I think it was when either Microsoft or Sony realised how big treat was the Wii for them (please don't say it is not competing, it's not HD, and all that BS. It's just lame)

So they defined the HD consoles as being the mature and serious platform, that has the hardcore games and the hardcore experience.

Untill that, people just used the term games and gaming. Using that expressions just feels a bit lame, because someone can play hardcorely Wii Sports. Or being an hardocre chess player.

thoughts

I don't know the exact origins but the first time I encountered the "Hardcore" and "Casual" debate was in Dark Age of Camelot ...

I started playing soon after it launched because several friends from school were playing it and (for some reason) they decided to play on the Hibernia realm. Unfortunately, Hibernia was the last realm created and it was (obviously) rushed and there were several classes which were poorly balanced and full of bugs ... This was made worse (in part) because as they fixed bugs they generally created more balance issues.

Now (much like most modern MMO games) the only way to bring issues up to the developers was to post on web-forums and any issue that was brought forth to the developers to improve Hibernia tended to devolve into the "Hardcore" and "Casual" debate. The reasoning at the time was that younger (less experienced) MMO players tended to play on Hibernia because it was more brightly colored and "Hardcore" MMO players favoured Midguard because it was a much darker realm.

Yea, but I bet in those times the conversation woudn't go like this:

"Hey folks, let's play a bit of Dark Age of Camelot when we arrive?"

"Yeah, that's so freakin hardcore. I can't wait to play it. What about some chess while the bus doesn't arrive?"

"What? That casual crap? Hell noooo"

See what I mean??

Outside of a few people who have probably never seen a girl naked, I don't really think that really happens on a large enough scale to really be considered fashionable.

Lets be honest, the hardcore/casual argument is being blown so hard its basically no one could relies on the ""kiddy"" argument anymore against Nintendo, being that older people and women actually started playing games.

Suddenly those people who played games casually on the PS2 started moving over to the Wii, they became the enemy. Yes the market that gave the PS1 and PS2 such a large userbase jumped shipped and they became the enemy. So then hardcore was declared.

When we all know hardcore also represents the word, ""Niche"" but trying to make themselves sound important when there really not.

In other words, no one really cares outside of forums.

I know this is completely off topic, but why nerds-that-don't-get-laid jokes have to always be the answer for everything? Is it really that common to assume that sex makes people less ignorant?

I firmly belive Nintendo was the first one to use it.

Its not that sex makes people less ignorant, it is that the obsessive fixations with things most people don't care about which hurt geeky men's chances with women.

Playing an online match of HAlo 3 during 1o minutes while the dinner gets warmed up in the microwave can be considered hardcore?
Because people are playing it casualy, just to pass time...

Hardcore and casual are in the players atitude not in the game itself. As I said, we can hardcorely play games like Chess, and ranbomly or casualy play a GT4 one track race, or something of the kind...

I would arguee different. From my experience, the more you care about things OTHER than her, the more she'll be at your case nonstop. Seriously, it's like they like to be ignored...