Why going for casuals is folly

[Mr Khan]

Otakumegane said:

Mr Khan said:
Because there are more of them then there are of us, and contrary to a generation's worth of apocryphal/anecdotal evidence, they do buy games.

Those who believe that the industry should fully focus on the core gamer are the ones who are in folly. One only has to look at the snarl that is the anime industry today to understand why it's a bad idea to focus your business model on milking a small, dedicated group of people.

Um...I think I might want to hear more on this Anime industry crash.

It hasn't crashed *yet,* but much of the signs are there. The major anime production companies depend more and more upon the otaku market to make their productions worthwhile, in that they're more focused on selling super-high-priced Blu-Ray sets, figurines, and other stuff. To that end, they make these series more specifically to cater to the otaku crowd, thus leading to the proliferation of the moe blob and harem series, because the demands of the otaku lead to a product that does not have mass appeal. Eventually, this stigmatized market will shrink and collapse upon itself.

So it is in the game industry, where often the demands of the "core" lead to creating something fundamentally unappealing to the layperson.

Remember: industries don't have to recover from crashes. American comic books never did.