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Casual games are in the rage nowadays. Diner Dash, Bejewelled and those mini-games shunned by ‘hardcore’ gamers but embraced by a majority of the demographics. They cost half, or perhaps one-quarter (or even less) of the normal development time of mainstream games but have so much return.

I think there is a certain confusion about casual games and the people who play them. Intuitively, by the word ‘casual’, it means ‘no committement’, something you do ‘as an aside’. But what happens when there are people who are addicted to casual games? Are they hardcore casual gamers, and is that something of an oxymoron?

We tend to think people who play casual games are casual gamers. I disagree. Genre and type of players do not go together. As a matter of logic, I am play Warcraft III competitively now and then, does that make me a casual hardcore gamer? I wonder.

A casual game has the following properties:

• It has a theme which the majority of the demographics can grasp with and have no problem partaking in
• It does not require heavy time commitment to learn to play.

A casual gamer can either be someone who prefers casual game or someone who just play games occasionally. For the sake of definition, I usually think of casual gamer as someone who prefers casual game at times (I play both Diner Dash and Dawn of War II with equal zeal, for example).

Casual Themes

There may be a temptation just to recycle old games, slap them on with pretty graphics and call them casual. The question is – if we take Contra and change the characters to be from the Hello Kitty universe, is that still casual? Instead of guns they shoot candy balls. Is that an instant casual game?

I believe strongly that a casual game is casual because of its theme. Take Insanaquariam for example – the theme is maintaining an aquarium and stay alive. That is something almost 90% of the target audience understands, grasp and have an idea of. However, it is actually a mini-economy and investment simulation. There are producers (you), who put out products (the poor goldfishes) who will yield profits (coins). Later in the games there are consumers too. The carnivore fishes which prey on the gold-fishes to grow bigger who give you more coins, or the octopus-pots which collect stars (incidentally, produced by goldfishes too).

This is the a typical producer-consumer aspect of economy (needs and supplies play less of a role here). But think about it. If this game is packaged as a serious business simulation, is it still casual? Rather, it is the theme that makes the game casual. Many other games use pretty serious stuff as their mechanics but have a theme that resonate with the majority of the non-gamers. Everyone has the experience of being waited upon at a cafe (Diner Dash), growing flowers and etc.

Learning Time

Is there a tempest in the game world is how many keys you need to play a casual game? The usual casual games feature just one click, but logic persists here. A casual game may lead to a one-click design, but a one-click design is not necessary a casual game. Are all casual games using a one-click design? No. Interaction Studies would say that if each click is context sensitive, then even though you are performing one action, the click is a ‘different click’. (Physically, I agree, it is still one click).

However, to me, this seems to miss the point entirely. It’s not whether it’s one-click, two-clicks, or no-click but how easy it is to learn the game.

Lord of the Rings Online(tm) is hailed as one of the best casual MMO out there. Its interface, like most MMO, is cluttered with buttons and there are so many hotkeys to use. But casual gamers still play it because of the theme (Lord of the Rings) and the time to learn (the interface is hard but the system is easy).

The complexity of the control can be misleading. By default, FPS are pretty easy to learn – there’s only 4 buttons (WASD) and one button (left) – if you discount all the other actions and abilities. Yet a FPS is not easy to learn – the orientation, finding cover, aiming real-time while running and so on. The controls may be simple, the learning time is not.

For most casual games, the player must be able to pick up the game quickly. Within five minutes, preferably. Some game introduces new elements over time. That’s one technique. However, quick learning time alone doesn’t a casual game make.

The Mysteries of Match-3 Games

One type of games that doesn’t fit into the theme/learning time motifs above are that of Match-3 games. Some have really elaborate mechanics: Puzzle Quest basically use the Bejewelled system to simulate combat, Bejewelled 2 adds in hyper-gems and score multiplication gems if you manage to get more gems in the row or column. Some players manage to get over 100,000+ points on Bejewelled Blitz, which give you just one minute to get to a high score. Clearly the learning time of match-3 games is short but the mastering is long.

That’s besides the point. The point is where’s the theme? Blocks do not destroy when they come in row of threes in real life. They don’t, but all human beings are gifted with the ability to organise and plan. Match-3 appeals because it is easy to learn and it makes use of a skill which we have been hammered with all our life and which make civilisation thrives – organisation and planning for the future.

The most basic of human instinct usually make the best theme for casual games, in my humble opinion.

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