's happening. Also a lot of us feel that it's kind of watering down the genre. When you take a genre that is very distinct from other genres and shift it more towards the middle, that's kind of a problem.
All MMO's are the descendant of the pen and paper Dungeons & Dragons which was a social outlet for a small group of role players. And pnp is a descendant of old Gentleman's Gaming Clubs. What it has become today is an electronic playground where all sexes can participate from a room in their home. Still meant to feed the social desires of people. Rubbing elbows with strangers, talking about interests shared or clashing with rival opinions. Most of which takes place on forums not during actual game play. So it does not really need to be an mmo for socializing. Console games have social forums as well. An mmo does need to be a well built game to draw in a club mentality of loyal fans. Many mmo's now are thrown together with thread and school glue to earn a quick buck. I suppose if this were an old England Gentleman's Club you might say that some clubs are in back alleys with BOOBS and some are uptown with true intellectual gaming. I think social improves when the game is well loved.
The level of difficulty or required level of skill when talking about "casual" isn't really a consideration.
Does SC2 have a formal set of rules, that must be followed by design? Are there informal "rules" that people follow, that are above and beyond the rules provided by developer? If so, then it's probably not a "casual" game.
However, someone can play a non-casual game in a casual manner. If someone plays SC2 when they feel like it or irregularly, even if they are very competitive when they play, they are a "casual" playing a non-casual game.
People keep bringing this up and I keep explaining the difference. Yes, people can play a non casual game casually. The question is what makes a game casual friendly. What is going to facilitate casual play? What is going to attract casual players. If a game is extremely mechanically difficult, that's not conducive to somebody playing it casually. You have to work to get good at it which means you can't get into it quickly. You can't play it sitting on the toilet as TB puts it. And the skill to play the game is something that you lose if you don't play it regularly, so the game isn't a natural fit for a casual player. It's not casual friendly.
I understand what you're saying, but "casual" in regards to video games refers to the time investment, not the skill set required to play the games. Referring to a game as "casual" because it's easy misrepresents what the game is.
Candy Crush is casual friendly because it can be played in short bursts. By your paragraph above, it's not that casual, even though it's not that mechanically complex, it can be very difficult. It requires reflexes and regular practice to stay "good" at the game if you don't want to spend tons of money on it.
Time investment as a deciding factor is definitive. Difficulty or skill as a deciding factor is not definitive. Difficulty is also very subjective. That's why it's not used.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
The new gen isn't missing the point ...
They never got to know the point.
They are not part of the genre as that genre barely exists anymore. They would have to had played more rpg style games, possible pnp games to understand what an rpg is. Todays players were dragged in from different platforms and games to play mmos created for mass appeal.
Mass appeal DOES NOT MEAN better. It means watered down. Reduced to the lowest common denominator. By definition this means that many of the features liked by players of actual rpg games are removed.
Mmorpgs used to be our genre. Mmos of today are not our genre.
The second poster sort of touched on this but was completely wrong. The outcome of making games that appeal to a cross-genre audience is that a genre is created and the old one destroyed. On top of this the current model is failing. The "mass appeal" concept did not work (or only once). Making games for smaller audiences will always be the more successful format and creates diversity. Old school mmorpg players get what they want by getting the game they wanted and by NOT having the players they do not want. The developers get a smaller yet much more dedicated audience. It is a win win win.
This is why there are several mmos in the works that are recreating the "lost genre". It won't appeal to the new gens who have never truly played an rpg and it shouldn't.
Lamborghini does not advertise their vehicles toward the soccer mom crowd for a %$#@ing good reason. Big game manufacturers should smarten the hell up too but indie developers will always be the driving force behind innovation and it is them who we should support.
You stay sassy!
I'm not so sure that a casual gamer would be defined as such. It may be the way they describe themselves, but that's kind of like saying somebody who describes themselves as an overeater isn't also fat. But either way, a casual gamer may be simply defined as how much of a time investment they want to make into a particular game, but in order to cater to that type of gamer, difficulty is a factor. If you're making a game and you want to make it so that it appeals to somebody who doesn't put that much time into games, you're going to make it easier (on average) than a game that you make that is geared towards a more hardcore player.
