18-05-2004 01:50									#1
	Year of the casual gamer. Increase the size of your Attachments

Lets see, we've got Myst 4 coming, Roller Coaster Tycoon 3, The Sims 2, and even a Sims clone.

The perfect storm of casual gaming, no?

Is the industry betting too hard on this? Or is this the time to get the casual PC games out, when consoles are at a weakspot in their cycle - (note, PC game sales actually declined in 2003, while console game sales increased - of course the industry data doesnt include internet sales IIUC)

	18-05-2004 02:31									#2
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Aren't there also going to be relased lots of action games?
Every year there's a lot of games for 'casual gamers', not it's not always famous titles being released...

	18-05-2004 02:36									#3
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MYst is not really a casual game, it's got some difficult puzzles in it.. At least myst1 was pretty hard

	18-05-2004 03:59									#4
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now if they would release another decent rpg

	18-05-2004 04:48									#5
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no way, this is the year of competitive gamers. casual still dominate, but this year, competitive players are getting a lil treat...

even as far as revival of the tourney scenes we saw during early 90s? who knows.

All the SF games going ONLINE, Isuka going ONLINE, VF4 getting another REVISION, T5 coming out this year.

Doom 3 coming out, Half Life 2 Coming out.... I wonder if i have time for all this. I m gonna have to drop one genre out of thre i play lol.

A lil lacking on RTS department, but wc3 and sc will still hold fer while....

	18-05-2004 09:34									#6
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Although it has been "dumbed down" significantly, Thief III can not be considered a casual gamer's game. The dumbing down takes the form of options, so you don't even need to use the cheat-like 3rd person view for instance.

	18-05-2004 13:36									#7
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Oh.
I thought they were modernising the Chinese calendar.

I'm not too concerned about the future of gaming. These things tend to go in cycles anyway. Besides, I own so few games that I have to get busy catching up with all the stuff I've missed since I threw my Amiga out. I have a PS2, but don't use it, apart from playing DVDs.

	18-05-2004 14:19									#8
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quote: Originally posted by Skanky Burns Although it has been "dumbed down" significantly, Thief III can not be considered a casual gamer's game. The dumbing down takes the form of options, so you don't even need to use the cheat-like 3rd person view for instance.

Well if you ever read my serious posts on this ( ) you'd know there are 2 separate but related trends.

Btw I don't know anything about Myst4 so tell me why is it is lumped with those Tycoon/Sim games.

	18-05-2004 14:23									#9
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The best thing is well designed games can be played over and over for years to come. I still play games that were released a decade ago.

@ Chinese calendar being modernised.

	18-05-2004 14:39									#10
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a decade might be a little too old for me.

although isn't civ2 going on the big 10? Although I never play that game.

The oldest game I'm currently playing is Baldur's Gate.

	18-05-2004 14:55									#11
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quote: Originally posted by DrSpike Well if you ever read my serious posts on this ( ) you'd know there are 2 separate but related trends.

If you wrote it, I would have read it. But refresh my memory.

	18-05-2004 14:57									#12
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Civ 2 was released in 1996, and BGI was released in 1998.

	18-05-2004 15:10									#13
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quote: Originally posted by Skanky Burns If you wrote it, I would have read it. But refresh my memory.

Well the increase in proportional terms of casual gamers is one trend, and another is the consolisation, or dumbing down of more mainstream titles. I think the 2 trends potentially have similar roots (and sometimes similar effects), but they are distinct.

	18-05-2004 15:13									#14
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I'd add that RCT has a reasonably wide appeal. It's more of a borderline game than a casual game. As I said Myst4 also looks strange in that list. That leaves the poster child Sims games, and you may recall my opinions on them.

	18-05-2004 15:17									#15
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Yeah - you really can't get enough of them can you?

Myst isn't a proper game. It's a slideshow with controls. The game itself is mindnumbingly dull, and as such, it's just a collection of pretty backgrounds. I have no idea how they got the first one off the drawing board, let alone be in the position to release a fourth!

	18-05-2004 16:00									#16
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Never underestimate games that non-gaes players can get drawn into without needing to know a plethora of rules. Especially if they can run on a work PC and allow you to Alt-Tab

	18-05-2004 18:26									#17
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quote: Originally posted by DrSpike Well if you ever read my serious posts on this ( ) you'd know there are 2 separate but related trends. Btw I don't know anything about Myst4 so tell me why is it is lumped with those Tycoon/Sim games.

Oh, i admit the puzzles are hard. I suppose ANY one of those games could appeal to at least SOME serious gamers. More that these are the games that are typically played by the kind of people who only play one game, and arent particularly deep into gaming. Myst I think was even included free with some PC's some time back.

