Frontier Developments chairman warns against hardcore gaming pretensions
I hate the term ‘casual gamer’. At Frontier we have made a number of games that appeal to a broad audience, including the so-called ‘casual’ gamer, like the Roller Coaster Tycoon games, Thrillville games, Dog’s Life and Wallace and Gromit games (we view LostWinds as primarily a core-gamer game, by the way). With each of these games we have conducted audience studies both in our own right, and with publishers, as well as the anecdotal feel we all have anyway as gamers. Over time this gives a good impression of what people tend to like and dislike, and it is a subtle, complex mix.
Golden era
Cast your mind back to ye olden times of 1997, which feels like a blink of an eye ago for some of us, and the release of Goldeneye on the Nintendo 64. I remember many gamers complaining how hard the controls were to come to terms with. Thankfully, they eventually did so and all this is now forgotten, and it spawned perhaps the most successful genre in our industry, the console FPS. There are still purists that think mouse and twenty hard-to-remember keyboard buttons are the ‘true’ FPSs, but that is a whole separate rant which just reinforces my point.
The previous year, other gamers complained about the number of buttons used in Mario 64 with its move to 3D. This, and the issues with Goldeneye, is no different to what a typical ‘casual’ gamer feels when they try to play Modern Warfare 2, especially when they get whupped instantly by pixel-perfect expert players, while they are busy trying to work out how to stop the camera looking down at their feet. In this sphere, they are merely beginners. We ‘core’ gamers have had a gradual build up over a long sequence of FPSs since Goldeneye, each very slightly more complex and unforgiving than the last. If our 1997 selves were magically brought forward today with just the experience we had then, we would probably be considered as casual gamers too, by today’s standards.
Those new to gaming now, attracted by the simple approachability of Wii, iPhone, iPad, and hopefully in the near future Sony’s Move and Microsoft’s Natal, have not spent all their waking moments poring over games reviews or the latest in gaming hardware. They have been doing other things. This doesn’t mean we should treat them like idiots, but should draw them in by providing interesting, accessible experiences that are something more than shallow party games.
Natal gazing
Great levellers like Heavy Rain, (in that ‘core gamer’ skills and twitch response are not needed), are an interesting move in this direction, as it is focussing more on the experience and choices of the player than their ability, and yet is not patronising them with a primary-colours-based simplistic interface.
We have seen new players come to the Wii in droves, but there has sadly been a significant exodus since, as I believe we have failed to follow up with enough varied experiences to hold the interest of those players, without overwhelming them with complex controls that make them feel foolish. Clearly many will have bought the machine through fashion, and may still wheel it out occasionally at parties, but no longer buy any games for it. It may be too late for these people of this Wii generation – but let’s not underestimate those who come to our industry through Natal or Move? These people are not afraid of technology – they love it and will buy it in droves – they are afraid of feeling, or being made to look stupid. It is our job to make them look and feel clever, to feel involved, to draw them in.
I have even overheard people say ‘the market for casual games is dead’. It is not. The market for some of the cheap rubbish labelled as ‘casual’ games, aiming for the fictitious straw-chewer may well be dead, but the market for new experiences is as alive as ever. There is a danger that as developers we will look inward as an industry, studying our collective navels. Microsoft and Sony have staked a great deal on their forthcoming technologies, which together present a scale of opportunity for innovation this industry has hardly seen before. We are in an industry that has never stopped changing – we should embrace the change and push these exciting new technologies to deliver great new experiences for all our audiences.
This is a good topic. While I don't have a problem is lower difficulty levels etc. What I don't like is what's happend to Splinter Cell in the attempt to broarden it's appeal it's lost what made it great in the first place - don't get me started on 'mark and execute'.
I think a bigger issue is online matchmaking. When done well it can be the perfect way to bring new gamers in to an online world but when done badly (Street Fighter 4) the fun is sucked out.
At Gamecamp last weekend there was a funny talk entitled "We need to get more boys into gaming", ironically mocking the similar conference talks put out trying to get more girls to pick up a game pad.
The casual games devs running the panel (all women) said that their main problem is that (primarily male) games graduates are being indoctrinated to think that AAA games on consoles are the largest market and that's where they should aim themselves. Just go on gameDev and look at the "help wanted" boards, everyone there is trying to make the next Gears of War, WOW or COD. I think its also getting compounded by the university's buying into the free tool sets and learning materials such as Cryengine and UDK.
So the reason why all the casual games we get are cheap rubbish is that, in terms of the market (hundreds of millions on the PC alone), there is a tiny proportion of developers cashing in and, according to the devs I spoke to, publishers and investors treat casual gaming on the PC with a markable disdain. With no proper competition or funding, we can probably expect a lot of rubbish.
It is a while since I've played Golden Eye on the 64; which was excellent for a console game, but I seem to recall that the game wouldn't allow you to move and turn simultaneously. So the inferior control argument would still stand.
The term “Casual gamer” means something completely different to me.
