By Omar (@siegarettes)

I am a filthy casual. 

I’ve spent hours playing Match-3 and word games on my mobile devices. I have a soft spot for “walking simulators”, bought Yosumin! just to have a game for every letter of the alphabet, play visual novels, buy licensed trash and love the Wii. Just look at some of the games I own:

Bejeweled 3, Peggle, Insaniquarium, MySims Skyforce, TMNT Smash, Blastforce, Hakuoki, Dance Central 2,Tiny Wings, Zookeeper. I mean that’s some serious casual nonsense, yeah? At one point I even contemplated buying that Power Rangers Samurai DS game and that Emily Strange skating game. 

My most played 3DS game is Animal Crossing. You could even say that’s the reason I bought a 3DS. So why is this guy running a site about videogames? And more importantly, why should you give a damn about these games?

There’s a divide in the games community that separates the “hardcore” from “casuals”. An idea that games aimed at a more casual audience are inherently lesser, or not worth any attention. An attitude that the people who engage with these games are somehow less legitimate “gamers”. (We’ll get to the “core gamer” stuff in more detail sometime later).

You’ll notice that I’ve put all those terms in air quotes. That’s because while those terms may be useful for some degree of categorization, they’re largely nonsense that doesn’t serve much purpose aside from puffing up certain games and players. 

While there’s more merit to some games than others, there seems to be a group that are willing to entirely dismiss games at a glance for not being “hardcore” enough. You’ll see this argument a lot when people begin to associate a platform with the “casual” crowd. “There are no games on the Wii”, they’ll say, or “when is mobile going to get REAL games." 

The reality is that while these platforms’ lowered costs of entry have allowed shovelware and clones to flood the market, there are still loads of wonderful and charming titles there. It seems like there’s a new quality title every week on iOS at this point, and the Wii has a certain catalog of cult games on it. There’s also a tendency to ignore the low quality and rehashed titles on the more "adult” systems. Remember X-Blades, Ninety-Nine Nights, Neverdead, Bodycount, Wet, Inversion, Fuse or Ninja Blade? No, of course you don’t. 

Writing off entire platforms because they attract a large crowd of less intense players seems like a ridiculous thing to do. If you enjoy games and really want to experience the full range of the medium, then there’s a lot to love there! 

Maybe it’s the academic in me, or my love of tracking down obscure and under appreciated titles but I’ve found plenty games with interesting or fun ideas outside of the mass-market, big budget titles. iOS in particular has had some interesting ideas and thought experiments (Year Walk, Device 6, the terrifying ALFA-ARKIV). As much as we might resent it, there’s a reason why Flappy Bird sparked a cultural conversation.

There’s a whole spectrum of games out there that go unnoticed simply because they are too kiddie, or too “casual”. It’s a self limiting attitude that winds up with a lot of people all playing games from a limited pool of games with a large marketing budget. 

More than anything it feels like “hardcore gamers” are missing something that the casual crowd implicitly understands: videogames are fun. There’s nothing wrong with having a bite-sized game that fits into the quiet spaces of your life. There’s a value to a little interactive piece of joy that’s very different from other games. Don’t limit yourself and don’t dismiss the casuals. Learn to appreciate a broader range of games, and maybe recommend a casual player something else they might like instead of dismissing them outright, yeah?