Are Casuals Killing Gaming?

The editors at Gameplayer bring us a five-page article that analyzes the disturbing trend of video game developers trying to appeal to casual gamers by making their games more “accessible”.

In an attempt to bridge the gap between the two extremes, Lionhead’s Peter Molyneux wanted Fable II to be accessible to gamers of all persuasions: (Maybe part of Fable is about this look; can’t we create a game that both of these people can play and enjoy?) he said at the recent Games Convention Asia. (You’ve got to give the core gamers all the carrots they love and casual gamers the accessibility that they want. And that’s what we tried to do with Fable.)

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Historically there have certainly been many examples of once great, feature-laden games getting diluted to appeal to a wider audience, especially from PC to console: Baldur’s Gate to Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance; the Total War series to Spartan: Total Warrior; Civilization to Civilization Revolution; the list could go on. But what’s notable now is that, with the PC market shrinking, publishers are increasingly stripping features from games to appeal to the masses from the outset.