Maybe game for the 'mass market' would have been more accurate.

I certainly get the distinction between casual/family/mass market games and the phenomenon of dumbing down of games in more "hardcore" genres, like FPS or TBS. I was referring to the former here.

And Im not saying its a bad thing. One hopes that some of the people who play these will move on to deeper games.

	18-05-2004 18:39									#18
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Indeed we must hope so.

	18-05-2004 18:42									#19
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Thats been one of the areas of concern for wargames for example. With few PG style beer and pretzel games, what brings new people into the hobby? Some have replied that due to massive computer power, many of the "deep games" can be played without looking to deep under the hood, and so are suitable as entry level games. Im not sure. In any case the problem in that genre is distribution - with no games in stores, will people who arent already interested in the hobby search out games on the net?

	18-05-2004 18:50									#20
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Yeah fair points LotM, but once was enough.

Edit: Damn your editing!

	18-05-2004 18:55									#21
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quote: Originally posted by DrSpike Yeah fair points LotM, but once was enough. Edit: Damn your editing!

Im so glad we still have the edit feature


I thought the first post had gotten lost. I would have deleted the second one, but that didnt work - my account must still be screwed up somehow. So i figured i might as well add some more substance while I was at it.


I suppose I could have just put in a smiley

	18-05-2004 21:26									#23
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casual game for the hardcore genre are aite. Even though some harcorist hate them to death for being so casual.

It does attract players and it does add to the community. And from there they have higher cahnce of jumping into games that are far better in that same genre.

	18-05-2004 22:21									#24
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quote: Originally posted by Zero casual game for the hardcore genre are aite. Even though some harcorist hate them to death for being so casual. It does attract players and it does add to the community. And from there they have higher cahnce of jumping into games that are far better in that same genre.

Zero, have you ever considered playing "Mavis Bacon teaches Typing"?

	18-05-2004 22:45									#25
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Nothing wrong with casual gamers. Or indeed, 'dumbing down'. It's absolutely vital that there is some force standing in the way of mindless feature creep and self-destructive elitism.

	18-05-2004 22:54									#26
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quote: Originally posted by Sandman Nothing wrong with casual gamers. Or indeed, 'dumbing down'. It's absolutely vital that there is some force standing in the way of mindless feature creep and self-destructive elitism.

quoth the person who is about to return Crusader Kings.

Really feel burnt, eh?

	19-05-2004 04:36									#27
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Yes.

But less IS sometimes more. Elitist gamers won't see it that way; it's their elite status on the line.

	19-05-2004 04:46									#28
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But mostly less is just that - less.

The only time more is bad, is when it is unclearly documented, or running too many complicated formulas "under the hood"

Take SMAC - it has a lot more than Civ - but all the numbers are reachable, understandable... you can work with these numbers to improve your skills at this game.

But take MoO3 - it has more still than SMAC, but the numbers are hidden, recessed and involve ugly decimals everywhere... you can't use these numbers... there's too much to handle.

On the other hand there is Civ3, which has LESS than SMAC, and suffers heavily as a result.

Let's be honest. We like games with lots of maths that we can manage ourselves. It makes us feel smart

-Jam

	19-05-2004 05:48									#29
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quote: The only time more is bad, is when it is unclearly documented, or running too many complicated formulas "under the hood"

Well, if it's confusing certainly. But I also think that if it adds nothing to the game, it's bad. An example would be the resting in the BG series. Why not just give the party spell regeneration? Of course, that's what they did in KOTOR, and rightly so IMO.

quote: On the other hand there is Civ3, which has LESS than SMAC, and suffers heavily as a result.

I dunno. What about eras, civ traits and culture?

Eras were a fine example of pointless flab on a perfectly good system. If one was really desperate to constrict unhistorical tech progress they could just have reworked the tech tree.

Culture took the border idea from SMAC and complicated it. Not very successfully or logically, in my view.

quote: Let's be honest. We like games with lots of maths that we can manage ourselves. It makes us feel smart

It should add to the gameplay, not just gamer egos. For the long-term good of the genre.

	19-05-2004 14:41									#30
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I agree with Jamski...........less is usually less. Having said that I don't think Civ3 is a bad SP game, since there are some nice additions, and the fact that the core gameplay is simplified as compared to Civ2 and SMAC makes the AI more competitive. However I don't think it's a really compelling argument that less is more through AI limitations, though some would consider it so.

Less is only ever more in actuality if you can remove the bathwater of unnecessary complexity without throwing out the baby of depth. This is very hard to do.