Q&A: Cai Looks Beyond 'Hardcore Vs.

Casual'
by Alistair Wallis
August 31, 2006

In its recent survey, Electronic Gaming in the Digital Home, market research firm Parks
Associates attempted to shift the focus of the games industry away from "hardcore" and
"casual" gamers, instead suggesting that the games market has diversified into six separate
categories of gamers. Based on the responses of online gamers in the U.S., the study's
important distinction was in removing the individual’s expenditure from the methodology,
rather concentrating on motivation and attitude in relation to games.

Yuanzhe (Michael) Cai, director of broadband and gaming at Parks Associates, has previously
researched topics including mobile platforms and multimedia networks, and has presented his
findings at industry events such as CES and E3. He notes that the survey shows that the
games market "is not black and white anymore, and game marketers need to understand these
finer nuances."

Gamasutra contacted Cai via email to ask about the results and the implications of the survey.

What was the methodology of the survey?

Electronic Gaming in the Digital Home is a primary consumer survey of U.S. Internet gamers
(defined as gamers who have Internet access and play electronic games for at least one hour
per month) aged 13 and older. The survey was conducted from April 24-28, 2006. The survey
sample was representative of the U.S. online population. 2,002 qualified respondents
completed the survey.

What are the six groups identified?

We first identified the median of total monthly gaming time among all Internet gamers, which
came out at approximately 20 hours and was used as the threshold to separate the entire
sample into two tiers. Within each tier, we used cluster analysis based on 17 attitudinal
questions to further identify unique gamer groups. Six gamer groups were identified,
including four under Tier 1 (gamers who play 20 hours or more per month) and two under
Tier 2 (gamers who play less than 20 hours per month):

Tier 1: power gamers (11 percent, 5.9 million), social gamers (13 percent, 7.2 million), leisure
gamers (14 percent, 7.4 million) and incidental gamers (12 percent, 6.7 million)
Tier 2: dormant gamers (26 percent, 14.4 million) and occasional gamers (24 percent, 13.1
million)

Why have you described the casual and hardcore markets as "mythical"?
Although most people define hardcore gamers similarly (still, different companies may have
different standards), nobody really has a clear definition of casual gamers. Casual gamers may
refer to anything from "everyone other than hardcore gamers," gamers who spend little time
and/or money on gaming, to gamers who mainly play casual games such as card or puzzle
games.

When you talk to someone in the industry about casual gamers, you frequently need to first
spend time defining casual gamers. Of course, our approach is just another way to slice and
dice the gamer market, but we did try to look beyond these two vaguely defined market
segments.

Why do you feel social gamers, leisure gamers, and dormant gamers represent an
untapped market?

Compared to hardcore gamers, whom the gaming industry addresses very well with constantly
evolving content and services, the middle-market gamers are less studied and understood. A
much smaller percentage of game developers and publishers can confidently say that they
have content and services that appeal to these gamers. Nevertheless, if they examine the
middle market carefully, they stand to benefit from new revenue opportunities and the gaming
industry can make the pie bigger.

For instance, dormant gamers are fairly motivated to play games and they actually spend the
highest dollar value per gaming hour -- even higher than the power gamers -- yet due to
lifestyle changes, they cannot find enough time to play games. These gamers are ideal for
snack-sized yet challenging games.

Our research also shows that leisure gamers show strong interest in web-based online gaming
services that offer not only game content, but also community features such as gamer ranking,
friend tracking, and instant messaging. These gamers are seeking a sense of persistence and
community, although they don't want to invest the money and time required for MMOGs.

How can publishers take advantage of this "middle ground"?

First, they must understand the demographics of middle market gamers, their gaming
behaviors, and their interest. Second, they should design games, services, and business models
specifically for the middle market gamers instead of treating them as an afterthought or
wishfully thinking that games designed for power gamers will magically appeal to everybody.

Third, publishers should recognize that middle-market gamers are less likely than power
gamers to talk about games all the time, and therefore it's vital to know where they acquire
information about new games and services. Fourth, they can leverage game advertising to
monetize the middle market gamers. If the leisure gamers spend so much time (58 hours per
month) playing games but not a lot of money, then generating ads revenue from their eyeball
hours makes sense.
How can marketers target or gauge "motivation and attitude" effectively, and why has
this not been a focus in the past?

