Don't be too harsh on robjoh, I understand where he's coming from. About a month ago we discussed this over and over and it led to never ending flame wars. Of course the intention of this thread is different, but it's just that it's been discussed already.

I seriously think if the Wii didn't have all the 'casual' games and just outright lacked titles instead, there wouldn't be this outcry that Nintendo has abandoned hardcore gamers. It is just the fact that there are a large number of casual games available and Nintendo has targeted an extra market that the 'hardcore' crowd is crying fowl.

Ok, can someone please help me out here. What is the definition of a hardcore gamer. The wii titles coming out looks great. But please help me here with the definition. My view of a hardcore gamer. Is a person who would devote most of his time and life in gaming(the one who plays 360 until the 3rings of death :D i.e overheating or until your wii freezes). And be able to play any game and be adjustable, he or she should be comfortable playing minesweep or tetris and of course bioshock or battle field etc. Hardcore gamer has been stereotyped into playing FPS eg quake 4 bla bla. please correct me if I am wrong. Hardcore gmaer is adjustable to any game genre and gives a fair judgement on the game.

Its all a matter of taste

Casual gamers + Casual Wii games = Sales = Nintendo Profit = Development Resources = Good Games

^^ Amen to that!

Where do you think Nintendo's getting the money to develop Mario Galaxy/SSBB etc etc? Big Brain Academy and Nintendogs of course!!

What the whiners are forgetting is that Nintendo has more resources now for R&D than they did a few years ago as a result of the Money Making Machine aka the DS. So even though they are shifting focus towards the so called "casual market" they can still maintain and even increase their budget for the hardcore market. For those mathematically inclined the following illustrates my point:

Note: The following figures are made up and unrealistic - but they work for proving my point:

Lets say their games budget was 50 million cash before the DS and Wii came along. They would split it so 20% was for the casual markets and 80% for hardcore. That's 10 and 40 million respectively.

Now fast forward past the successes of DS, Brain Age, Nintendogs, etc... and Nintendo now has 500 million to spend on R&D. They announce that they are SHIFTING FOCUS towards casual games and flip the budget so that casual games get 80% and hardcore only gets 20%.

Result: The gamers whine that they are beeing "forgotten". But is that really true? Look at the actual dollar values of the budgets:

Casual: 400 million
Hardcore: 100 million (a 150% increase!!!)

That actaully means that even though they have shifted focus (and quite heavily so) - we are still getting more hardcore games than ever before.

I know Robjoh is cool in my book, it just came off a little harsher than I meant. I was here for all those. The reason why it is different now? Because more have been released, and many have solid dates.

oh, and good point sam. All that profit has to go somewhere, it isn't all paid out in dividends that's for sure.

this is a hard question to answer. Cause we will be getting the hardcore games soon.

However what is installed for the future from Nintendo themself?


This question really needs to be asked a year from now.

other things to consider is:
Nintendo gonna stop making many hardcore games?
if so why?
do they waat 3rd party developers to do the hardcore games from now on? so they can succeed on a nintendo platform which they all complain they can't since everyone buys nintendo games
Will nintendo still make hardcore games or party games because of the above reason?



Like I said too hard to judge atm.

Hardcore games =  Mario, Metroid...

 Not hardcore games = Wii sports, brain training.

Kpeins dat je de link kunt maken :)

edit:  I thought you were asking what are Hardcore games :s.

But yeah you are true even if you play brain training for 20 hours a week you are a hardcore gamer.

A hardcore gamer is whatever a particular poster wants the hardcore gamer to be for the purpose of proving the poster's point. :P

But I think your conception is pretty fair. Any person who plays 20 hours or more of video games in a week is pretty hardcore, whatever the game is.