For me it refers to people who either lack knowledge to assess a game's production qualities, or people who are new to games, and therefore have no point of reference to constructively compliment or criticize any aspect of the game.
Both of these consumer types, give respite to developers and publishers producing games that don't build on best production techniques of the past. And they don't require much concept originality to be impressed either.
This ultimately grates with gaming aficionados/connoisseurs or core gamers if you will, as it lets them see, which companies have a real passion for making great games that are profitable, and those that only care about profit through sub-standard clones.
When Casual Games means what it says; easy to pick up & play, for long or short periods of time, and backed by the best production quality of the past and originality (like Wii Sports is), then and only then is it likely that core gamers will ditch the snobbery.
Good article! I was one of those hard core 1997 gamers and now probably considered sort of a casual gamer these days (even though I am a real avid gamer) because I am so busy trying to set up a game business making my own games. Not one of those shooting killer fighter games, but real adventure games. What I am insulted by (as a game developer and designer) is those many many bloody "Hidden Object" games! Those make a mockery in a way, of REAL games, with good story lines and much more interactivity! The hidden object games are merely backgrounds made by putting together photographed items and rendered quickly in a couple of hours by photoshop and then items throw into parts of the background and simple text saying find this and that. WHERE is the genuine storyline?? Only a shallow storyline. Where are the missions and real clues?? Hidden object games have clues that are bloody easy and direct u to the next hidden object, too linear and boring. Whats happened to actually talking with other people, doing mini puzzles based on clues, and following an adventure??? Hidden object games are being sold for a rip off $20 in stores when they are only really worth $5. Don't tell me about the Big Fish games site. I already know about that! My opinion is they need to BROADEN their game genres more. They have too many boring hidden object games and the graphics are getting rather boring. Lovely sure, but just good graphics isn't enough! I would prefer a GOOD story, a true adventure (examples like Runaway, Broken Sword, CSI, So Blonde and the older games by Sierra, like Kings Quest) are QUALITY adventure games with substance and fun and you can interact with other characters to solve clues and play mini puzzles/games or even create spells (like in Kings Quest 3) to make something work in order to solve a problem. You also have the option to choose between more than 1 or 2 and more paths in a game and have different endings. Now that is a REAL game. Those hidden object games only take half a day to make!! Hence my feeling insulted!! And I like some of the virtual worlds games like yoville, farmville, petville and farmtown. Those keep changing, adding new things, making it fun! Those games are worth playing and mostly free, with the exception of paying a bit for premium items which are great quality graphics! (From a graphic artist's point of view, if the items look good and have some interactivity then they are worth paying some money for). Having said all this, I am a proud casual gamer and use my 'casual gamer' status as time to relax!
I completely agree about the casual gamer problem, it's better distinguished into "hour and a bit at a time" gamers and "simple interface" gamers, as Alan Wake has beautifully proved. It feels casual, down to the way every episode contains a mini learning curve to bring you back up to speed and to the simple fact that there are paced episodes at all. It just feels like it's designed to fit into a healthy lifestyle, a context aware game.
Then on the other side you have heavy rain, an accessible and totally absorbing game, that can suck and hour or three from you easily. (I think that probably limits it's real world accessibility actually; how many people with limited time would play through the first bit only to decide to switch off the game and play with their own kids?)
There are loads of other games that fit this category, without having to make "bad games for people who don't know any better" games.
The key for me is giving people a basic gameplay hook that is easy to learn and consistently applied (ie it avoids the main effects of interface unreliability such as motion magnitude in the wii) and then apply all the tricks of difficulty curve creation we've known since mario. On that note I have to shout out the browser-game makers nitrome, who with a few exceptions make games that ease you in perfectly, providing just enough challenge at each stage to keep you learning. I rarely complete them, but I love whatever I do complete, stopping not because I'm stumped but because I don't quite want to commit the resources.
since i'm not a natively english speaking person casual in context with gaming gave me some problems to understand ;) i mean i understand the word casual but a casual gamer? even worse a casual game? to me playing computer games since early eighties when i also bought my first console (intellivision) that didn't exists at all. i guess people that are playing computer games won't do this occasionally, except ok, you would like to play just for a few minutes to relax from something else, but that's a different task and games for such occasions exist enough and it didn't matters if there are new, complex or graphically advanced. women, as a experience of mine, often play "casual", might be the haven't found the right grip to computers at all or well there exists not many games they like. in my point of view it depends mostly on how you grew up, unfortunately girls and boys still get parted in games and interests by their parents and in school, so they will have different interests when growing up or been grown up. finally you can say, a casual gamer is a "artificial word", not a real person. and speaking for my self i'm anything else rather than a casual gamer playing casual games, more somekind of addicted to since a long time, playing "unfortunatly" the same since a long time. something i posted somewhere else is the fact that todays youth is fortunately not as addicted to computers in general like we was, it has become something very common like tv to my generation. i guess in a quest for new games or genres we should respect this fact.
they might not play as often as we did, but they are of course no casual gamers.
