[casual_games] Definition of Casual Games

[Joe Pantuso]

For the purposes of my company we define the 'casual' scope in terms of
three things;

1 - Target audience
2 - Learning curve
3 - Time to play

So the bounds you can see I guess would be appropriateness of subject
matter, difficulty and time commitment.

The target audience broadly encompasses the theme as well, for example we
shy away from anything that would be graphically violent, or inappropriate
for kids.

We expect to be able to figure out how to play a game in 3 minutes or less,
though if there are nuances that take longer to figure out that is ok.

Time to play should be about 20-30 minutes.  (Some games we've accepted for
publishing can have an outside edge of 60 minutes but that's really only
acceptable because of our multi-player focus.)  Repeat game play only makes
sense if it is tournament structured, not episodic.

I'm curious to hear how others define casual, but I bet these 3 overlap for
anyone's definition. 


-J

Joe Pantuso
TrayGames Corp
www.traygames.com
Online multiplayer casual games community

-----Original Message-----
From: casual_games-bounces at igda.org [mailto:casual_games-bounces at igda.org]
On Behalf Of Charles Parcell
Sent: Wednesday, July 13, 2005 12:31 PM
To: casual_games at igda.org
Subject: [casual_games] Definition of Casual Games

What defines "Casual Games"? When does a game stop being "casual" and 
start being more intense or demanding?

Are there bounds as to the scope of a "casual" game?

Yes, some very general questions but I wanted to get the ball rolling 
somehow. :)

Charles P.

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