In Defence of Being Casual

Casual gaming is a rapidly increasing market

Last week, to celebrate the release of The Sims 3 on Valve's Steam platform, all Sims 3 titles were offered at half price in a bundle, coming in at just under £60. Say what you like about The Sims, (and the selling piecemeal of things which should really be in the original title), for a current generation title with all current expansion packs, £60 really isn't bad. I asked my housemates what to do, and they informed me that it wasn't their decision, but if I were to go ahead with it, they would forever label me “casual”, and I got to thinking: What does that actually mean? And is it really such a bad thing?

Obviously, in its purest form, a “casual” gamer is one who plays “casual” games. And while the notion of a “casual” game is disputed, it can generally be understood as something which has mass-market appeal (i.e. beyond the traditional video game fayre); think Angry Birds rather than Call of Duty. Casual games in general feature relatively small learning curves and “pick-up-and-play” mechanics; again, think of Angry Birds, or the Nintendo DS favourite Nintendogs. Indeed, one could broaden the definition to Internet Adobe Flash-based games, things like Bejeweled, or perhaps even stretch further into the video gaming past and pull out Tetris. Broadly speaking I'd say that if your mother/grandmother could play the game, you could certainly term it casual.

But here already we have a conflicted definition. What does it mean to be a casual gamer? What games are actually casual? I think that one could certainly make a case for Call of Duty being so; it certainly sells in large enough volumes to break sales records, and is arguably a mass-media cultural phenomenon, yet because it involves shooting people and a brown and grey pallet it is generally deemed “hardcore”. Indeed, in many similar games (for example Just Cause 2) the lowest difficulty level is termed “Casual”. Could you say this is a casual game? But then what about games from before Nintendo's Blue Ocean Strategy of 2005 when, according to many, “the casuals started coming”. I've already mentioned Tetris – bundled with Nintendo's original GameBoy, in all its explosion-defying, grey-bricked glory, Tetris sold millions and still does to this day. Going back still further, one could ask about arcades. One would hardly call Space Invaders or Tempest complex games, yet they were multiplayer and emphasised communal playing with friends in an arcade - not a dark bedroom. Were these games hardcore? Casual? Do they transcend definitions? Pigeon-holing of games isn't helping anybody.

But enough about definitions. We don't need them to label people casual, right? But now I want to ask, just what is so bad about being casual? As I said at the beginning, it's often applied by more “serious” gamers like my housemates to refer to people less serious, like myself. I mean, my favourite game is Minecraft. I enjoy The Sims immensely, and when bored I play Angry Birds on my phone. I'm eagerly anticipating the release of the 3DS, arguably the handheld with more mass-appeal than its Sony rival the NGP. I don't think this is a bad thing. I enjoy games; I play them for fun on low difficulties. I don't, like one housemate, go for all the achievements and attempt to 100% a game. I'm not a fan of competitive multiplayer games, despite being in FragSoc. Is it really so bad that I play games for fun? Maybe I don't complete them all, maybe I'm just rubbish (which is highly likely actually), but really I don't see what's so bad about being called “casual”. Incidentally though, I never did buy The Sims 3.

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