DikuMUD 1991, free to play text based MMORPG.
Trying to grasp hold of a literal definition of a word is like trying to grasp water with your bare hand. Water isn't easily caught that way. Using the dictionary is like taking a picture of a bird and saying "bird" and hoping some magical bond between the word and the picture will make it official. Well, why is it that the bird I see above me in the trees has yellow wings, whereas the picture only shows brown?
We all more or less know what is meant by "casual", and trying to fix that into some "official" definition only results in the word apparently becoming more elusive than it was at the start. Countless walls of text you fellows have created and absolutely no clarity has been achieved whatsoever. The word is not a fixed thing, it is an always moving and evolving thing. The tighter you grip, the more superficial any exploration of the word becomes, the more we find ourselves scratching our heads, "why are they arguing over this?"
We can think about the casual gamer in a million ways, the very term was constructed to allow us to think about it. For me the casual gamer is a person who will not or cannot enter as deeply into the reality of gaming as I can. Their subjective understanding of gaming is superficial because they do not love it so deeply the way I do. For them it is a distraction, for me a romance. For them it is cheap six-pack meant only to get them drunk, for me it is the magical flavor of a thousand dollar bottle of wine. For them it is jerking off to porn, for me it is making love to a beautiful woman.
(Incidentally, making love to a woman tends to be much more difficult than jerking off to porn, though I can't say the latter is more relaxing than the former.)
D3 isn't an MMO. Blizzard doesn't portray it as one. As you weren't around when it launched, the forum users here overwhelming wanted it listed on the sight. (Now whether we actually had feedback regardless of the sway of the user base or not I'm not sure, nor do I care.)
MMO's haven't been failing, unless your comparing that to WOW's numbers. Most MMO's are still somewhat successful, and few close down in few years.
MMO's are about having fun with a community of individuals enjoying the same game, conquering whatever I deem is fun to me. Whether that is a solo time, duo time, or group element depends what I'm in the mood for. Are they catered differently and not a stigmata around them as the basement dwelling scumbags that leave their kids in the car to burn up or some random other death associated with Everquest? No, they are now mainstream. If you think MMO's are only about making the most profitable game, I'd say Apps for phones are tons more profitable than any MMO will probably ever be other than maybe WOW, as those can be flyby hits with whole slews of people.
I agree that a casual gamer isn't something you can nail down. However when somebody says "a casual gamer is somebody who only cares about how long the play sessions are", I take issue with that. When you say "this is the one thing that defines a casual gamer" and that one thing isn't included in any definition of the word casual, I think that IS a situation where you can get some clarity by looking at the definition.
I've been saying from the start that there are many things that define a casual game and a casual gamer. I don't buy for a second that the only thing that they care about is being able to jump in and out of a game at will. I think that's PART of it, but not all of it.
So correcting someone's assumption should be taken as a post to attack the OP?
What was that about 'subset of information / out of context' line? Oh yeah... Intellectual dishonesty.
How kind of you to demonstrate exactly what that is. Thank you! ^_^
Gdemami -
Informing people about your thoughts and impressions is not a review, it's a blog.
I bet none of the definitions explain casual in the context of video games.
Ofcourse it does! Skill transfers over from game to game. Accumulated wealth and advancement does not. Ergo, practice and training is not the same as grind.
To put it simply, casual friendly means minimal time investment and the ability to enjoy the game in short bursts. If you look what that means in practice, you realize accessibility (and, in part, usability) plays an important role to make that possible.
From the gamasutra article Venge linked:
Challenge. The most common assumption is that a difficult game is necessarily hardcore. This is simply not true. The confusion lies in the language: just as "hot" describes both spice and temperature, difficult describes more than one thing.
