This trend of spitting on casual gamers...

[Kytiara]

Oh man...I go to sleep and come back and you guys are debating about what constitutes art and which games are mature =).

Hell, consider anything whatever you like, since everyone has the right to their own opinions. Nobody will agree on every point because everyone is different. Some people like the Marylin Mansons or 50 cents of the world, and think they are superior to classical composers. Some people think that anything not composed by Beethoven, Strauss or Bach is like nails being scratched down a chalkboard. Y'all need to stop being so critical of others personal tastes.

My point was that whether you like casual GAMES or not is up to you, but looking down on casual GAMERS, or actively insulting them or saying you hate them or saying that they are ruining gaming, or ruining the industry, or are to blame for less super high budget hardcore games being released, is false, stupid and incredibly shortsighted.

Casual gamers are responsible for this industry's survival and they always have. They are the investors that buy a few shares here and there and all of them combined make up the vast majority of all purchases. The hardcore gamers up until now have been able to control the direction the industry has gone in. They are the board of directors (well not really but thats the best analogy I could think of), each individually investing much more heavily than the casual gamer, but all together they only make up a very small portion of purchases.

What we are seeing now, is that companies are waking up and realizing that the people who pay their paychecks are in fact important. The hardcore gamers will always need to be placated, because they are the most vocal and critical group and have the power to change the casual gamer perceptions. BUT, at the same time these companies are realizing that they can't keep ignoring the people who make up the biggest portion of their investors. So they are developing games that are trying to target them directly.

You guys just have to chill and relax a little. There will always be hardcore games (or what you think of as hardcore). Game developers are gamers too, so there will always be titles that interest you. You need to wait out the current re-adjustments that are being made right now while companies try and support the casual gamers more fully. Hell, Nintendo has been hugely successful over the years in catering both to their hardcore gamers AND to their casual gamers. If they can do it why can't EA, Sony, M$, SE, etc...?