I think casual games are fun sometimes. He says he doesn't like to lump them together but most of the time aren't mobile games both social and casual?

I don't really play any games people would consider casual, or I would consider casual. I think they have their place, but they're for shorter experiences, and they're not usually as engaging or memorable as "core" games. But if there's one casual game I hate...it's Angry Birds...I will never download, since well...I hate one of Rovio's main people (I forget his name, I think he was the creator of AB).

I've thought about this as well. Every gamer makes fun of Angrybirds being a playonyourtoilet game but if it came out 30 years ago it'd be considered legendary as of today. We might have even seen Angrybirds Kart or Super Angrybirds Galaxy or Angrybirds adventure 2.

Casual games are "casual". I consider "casual" to mean not only easy to pick up and play for a few minutes, but also designed that way. I could play Mass Effect in 5 minute bursts, but would not a "complete" game experience with that. Whereas with facebook games, I can do like 5 activities, run out of action points, and come back in a few hours to keep playing. The "grey" area for me is soccer games; I can 1 short match in a day and that is enough for me, but I am drawing on prior experiences of playing the game in a more "hardcore" setting.

I think that Zynga Should be backlisted and never spoken of again.

Pitfall was awesome. I want it back.

I consider casual games to be games that aren't for spending hours playing it...casual games are more for people who want to have fun, but don't want to get sucked into a 100 hour game...Casual games are great for phones because you can play them even on a 5 minute car drive to someplace.

But Angry Birds IS a casual game...

I'd say a casual game is something like Angry Birds or Castle Crashers.  A game that is really easy to get into and can be played by anyone.

I still consider them fad based on a name brand level. Casual games usually don't have much staying power. People float from franchise to franchise apathetically.

But as far as the overall market for casual goes, casual gaming in general is not, and it's here to stay.

I totally agree with him! Except instead of 10 years ago, I'd say 30 years ago. All Atari games back in the day are what we would consider "casual" today. Gaming was founded on casual games.

AGREED

What are some of the best-selling, most recognized games of all time? Tetris (anything) and Pac Man (anything)- the expansion of the casual market is just one more example of the cyclical nature of cultures, trends and pop-culture. Also they're a lot of fun.

Also Artillery, a game that kids were playing in computer lab 5-10 years before I was playing it in computer lab is an awful lot like Angry Birds- as 'them kids' would say: "just sayin'"

I agree with him. I think a casual game is something that you play for fun and not seriously. That can be any game. It's not casual gaming when the gamer decides to, say, train for EVO or similar tournaments.

A casual game is one where the controls are easy to grasp, and the normal playtime is under 10 minutes. Sounds a lot like Mario games.

a casual game is a game you can play casually, unlike say, an RPG.

Cool points to Crane on this one. I'm sick to my stomach of everyone and their uncle trying to define casual games, usually by making them out to be inferior to "hardcore" games. Casual vs. core is only something that should really matter at the developmental level and when the consumer's deciding to spend sixty bucks or just one. Trying to use it as an automatic status symbol for any given game is plain dumb.

In my experience it's much easier for people to define casual versus hardcore. Till this day no one I've asked has been able to sufficiently define what makes a gamer "hardcore." Yet when it comes to casual there seems to be a general consensus and agreement on what that entails. I find that interesting.

Every game is casual, it just depends on how seriously you take the game. Angry birds is casual until you become obsessed with getting all 3 stars with the highest score possible. I play hardcore games like call of duty for fun and don't really care about leveling up. So a game is either hardcore or casual depending on how you play it.