If your interface is vague, the game is "difficult", if the objectives are unclear, the game is "difficult", if your game is addictively simple yet impossible to master, it is also "difficult". Difficult describes both accessibility and challenge. Difficult accessibility is bad and is covered by all six bullets in the previous section.
Difficult challenge is good and, in fact, it's the most casual route to replayability. You want a user to feel that mastering your game is a challenge; that each session ends with a new sense of accomplishment. The real trick is in instilling challenge without devolving into one of the six pillars of hardcore design. Tetris manages to do it simply by speeding up the drop rate of the pieces, but most games don't have the luxury of such a straightforward solution.
-Tony Ventrice, Evolving the social game: Finding casual by defining hardcore, Gamasutra.com
Another piece Venge quoted:
While the term “casual gamer” is utilized a great deal in today’s market, some experienced game players dislike the term and consider it divisive. That may be because the descriptor “casual game” is often (and incorrectly) utilized to identify easy and/or childish games that are repetitive and mind-numbingly simple. A casual game can actually take a lot of skill to master: again, consider Tetris, which has very basic rules, but boasts a heck of a challenge at certain levels. Well-built casual games should appeal to everyone, regardless of their skill level.
-Nadia Oxford, Casual game, About.com
And another:
So, what is casual? Portnow believes it's hard to define, but the quick and dirty answer is: a game that can be played in short sessions, lacks finality and is "replayable ad nauseam." Now, that could mean Bejeweled, but it may also include "hardcore" darlings like Geometry Wars.
-Alexander Sliwinski, What defines a casual game, Joystiq.com
Now I am not going to list all of them, but I am curious, which one of those says that hard games cannot be casual friendly?
Kudos to Venge for scouring the Internet for some articles by the way.
Don't play dumb. Your definition of casual is a general definition. It does not define the word within the context of video games. The context we are talking in right now. Different contexts offer different meanings to words. Venge's articles talk about the definition within the context of video games.
The part which you quoted I am referring to games where the game starts with just a press of a button i.e. you enter que, and the system finds you a suitable opponent(s).
Good usability design can make a difficult game accessible. Although the initial skill level of a player is relevant as it defines that starting point for usability design, it is not required to teach the player everything there is to know about the game. For example, things like metagame are frankly impossible to teach in a tutorial. Some things players have to learn themselves.
Accessibility is a broad term. You talk about accessibility in terms of first time use. Yes, if I jump into SC2 from WC3, SC2 may appear more accessible to me than to a player completely new to RTS games. But difficulty does not matter when we talk about accessibility relevant to casual friendliness. After we have both become proficient in the game, how hard the game is becomes irrelevant.
And I am saying it is not. See above.
And you are bringing up definitions that are not within the right context. You are doing a horrible job proving your point.
What you are talking about is "how to stay on top". You are not demonstrating how to enjoy the game. While one does not exclude the other, you don't have to try to be the best in order to enjoy the game.
Lets see if you can follow this:
These points I gathered through years of observation. This is how they are used as far as I can tell. There's a huge difference between a "casual game" and a "casual friendly game". Majority of todays games are casual friendly (SC2 included) as opposed by many of the old school MMORPGs which were not.
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been -Wayne Gretzky
What I hear you saying is something like this (these are my own words of course): the casual gamer is looking for a more superficial gaming experience. Now, "superficial" has many facets, some may apply to this casual gamer, others to that casual gamer, but on the whole all casuals are united in their desire for a more superficial gaming experience. In many situations, that superficiality comes, in part, from short play sessions, in other situations the superficiality comes from easy game play. But overall, and this is the point, they want a less meaningful gaming experience.
To that someone might argue, "no, casual gamers WANT just as meaningful a gaming experience, they simply do not have as much time!" That is to say, someone might argue that the very definition of a casual is in their time limitations, not in the depth of gaming they wish to experience. It is the kind of 140 characters or less argument. The meaning need merely be compressed into shorter, more concise and potent messages.
