The Casual Divide
A game about babysitting? Hardcore gamers, take notice.
10/27/2008 7:23 PM | 6 Comments | Page 3 of 3
Erin Bell
Status: Have you figured out the status secret yet?
Manage your potion empire and crush the competition in EA Pogo's
Fairy Godmother Tycoon.
In fact, many of the popular casual games of today are reminiscent of the classic games of yesteryear.
Super Granny? It's basically
Lode Runner starring a little old lady in a jumpsuit.
Fairy Godmother Tycoon? A highly entertaining strategy game about running a ruthless potion empire instead of conquering the world with guns.
Dream Chronicles? A proto-point-and-click adventure.
In short, it's time that we started acknowledging the paradigm shifts that are taking place. Game demographics are widening to the point that the industry is no longer dominated by young males. As such, just because a game doesn't cater to their specific tastes and needs, that doesn't mean it has any less of a right to exist.
And who decreed that the driving force of a videogame had to be combat, or even conflict of any kind? Some people just want to search through pretty "Where's Waldo?"-style scenes for hidden objects to click on and cross off a list.
And there's nothing wrong with that. So you don't want to play games that involve taking care of kitties or styling someone's hair. Great. You don't have to. But respect these games' right to exist. Respect the fact that there are people out there who do want to play them. What's more, they probably think that your games about robots and ninjas are, like, totally stupid.
Erin Bell is the editor of leading casual games editorial Web site Gamezebo.com.
