Comments on: How Midcore Are You?

By: Rock, Paper, Shotgun: Still Hoping For That Post-Apocalyptic Robot Versus Monkey Immersive Sim » Blog Archive » RPS Omnibus: Feb 3rd-8th

Sat, 09 Feb 2008 15:19:08 +0000

[...] A manifesto for ‘midcore’ gamers [...]

By: Fumarole

Fumarole — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 15:59:00 +0000

Too unique? Groan…

By: KingMob

KingMob — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 15:43:01 +0000

I find there are two kinds of gamers: Those that like these classifications, and those that don’t. Unfortunately as I am a bit too ‘unique’ to agree down the line with any of these types of articles, I find myself less and less interested in reading them. Sorry to be a spoilsport.

By: Zarniwoop

Zarniwoop — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 11:29:51 +0000

What strikes me about the person writing it is that, like me, they once had a slavish, all-consuming obsession with computer games, but recently only really plays them casually.

By: Frosty840

Frosty840 — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 21:29:52 +0000

Eeeh.
Not too happy with their definition, as I think he’s combining two different things onto the one scale.
I quickly made up a 0-9 scale of attach-ed-ness, which seemed to fit quite nicely for pretty much anything, so I took out the gaming references.

0 – No.
1 – Yeah, sometimes… but no.
2 – Sometimes, if I’m in the mood.
3 – I spend a bit of time doing it.
4 – It’s definitely an option, most days.
5 – Yeah, probably; if there’s nothing else I’ve got to do urgently.
6 – I’m more likely to be doing it than not, really.
7 – I can be persuaded to do other things… sometimes.
8 – I think I might have a problem…
9 – No, of course I don’t have a problem; now sod off and let me get back to what I was doing before you showed up… Mum.

Obviously this is all entirely unscientific, but it seems to me that while this arbitrary, but linear scale deals well with time spent playing (or whatever-else-ing), actually attempting to connect different “hardcore” or “casual”, or even these so-called “mid-core” players to the scale anywhere tends to create offshoots and branches to the extent that I just ended up with a separate scale for each player type.

Sorry, bit rambly there.

Anyway, what I think I’m trying to say is that I probably agree with all ten of the points made in the article, I don’t think that the “Mid core” gamer is a particularly solid middle-ground of gamers. I think, instead, that it’s a middle-ground of a type of gamer, but that there are other types of gamers with other middle grounds, and that those gamers don’t neccessarily fall anywhere on the scale where “Mid core” exists.

Bit rambly there, too. Ah well.

By: Yhancik

Yhancik — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 21:01:16 +0000

There’s something missing about the length of games, and to me it’s probably more important than the Size-on-the-harddisk part.

I haven’t finished a game in Years… except Portal (oh and Mondo Agency). Because I knew it was short, and I knew I could finish it.
I tend to give up with most games because, obviously, i still have 60 hours of play to invest in it – except I don’t have the place for 60 hours of play in my schedule, even (or especially) splitted in 5-60 min increments.

But I totally agree with the other points ;)

By: Zuffox

Zuffox — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 20:20:09 +0000

9. No need to be “mature” for the sake of being “mature”
(…)Mature content is not necessarily taboo, it just needs to be used to serve the story, not in place of it.

Someone’s been playing The Witcher recently.

By: Butler`

Butler` — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 19:51:18 +0000

‘Midcore gamer’, it’s like a nice way of saying midlife crisis.

By: The_B

The_B — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 19:39:48 +0000

Although like most people, I do love these little light hearted classifcations of gamers, but I don’t like to pigeon hole myself into either a “hardcore” gamer or a “casual” one – my gaming habits never seem to fit quite into any of the categories, and I would hazard that it’s a similar situation for many people. I prefer to think of myself just as “someone who loves games”. Which is cheesy, but sue me.

By: Mo

Mo — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 19:22:18 +0000

The game I’m currently developing pretty much hits all those points. Their manifesto definitely resonates with me, so I guess I shouldn’t be too surprised.