Eh, a few very broad generalizations about the "warrior" class not wanting to interact with people outside of their peer groups.

You ever encounter some of the "clans" in online gaming. Not exactly social clubs

Nice post, but you tend to categorize too much imho.

I think the term of hardcore has changed in past years :
In the late 1990's, a hardcore gamer was the one who bought all consoles on launch day, regardless of the cost, and specific games directly from japan.

In fact , I think forumwarriors/fanboys are responsible for the evolution of this term to the absurd nonsense it is used nowadays, so that they create a group so they can recognize each other. Maybe they are afraid to get pwnd in the future on a random online game by girls who began gaming with Nintendogs.

Imho I think my gf is a hardcore tetris player, my father is a hardcore minesweeper player... hardcore is about the people who plays, it's not to defined by the game you play, since everybody have fun. Better than being drug or tv addict ^^

Nice post

But I've got to disagree with you

I would consider zelda, mario galaxy, super smash bros brawl and even mario kart to be core games, and yet each one I have completed each as a group activity.

I think Grampy, that if you saw a group of about 10 college students taking it in turns playing and watching others play zelda, you would change your mind on whether core games can be social.

ps, this group did include females, us adolescent guys managed to restrain ourselves from our desire to experience a different type of interaction. Not all young males are incapable of having female friends :P

I certainly applaud the behavior posted above and I by no means meant to imply that all young males are testosterone laden jerks.

As I said in my original post, it had to be couched in terms of gross generalization and stereotypical examples or it would have been far too long.  Hopefully no one here characterizes the extreme form of adolescent and young adult male isolated peer groups such as street gangs exhibit.

But as a group, they are more aggressive, competitive and tend to identify with a peer group. For most well rounded, normal individuals this will only manifest itself in healthy outlets such participation in competitive team sports or simply a drive to excel. Even there, it is not uncommon for the top athletes, “the jocks” to form a subculture at a social which will exhibit more of the stereotypical player.

Most young men will maintain a reasonable healthy relationship with family and friends outside their peer group, male and female. But anyone that has spent much time in chat rooms can attest that there is a significant population that exhibit bigotry, abusive attitudes towards women and other signs of poor socialization.

But that does not mean that even basically healthy normal members of this demographic will not exhibit attitudes that certainly show a emphasis on competition.

Some great classic comments from these forums in the last 24 hours:

“Then again a lot of things about the Wii completely baffle me like what is the big deal with Wii Fit?  Seriously a balance board?  Is this even a game? “ (Male – no age given)

[If you can’t compete, and keep score what’s the point – this individual is not likely to fall in the demographic target group for Nintendogs either]

“Consoles have a more difficult aiming ability (and therefore a steeper learning curve) allowing for good  gamers to reach high scores fairly quickly”  (Male 25)

[ It is a great example of both hyper competitiveness and elitism to prefer an inferior control system because it will filter out all but the “true brethren”.  Ie This will keep out the kids and grannies (IGN –term for “casuals” – note that this terminology in itself recognizes that the hardcore gamers are not female or preadolescents]

I agree that their is an unfortunately large group of young men that act and behave exactly like that. Stereotypes are around for a reason. *goes to eat raw meat*

I came into this thread expecting to disagree with you, but you make some good points.

A lot of stereotyping there though.

@ grampy - I had read that disclaimer about gross generalisations, I was just trying to give you a bit of faith in us, the target demographic of all the blood, sex and violence in our mdeia.

That said, there are a lot of immature people my age and sex that make us look bad :P

Aw, I agree so much with the OP it's not even funny.

I think you have some of your basic demographic groups down but would not posit that the only (or primary) differentiating characteristic is based upon social interaction, but rather how much time the individual devotes to gaming as a hobby.

NOW that is incredibly open-ended, I know. But, IMO, if any aged, male or female, drops 5 hours a day, 5-6 days a week playing ANY game, they are freaking hardcore. Whether that game is social, competitive, or any other category, if the player is devoted to mastering the game and it's complexities, whatever they may be, that is a hardcore player.

That being said, I'm having a cook-out this weekend...I can send a horse for you, if you'd like to come? Just bring some Lone Star, k?