Sal.Paradise said:
Pft! This large swathe of people I'm judging are not good enough to identify with the likes of me! They're so elitist! No irony at all there :x |
I'm not seeing the irony here...
He's judging people by his actions, unlike those self-proclaimed "hardcore" gamers that judge others by their gaming preferences.
And I agree with him. I have yet to see any gamer that refers to himself as "hardcore" having respect for what are called "casual" games or those who played them. In fact, I would say that the sole reason the term exists is just for the opposite. To perpetuate the idea that some types of games are inherently superior than others, and that those who enjoy them are either ignorant or have poor taste. And of course, I would also call this immature behaviour...
These ambiguous labels say nothing about the quality of the game in question, nor are always representative of the gamer's experience. I for one have been playing videogames for around 18 years now and I prefer to play Mario Party or Tetris than Uncharted or Counter-Strike. What am I, "hardcore" or "casual" ?
In addition, these terms represent a false dichotomy. There's not just two types of games/gamers, but many, many more. Just because a "hardcore" gamer likes 2D fighters doesn't mean that he likes FPS games as well, and the same applies to "casual" ones. So, what's the point of using these terms anyway ?
As others have mentioned, any content distributor that wants to attract a big number of customers has to appeal to a variety of tastes, which in this case includes both "hardcore" and "casual" games, whatever those are. Sony knows this very well, which is why they have published plenty of games that could be labeled "casual" every gen. The success of both PS1 and PS2 had a lot to do with this. You don't get to sell over 100 million consoles with only the likes of Final Fantasy, Tekken, and Metal Gear Solid. You also need your fair share of Harry Potter, Madden, and Guitar Hero.
