NYT on the Rise of Casual Games

securitas writes "The New York Times' Michel Marriott reports on the rise and growing importance of casual games to the video game industry. Casual games are sold exclusively over the Internet, are downloaded to PCs from sites like Yahoo Games, Real Arcade and Shockwave.com, and are 'generally simple-to-play, short-duration games that are graphically unsophisticated'. Casual games will represent $250 million of the $8.4 billion in 2005 domestic United States sales according to PricewaterhouseCoopers. The article cites Diner Dash, which publisher PlayFirst says has 'sold more than 50,000 copies and continued to sell about 1,000 a day' at $20 per game. The article says that this type of game '... is not found on the shelves of video game or consumer electronic stores. Nor is it sold on the DVD's that deliver interactive 3-D fantasies to millions of PlayStation 2 and Xbox game consoles...'"

Comments

Word.

[Saeed al-Sahaf]

The Slashdot game crowd doesn't like to hear this type of thing, and no question, Zonk and his boy Timmy will log in under assumed names and use their unlimited mod points, but MOST people including a lot of Slashdot regulars, don't give two shits in Hell about video games. Believe it or not, there are a shit-load of people out there that dig Doom95 and Solitaire, and then after a few rounds go back to normal things like socializing with real humans, writing code, doing sports, and other non-game shit.