[casual_games] Slow death for the current generation of casual games?

[Matthew Douglass]

The game itself decides during installation whether or not to add itself to
the Game Explorer -- it is completely opt-in.  (I should note one exception
-- there are a few legacy games that MS auto-detects and adds to the Game
Explorer -- but if you're in this category you probably already know it).

Also, as far as I know nothing stops you from adding yourself to the Start
Menu as well as to the Game Explorer (and in fact, that's what we're doing
currently).  

And a final note -- when Parental Controls is installed the default option
is to allow unrated games to be played.  So that at least helps a little.
The system is defined to allow ratings from multiple sources; maybe the IGDA
(or someone else) can start a rating system more oriented towards the casual
game space.

Matthew

-----Original Message-----
From: casual_games-bounces at igda.org [mailto:casual_games-bounces at igda.org]
On Behalf Of Audry Taylor
Sent: Tuesday, December 19, 2006 12:46 PM
To: casual_games at igda.org
Subject: Re: [casual_games] Slow death for the current generation of casual
games?


>>Vista has a 'games' menu that is different from the typical program menu. 

>>The preferred (by MS) behavior for games is to install your program 

>>shortcuts there only and not install like a regular app.


Are restrictions being placed on how regular apps are installed?  Will Vista
attempt to classify incoming programs as "games" or will it accept whatever
category the program classifies itself as?

Another question this brings to mind is how will programs that provide
games, but aren't games themselves, be classified?  If a user downloads and
installs Steam, will it join the regular apps or the games?

I work for a company that is just getting its feet wet in the casual sector.

  Our target audience is under 18 and our budget is small.  If we have get
every game an ESRB rating, that could increase our costs tremendously.  That
would be frustrating, to say the least.

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