Sports Coat, No Tie: The Future of Casual Games
August 11th, 2006, By Duncan Gough
I’ve been honoured by my inclusion in the August Round Table whose topic has in part been inspired by my post asking whether Casual Games are not for Women?
The Round Table top is Sports Coat, No Tie and my take on it is simply to ask What is the Future of Casual Games?. Gamasutra recently asked Will Casual Games Dominate the Future of the Industry? to which Craig Perko astutely responds yes.
“Will teh casual gamez take oevr?!?!?!!?!”
Yeah. Duh. It’s a new market: there’s no experience there to build complexity off of.
So where does this take us, then? Or rather, where do I want it to take us? That sounds like an excuse for a big list I’d like to see:
- Mobile phone manufacturers include flash lite and give us a massively installed user base of advergaming and casual gaming possibilities.
- MMOs to move away from fantasy, partly to appeal to a broader audience, partly to give way to the possiblity of relevant in-game ads.
- For Casual Games to be the first game genre to include an ad that really connects with people - the same way this Honda ad made people talk. I want to see casual games become the first of any game genres to include an ad that equals or betters anything that television has achieved in terms of popularity and measurable success.
- Perversely, I want to see casual games give hardcore games an arbitrary maximum file size based on what the majority of customers would stomach, like the 10 MB limit for downlodabe casual games, just for the fun of seeing Unreal Tournament 2007 be crammed into 1 CD like the old days.
- A new version of Gauntlet that doesn’t suck.
- Casual Games forcing Co-op games to make a come back in a big way.
- Casual Games leading the renaissance of split screen, shared keyboard gaming, like Gibbage.
- Casual, massively single player virtual worlds like Spore, as that’s the best way to support egress and still be informed by what makes multiplayer gaming so much fun - the unpredictability of other gamers.
- A better definition, or a better understanding of who plays Casual Games.
- A hand help device for casual games, a PSP 2D, if you will. Or proper support for Flash and Java in the PSP and DS.
And after that, a spot of lunch.
One comment
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Man Bytes Blog: A Frenzy of Lexicological Optimism » the Round Table Turns One! replied:
[...] Duncan called the inclusion of his first post in the Round Table an honor. An honor! I’m flattered. Regardless, I felt so warm and fuzzy about it that I’m tossing out a nod for his second post which is an actual Round Table submission in which he lists the things he’d like to see in Casual gaming’s future (link). Personally, I’d love a version of Gauntlet which didn’t suck too! [...]
August 11th, 2006 at 12:21 pm. Permalink.