For the sake of argument, let's assume it is possible to squish meaning into condensed packets of time, to be able to convey Henry David Thoreau's Walden in 140 characters or less for example. Let's say a good game discovers a way to make what previously took days to experience, now can all be had in 15 minutes. Shouldn't that make the hardcore gamer's experience -- the gamer with lots of leisure time on their hands -- even richer? Someone who can experience not one of these rich 15 minute experiences per day, but 10, 20, or 30 of them? Shouldn't they be capable of a gaming experience unlike any ever had?
Yet that is not what we hear from hardcore gamers. Instead, what we hear is that the games are exceedingly boring.
Well as it turns out the phrase includes the word casual for a reason.
Dear lord.... please please please try to read and comprehend this. I'm not saying they're not different, I'm saying they're not different in the context of this debate. The fact that training can transfer into different games doesn't matter when you talk about accessibility. You put somebody in front a difficult game and he's going to have to spend time to become competent at it. The fact that his time can then be used LATER in life in a different video game doesn't change that.
Those are terrible examples TBH. It doesn't compare casual games to hardcore games at all. Difficulty isn't an objective thing. The point is that casual friendly games are going to be easier than their hardcore peers. It doesn't mean every casual game is easy and every casual gamer is bad at games. But it does mean if you're making a game geared towards casual gamers, it's going to tend to be easier than a game that is geared towards hardcore players.
Also you're defining casual friendly incorrectly. You're describing a casual player (and even that definition I don't agree with). Casual friendly means it's designed to attract casual players. Aside from the fact that a casual player by definition is looking for a relaxing experience and difficulty is related to relaxation, you're wrong even assuming that's not the case (which it is). Even assuming your definition of a "casual player", a casual friendly game is still one where the difficulty is going to be easier than a hardcore game. Why? Because it's appealing to somebody who doesn't play games as much as more hardcore players.
Casual game:
"A casual game is a video game targeted at or used by a mass audience of casual gamers. Casual games can have any type of gameplay, and fit in any genre. They are typically distinguished by their simple rules and lack of commitment required in contrast to more complex hardcore games.[1] "
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casual_game
Two things to note here:
1. It says they are typically distinguished by simple rules and a lack of commitment required. If a game is more difficult, it requires more commitment.
2. They're targeted towards casual gamers. Casual gamers can be described as such:
"For this reason, games which attempt to appeal to the casual player tend to strive for simple rules and ease of game play"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casual_game#Casual_gamer
Right when they made the term for video games they completely changed the meaning of the word casual, I guess. A casual gamer is somebody who plays games casually. Casually has a definition. So does casual. You can say the definition of a casual gamer is simply somebody who doesn't want to put in the same time commitment as a hardcore player and you'd be wrong. But even assuming you're right about that, you're still wrong about what a casual friendly game means. A casual friendly game is appealing to those people. It's appealing to people who spend less time playing video games. What on earth makes you think it wouldn't be easier than a game that is appealing to people who play games MORE?
You said accessibility is how fast you can be having fun. Having fun depends on the difficulty level.
The rest of this reply is just you rambling until you simply repeat your mantra of "Difficulty does not matter when we talk about accessibility relevant to casual friendliness." Why? Because you say so, that's it. I've explain why accessibility is related to difficulty. If you have a game that is mechanically difficult to the point of you having no idea what you're doing (Broodwar), it's not going to be as accessible as a game that is mechanically easier, a game that lets you start doing all of the cool things the game has to offer more quickly.
You said I myself didn't bring up difficulty in my example of SC2. I did. I highlighted it. You're clearly not even reading my responses at this point. Here it is again:
"LOL.... no. I didn't ask anybody anything. It's a known issue that LoL is more casual friendly than SC2. Like I've said, there was a massive crisis in the SC2 community about the game not being casual friendly and it wasn't able to compete with LoL for those reasons. It lead to a lot of changes in the game, including things like ranks you can level up for each race, new avatar portraits and an emphasis on the "arcade" aspect of starcraft which promotes community made custom games that are mechanically easier and less hardcore PRECISELY to attract casual players."
