Nice post, but you tend to categorize too much imho.
I think the term of hardcore has changed in past years :
In the late 1990's, a hardcore gamer was the one who bought all consoles on launch day, regardless of the cost, and specific games directly from japan.
In fact , I think forumwarriors/fanboys are responsible for the evolution of this term to the absurd nonsense it is used nowadays, so that they create a group so they can recognize each other. Maybe they are afraid to get pwnd in the future on a random online game by girls who began gaming with Nintendogs.
Imho I think my gf is a hardcore tetris player, my father is a hardcore minesweeper player... hardcore is about the people who plays, it's not to defined by the game you play, since everybody have fun. Better than being drug or tv addict ^^







