Portal is casual? I remember starting it, going oh shit this is funny! then playing it, with the goad in mind to beat the puzzles to see the ending :P A start - line out path - and an ending. Thats a one way arrow in my book lol. But in terms of playability I would rate portal more towards the casual end than the hardcore. It's a puzzle game after all right?

 Edit: So I'll agree that portal is one of those games that could go either way. I'm not sure what your reasons were for playing it, but my personal reason was to get through the story/dialogue, and if I had quit halfway through and forgotten, I'd have to go through again to get the whole experience.

I dislike that game

Ok then is it casual or hardcore, I got confused here.
The story was a distraction(not that it was bad but), it was so good because of the puzzles. I mean rayman also had a story if you want to count it that way.
So what you are saying is that if a game has a funny story it is hardcore?
After reading Vipers response I thought I understood, but now back to square zero.

edit: I didn't know I had to have a reason to play video games :D 

sounds like monkey ball...u have the goal in mind to beat all of the levels...a start (level 1) and an ending (final level)...one-way arrow

and so now u are saying hardcore games have to have a linear path?  or they have to have a start and an ending?  the goal to beat the games to see the ending?

the definition of 'hardcore game' is getting fuzzier by the post

Because people like arbritary labels. It really doesn't matter, because these labels didn't exist not too long ago. A real "gamer" just plays whatever is good and fun, if it's GTA or an obscure "kiddie" DS game featuring really cool gameplay.

If anything, I consider the really popular games, most of which made to just be run through w/ minimal trouble,"casual": Halo, CoD4, GTA. These games are made to appeal to the widest group of videogame players possible. That's not "hardcore".

@gorgepir You don't have to have a reason ^^ That's what might make you a more casual gamer. I usually can't buy casual games because they're not story driven. But I don't mind playing them if someone else buys them. I love me some Smash brothers :D

@Fast I don't know a single person who played monkeyball to see the story xD The point of portal isn't to unlock everything just so you can have access to it (maybe it is for you :x), but for me it was about an entire experience as a whole. In monkeyball I can unlock certain events and never even bother playing them with my friends. Monkeyball was never about an engrossing single player for me, monkeyball was... Get events -> Play with friends. Once I got everything I had no reason to ever play a "story mode" of any sort. It's just like my friends with Smash brothers melee. The goal was to unlock every character. Once at that point we just kept playing the matches. There was no absolute reason we HAD to keep playing, not one of us ever touched the single player afterwards, we met our goal and the game became casual at that point. Which isn't a bad thing because we play it often, but the melee experience for us is the same as it was 2 years ago.

so story = hardcore?

that's the key differentiator?

or is it that in monkeyball it had multiplayer so you personally never finished the single-player mode? was it too hard for u to finish?

Fastrabbit09, read my post. That should help you understand it better.

I generally tie story's to more hardcore games yeah, you can't just pick up a book and start in the middle after all lol.

Casual games are great because they're entire experience comes from the game play, you don't need the flashy shebang and what not. I can easily spend 5 hours on rock band and not once even think about a story or purpose :P The same can't be said about Bioshock :x

In your case I'd say a game like Monkeyball can be considered hardcore up until you get everything, in which case the game becomes what it was meant to be. A casual experience. You can down an infinite amount of hours on a casual game and it never changes. That's it's point. You play the mechanics not the plot.

The only games I've ever personally thought were hardcore were the insanely difficult ones. I haven't played enough of Super Monkey Ball to know whether it qualifies or not, but to me a story never kept Super Ghouls N Ghosts, Ikaruga, Ninja Gaiden, and Contra from being truly hardcore games. A game that is truly challenging even on the easiest difficulty not resulting from bad programming is what hardcore means to me.