I'm bringing up definitions that are what this term is based on. Casual players want a casual experience. I've explained so many times that difficulty is related to accessibilty and that a casual gamer is obviously not going to be as skilled, on average, as somebody who plays games more often and for longer. Yet you just kind of ignore it when I say these things and go back to saying "difficulty is not related to accessibility."
If you're getting worse at the game over time because it's so mechanically difficult that you have to play often to maintain your skill level, that's probably not going to be very fun for a lot of casual gamers. It's not about staying on top, it's about accessibility. You can't come right into the game and start having fun, you can't leave and come back and be right where you were. Lots and lots and lots of people quit SC2 for this very reason and switch to more casual friendly games like LoL and DOTA.
In fact that makes me realize how wrong you are about the SC2 skill compared to LoL rank thing from above. Having a rank that isn't based on personal skill is probably MORE casual friendly because you can leave and come back and still have that benefit. A game that requires a lot of consistent training isn't going to be as casual friendly because you don't have that same ability to leave and come back.
Wow you are so incredibly wrong. How can a casual game... hell, how can ANY game attract all players? There are conflicting types of players.
The degree to which a game is casual friendly is the degree to which it attracts casual players. Why would they be called CASUAL friendly games? Why not hardcore friendly? Are you serious right now?
And if they're designed to attract casual gamers (they are, btw), then you need look no further than your second bullet point: casual gamers don't play video games that often. If they don't play video games that often, they're not going to be as skill, on average. If they're not as skilled on average, making a game accessible to them is going to have to be easier than a game that is designed to appeal to more hardcore players. Game. Set. Match. Stop wasting my time.
Assuming the definition of a casual gamer IS simply their time limitations, a game that is designed to attract a person who doesn't have as much time to play video games is going to be easier than a game that is designed to attract a person who has more time to play video games. That seems pretty intuitive to me. Assuming no other differences between the people, if one group plays games more than the other group, they're going to be better at games. Since enjoyment for the majority of people is going to include the CORRECT amount of challenge (not too much, not too little, for each given person), then a game that is geared towards the lesser skilled group should be easier. Correct?
Yes, seems straight forward to me. A book written for a mass audience is not going to be as complicated as one written for an academic. And?
Uhhh annd that's my whole point? This has been about whether or not the term casual friendly includes information about difficulty of the game.
Yes, and clearly it does. However, one might object to what is implied, namely that a game that is casual friendly is necessarily boring to the hardcore gamer -- by appealing to the fact that difficulty occurs at different stages in the learning process of a game, and that a game can in principle be easy to learn (i.e., casual), yet difficult to master (i.e., hardcore).
Chess is a perfect example. It is a relatively easy game to learn, but it is extremely difficult to master, and its difficulty ranges quite a bit depending on your opponent's skill level. A game can be very easy and engaging right from the start, drawing you in and providing you with fun in a relaxed and casual manner, and yet simultaneously contain so much potential that it keeps you enthralled for a lifetime.
Interesting to note, that was actually my experience with my first MMORPG, DAoC. I suspect this was many of our experiences. We didn't start out hardcore. The game was simple enough to jump into and have fun right from the start, and yet the amount of fun I was having drew me in deeper and deeper, eventually turning me into a hardcore gamer. The key, however, was that when I wanted to go deeper, the game let me go deeper, there was more there there. Modern MMOs sometimes feel like they are simple and let you jump in, but they don't let you go any deeper.
You keep coming back to the idea that casual games are easier, but there's nothing to support the idea as being generally true. It seems intuitive, but looking around at the games being offered results in many examples that do not support the idea.
Team Fortress 2 is designed with a very low time investment needed, but it is nearly 100% skill based. Left 4 Dead 2 can be played in short, ten minute bursts but again, it's nearly 100% skill based. It no longer exists but Picaroon was a game designed to be played in short bursts, but required a good bit of strategy and luck to be successful. There are mobile games designed around the idea of players spending as little as ten minutes at a time playing, but those games require strategic skill to be successful. Especially since action takes place without player input. If advanced planning and strategy skills are absent, the player will have little fun and have little progress.
