Ok, I’ll give you that one. The vast majority of the game was very easy, but the f-ing purple coins got me, too
I’m not denying that a lot of previous gen games were better than current gen (though BioShock is so different from system shock they’re not really worth comparing. Granted it’s a “spiritual successor” but it’s a completely linear FPS with a few RPG elements to it and no exploration, rather than an RPG from an FPS perspective) but that wasn’t the question. The question was whether you could be considered a “core” gamer without playing current gen Wii AAA titles like Mario Galaxy, Zelda TP, etc. And I simply answered that yes, you indeed could
Realistically, I think we can call someone a core gamer if they have at least one of the current-gen systems at any given time and at least, say, 50% of the AAA titles for that system.
Otherwise you have to have stupid amounts of discretionary spending (at $250 per console, and $40-60 per game) to be considered a gamer, and that’s asinine.
Hell, I never owned ANYTHING from the PS1/N64 generation, and I still consider myself hardcore–Counterstrike, Wing Commander 3/4, and anything else that was out on PC still counted.
This is where it differs from the cinephile analogy upthread–seeing the “entire” canon is significantly pricier for a gamer.
That analogy was retarded. I’m still in touch with one of my film professors from several years back-- had dinner with him last week, actually. He could walk into any university in the world and teach a film class tomorrow, unprepared. The roots of the technology, the beginnings of the cultural form, German expressionism, the French New Wave, contemporary film, the films of virtually any country, and on and on and on. The guy is any encyclopedia. He’s by far the most legit cinephile I’ve ever met in my life. And he’s never seen Star Wars.
The entire “hardcore” versus “core” (even if they are add odds) thing is silly. The second you make that distinction, the line will be blurred. There’s nothing to gain from it.
Instead, just speak to what you like and be done with it.
Can we at least agree that the Wii has DIFFERENT KINDS of games than the 360 and PS3? And that different kinds of games appeal to different kinds of people?
If we can agree on that, we can probably agree that there is a term for people who like (and buy. Buy is important from an industry perspective) 360/PS3 games (and may or may not like Wii games) Those people like to call themselves ‘core gamers’. Why? Maybe because it makes them feel important, but that’s the term the industry, as a whole, seems to be using to describe that demographic. We can argue the semantics until we are blue in the face, but the term and its application are pretty much outside the scope of the discussion. When EA and Ubisoft and Activision are talking about Core Gamers, they are talking about people who bought Modern Warfare 2 and Uncharted 2, not about people who bought SMB Wii or Metroid Prime 3. That’s really all there is to it. For purpose of clarity, and understanding things that people in the game industry write, that’s what “Core gamer” means. Is it possible to be a “core gamer” AND a Wii gamer? Yeah. It’s probably even possible to be a Core Gamer by the industry definition even if you only own a Wii, but your library will be pretty small.
I guess the trick here is that “core gamer” isn’t mutally exclusive with being any other sort of gamer. It just means that you are buying what the industry considers “core games.” By which, I think they mean “games made by us, and not by Nintendo” or, in a less sarcastic fashion “Games that were the core of the hobby before all this crazy Wii motion control stuff came along.”
Is “core” really the best word for this? Maybe not. But you can see where the industry is coming from, because it’s the same sense as a “core audience” for any other product - it’s the people you can count on to pick it up and evangelize it to their friends. As distinct from all these casual gamers than bought in with the Wii but by and large have been determined to buy extremely small numbers of actual games.
So that’s what the game industry means by “core gamer”; I suggest that we stop arguing about it too much, because at the end of the day, your opinion on what it means is irrelevant, because it’s an industry term that means something relatively specific. I don’t have a good analogy offhand, but trust me. We can decide whatever we want about what “core gamer” means, but the next EA press release is going to be using the industry definition, not ours.
As someone who is heavily involved in the game industry, this is not the definition that is used.
“Core gamers” are people who buy the big blockbusters which includes Halo, Call of Duty and the latest Mario game. The fact that people are ignoring the long-standing definition of “core gamer” (or trying to rewrite it as PS3/Xbox 360 gamer) is the debate of this thread.
I have not heard this being used in a fashion to describe people who buy “the latest Mario game”, but your definition might work. I just see the term “core gamer” being used by companies like EA/Ubisoft etc to describe how they are “refocusing” on their “core titles” which usually means “we’re giving up trying to make games for the Wii.”
One of the great debates around the Wii (from an industry perspective) is that core games don’t sell well on the Wii, not that they don’t exist. These articles show that core games (and the core gamers who play them) do exist on the Wii.
Like I said, it’s marketing hype, and some of the people here have bought it hook, line, and sinker. Call of Duty and Bioshock are cooler because Sony and Microsoft SAY they’re cooler.
Which seems directly contradict your assertion that “core games” don’t do well on the Wii - since obviously the latest Mario game has done very well on the Wii. It also contradicts the fact that two of the articles you link (and several others that I’ve read) treat Madworld as one of the few “core” titles on the Wii.
So unless you are asserting that “core games” does not mean “games played by core gamers” I don’t really see how you can make a case for your earlier definition of “core gamers” including “the latest Mario game”; I’ve never seen it used in that context, and all of the links you provide seem to counterindicate that as well.
I think I see the confusion here though - you’re trying to correct me when I said “people who like PS3/360 games” are the definition of “core gamers”; You’re right that that’s not strictly correct. What would be closer would be “people who like the sorts of games that are usually produced for the 360/PS3, rather than the style of games that are usually produced for the Wii”.
I don’t think there’s anything inherently “cool” about being a “core gamer” (I am not one. I am firmly niche.). And you do need to have terms to define these things, or it becomes impossible to talk about anything.
I think the problem is the people in the fan community who have decided that it is more cool to be a “core gamer”, possibly because they have mistakenly decided that the only “non-core” group is the “casual wii-sports crowd”, which is blatanly untrue (I cite myself as an example - I don’t go in for ‘traditional’ “core” games (traditional is in quotes because what a “core” game is now is pretty different from what it was 5 years ago, so there’s not much ‘tradition’ involved.) nor do I care for the Wii and it’s motion controlled affairs. Like I said. I am niche.
You’re right of course. But a racing game in a long-running and ridiculously popular series has to be considered a “core game”. Just because it’s cartoony means little as all games were cartoony until a few years ago.
I’ve always seen “core game” as the opposite of “motion-controlled party game”. Before the Wii, everything was a “core game”.
