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MisterManGuy on 30 April 2017
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Soundwave said:
MisterManGuy said:

From your posts though, you seem to think that casual gamers will only play on mobile and nothing else, when that's not true. There are plenty of casual gamers with a PS4 who play the occasional Sports or Indie game, and they even play games on PC, the home of strategy games, sims, and hidden object titles, 3 of the most casual friendly genres in gaming. I don't buy this narrative that core gamers are the only ones who play consoles, and casuals only play games on phones and nothing else. Do you ever think that maybe casual gamers can play games on both a console AND a phone? 

Now yes, the Switch is being bought by young men primarily, but it's early in the Switch's life, and early adopters of gaming consoles typically tend to be those who knew about the product way before hand. Casual gamers don't start taking notice until a bit later. That's mostly how it's always worked. The great thing about the Switch is that it basically markets itself. You can pull out a Switch, prop it up with the stand, and hand a Joy-Con to someone who's never really played games before, and you two can easily play Mario Kart or Snipperclips instantly. It's simple, intuitive, and rather foward-thinking, so much so that it may also encourage those who don't have one to get one now that they got a taste of what it's like. 

Plus, there's also Nintendo's mobile initiatives, where they hope people will buy a Switch in addition to their phone. Which like I said, is possible and if you want proof that it's an effective strategy, Pokemon Go single handedly boosted 3DS sales for 2016, and helped made Pokemon Sun & Moon the best selling games in the series. 

Casual gamers are important, and it's important that they grow to become hardcore gamers too. Simply saying "They're fine with mobile games, they don't need anything else" is like saying "Kids are fine with Dr. Seus books, they don't need to learn longer, more complex novels, just let them read Green Eggs and Ham forever." 

Well some people don't read books period. Playing video games is not a neccessity in life. 

I don't think the average woman is magically going to buy a giant Switch system to go with her smartphone. Free games + free hardware (bascially, since everyone has a smartphone already) is too strong of a killer 1,2 punch to be stopped. 

Who even cares, like I like the show Breaking Bad. Now likely the main demographic for that show is men. And my fiance likes Gossip Girl. Now the main demographic there is likely women (just taking wild shot in the dark here). 

And that's fine. The people who make Gossip Girl or The 50 Shades of Grey movies don't need to go out of their way to try and get me to enjoy that product, it's just something I might watch for like 10 minutes, but I'm never going to be an enthusiast of. I'm never going get into knitting or arts & crafts either, doesn't matter what those industries do. And there's nothing wrong with that. 

If Miyamoto can't even get his own wife to enjoy console games, and says that she prefers smartphone games, I think we are getting to the point where this is trying to force a square peg into a round hole. Let them enjoy their smartphone games, in fact maybe give smartphones some credit here ... they do what the DS and Wii tried to do, but they simply do it much better. Way more games, easier to play in general, way more convienant, and way more ... free. 

Who says smartphone games are Dr. Seuss? There are plenty of smartphone games just as good as Wii Sports and better than 1,2 Switch. I played that Ellen party/trivia game at a party hosted by one of my female friends, and we had a lot of fun, and the total cost of that was $0. We had just as much fun as you would have with a Wii Sports type game, people were roaring with laughter and all that. Good luck competing with that, Switch. 

Some people don't read many books, but they can at least read proficiently. Saying that people don't need to learn how to play games is exactly like saying people don't need to learn how to read. This video explains what I'm talking about.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNV2xtiBk5U&t=47s

I'm not saying you'll get everyone to become more involved gamers, nor am I saying that you necesarily need to get every Candy Crush player into Dark Souls. But if we have no window of opprotunity, no way for people to at least take an interest in more traditional style games, then we have a huge problem. This isn't even about women anymore, it's about people who are new to games and or don't really play a lot of games at all, which include both men and women. You do realize there are plenty of male casual gamers too do you? It's not like every guy on the planet is a hardcore gaming junkie. This is why I say it's important to at least make an effort to get casual gamers to take an interest in non-mobile games. And don't tell me that's not possible because mobile games are free. If people can spend $15+ on Movie Tickets or buy expensive Starbucks coffee, they can spend $40-60 on a game as long as it's good. Like I said, if your product is desirable, people will buy it. The Switch is selling well because it's a desirable product.

Casual gamers aren't just women who play smartphone games exclusively. They're simply people who play games, but don't play a lot of games, and aren't as enriched in gaming culture as hardcore gamers. For example, a casual gamer may not be a fan of most console games, but can probably pour hundereds of hours into Breath of the Wild. There are casual fans of every medium. Movies for example, have people who don't really go to summer blockbusters, but will always be willing to go see say, a period piece. It's the same with games. 

Saying Consoles must be for this demographic only is oversimplication and doesn't really help games grow as a medium. True, not every game is for everyone, but we shouldn't shut off demographics from an entire ecosystem, just because they play phone games.