I'm sure with a little bit of research we could compile a longer list of games with a low time investment, skill dependent games. The idea that casual games are generally easier may seem intuitive, but it doesn't work in practice. This is probably why the terms "Casual" and "Hardcore", when applied to games and people generally revolve around the time investments rather than the difficulty.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
A game being nearly 100% skill based doesn't mean it's 100% difficult. You're quite suddenly using how "skill based" a game is as an analog for difficulty, it isn't. Using your example of TF2: its predecessor, TFC, is equally skill based but mechanically more difficult. It also happens to be far less casual friendly than TF2. TF2 was designed to be more casual friendly than TFC and it's not a coincidence that in designing that game, they made it considerably easier.
You seem to agree that on paper casual friendly games seem like they should be easier. Like I've pointed out before, a game that is targeting a lesser skilled group of players is obviously going to be easier than a game targeting a more skillful group of players. But you say that it doesn't work in practice. I totally disagree. It seems like observing what actually happens is the strongest indicator that I'm right. The only examples you're giving are example of games that are "skill-based", but as I've pointed out, skill based doesn't mean difficult. It simply means the outcome of the game is going to be dependent on the player's skill rather than some other variable like luck, theory, etc. You can have a 100% skill-based game that is relatively easy.
Tetris is another example that people here have brought up about a videogame that starts out casual friendly but can be appealing to hardcore gamers. I don't have any qualms with that. In the context of my claim (casual friendly implies on average less difficulty), and you break these examples down you'll see that the casual friendy aspect of these games is the easy beginnings and then as you become more hardcore about the game, that's when you get into the more difficult aspects of it.
For example, let's say Tetris started out at the max difficulty. That wouldn't be very casual friendly. However, to make it more casual friendly you could have the difficulty start out relatively easy and work up from there.
I think you are getting the term MMO and MMORPG confused. MMO is generic for any massively multiplayer online game. MMORPG is a subset of the MMO genre.
I think you are getting the term MMO and MMORPG confused. MMO is generic for any massively multiplayer online game. MMORPG is a subset of the MMO genre.
The colloquial use of "MMO" is to mean "MMORPG"*. It's a perfectly legit usage. The speaker needs to make it clear through context what they truly mean though, or it can create some confusion.
Oh, what the h3ll. We've strayed so far from the topic, we may as well argue about the meaning of "MMO" and "MMORPG".
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
I think you are correct to say time investment is central to the common meaning of 'casual' and 'hardcore', and twitch skill isn't. But then, why bring up twitch skill at all?
It seems to me that twitch is the ultimate expression of casual gaming. It is simple, even a 3 year-old can do it, yet mastery can be difficult. It is like throwing a football, anyone can do it, it is casual . . . not everyone can be a professional quarterback.
Nevertheless, it isn't precise to say "casual" -- understood in terms of time investment -- has no connection to difficulty. If you threw an average person who can throw a football into a professional game, it would be EXTREMELY difficult for them.
I think you are correct to say time investment is central to the common meaning of 'casual' and 'hardcore', and twitch skill isn't. But then, why bring up twitch skill at all?
It seems to me that twitch is the ultimate expression of casual gaming. It is simple, even a 3 year-old can do it, yet mastery can be difficult. It is like throwing a football, anyone can do it, it is casual . . . not everyone can be a professional quarterback.
Nevertheless, it isn't precise to say "casual" -- understood in terms of time investment -- has no connection to difficulty. If you threw an average person who can throw a football into a professional game, it would be EXTREMELY difficult for them.
I think that's a marketing thing. Team Fortress isn't going to advertise itself as a "casual" game, no matter how little time investment is needed to play the game and have fun.
Also, "casual" doesn't refer to the total time invested in a game. A person could play the same game casually for years, becoming very skilled at the game. This doesn't change their status as a casual player and it doesn't change the game itself either.
Professional football isn't a casual sport. For that matter, neither is high school or college football. The time investment is significant.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.