Motivation and attitude are what really defines a person/gamer. Nevertheless, they are more
abstract than factors like time and money. That's why we further analyze the demographics
and behaviors of the different gamer groups based on motivation and attitude. For game
marketers, understanding the gap between motivation and actual gaming behavior will
provide plenty of interesting insights. For instance, if there are gamer groups out there that are
quite motivated to play games and actually spend a fair amount of time gaming, then the
important question is how can we make more money off them?

Why has this not been a focus in the past? That is a tough one. I guess it's more complex to do
and harder to explain. Also, remember people have comfort zones and companies have active
inertia.

Why do you think it's necessary to leave out gaming expenditures from this survey in
order to explore new business models?

If gaming expenditure is used as part of the methodology, then it will bias the results. How
different gamers spend money is tied to pre-existing business models. Certain middle-market
gamers with high motivation but low expenditure may have done so because they can't find
game content and services that fit their lifestyle and appeal to them.
Since an important goal of the study is to explore new business models and revenue
opportunities, we chose to leave gaming expenditure out. Doing so can also free marketers
from the shackles of current business models and allow them to explore new ways to
monetize gamer groups that are highly motivated but do not currently spend much money on
gaming activities. After the groups were identified, we analyzed gaming expenditures through
cross-tabulations and the results made a lot of sense.

With power gamers accounting for 11% of the market, but almost 1/3 of expenditure, do
you think they will inevitably still be the focus for many publishers?

That is a great question. Only a small percentage of companies become successful by

addressing all consumer segments. Proctor & Gamble has a solution for pretty much every
one but there are not many Proctor & Gambles out there.

Although differentiation and price are frequently two important competitive dimensions,
companies can also become successful if they focus on niche markets. In the retail market,
you have Whole Foods but you also have 99C.

I guess what I'm saying is that companies like EA might be able to afford targeting all gamer
groups, but smaller companies and new market entrants can become successful if they focus
on the middle-market, which represents 56 percent of the retail market. These gamers also
represent good online opportunities. There are only so many gamers who are willing to shell
out $50-60 whenever a new Madden game comes out. If more companies come to realize that
there are a large group of non-power gamers out there, ripe with opportunities, we'll see more
activities in those markets.

Is there overlap between the groups - for example, wouldn't many power gamers also be
social gamers?

No. These are exclusive gamer groups. The names of the gamer groups are based on their
most differentiating attributes. For instance, social gamers are called "social gamers" because
they do not enjoy gaming alone; they prefer to play games with others, and are likely to play
games because of family or their friends' requests. Power gamers definitely value the social
aspect of gaming. They also enjoy playing casual games, but we don't call them casual
gamers. Let's put it this way, there are overlaps between the attributes of different gamer
groups, but not group membership.

Why did the importance of social interaction to all these groups come as a surprise?

Right now MMOGs and online FPS games seem to be all the rage. MMOGs are essentially a
big chat room, right? The result that middle market gamers also value socialization does not
surprise us per se, but it is surprising in the sense that the industry has not paid enough
attention to this obvious fact.

Many gaming services targeting non-core/power gamers tend to focus on content access and
single-player games rather than community building and multiplayer gameplay. Club Pogo
was successful partly because of its focus on community features.

It's actually interesting when you think about this: MySpace now has more than 100 million
registered users and even WOW, the most popular MMOG, pales in comparison.

Profils de joueurs, la typologie selon Park Associate

Alors qu’il y a quelques années on considérait en marketing que les joueurs se divisaient en
deux catégories, à savoir les « casual gamers » (joueurs occasionnels) et les « hardcore
gamers » (joueurs inconditionnel), le cabinet Park Associate publia en 2006 une nouvelle
perception sur la typologie des joueurs.

Si les compagnies de jeu vidéo continuent à se baser sur les mythiques hardcore et casual
gamers, elles rateront plus de la moitié du marché. Le marché n’est plus blanc ni noir, et les
marketeurs du jeu vidéo doivent comprendre ces nuances.

Yuanzhe (Michael) Cai, Parks Associates.

Nous voilà donc avec 6 catégories définies de la manière suivante :

Power gamer : Le joueur passionné, fan de jeu vidéo, passe énormément de temps à jouer.

Social gamer : Joueur social, ne joue pas seul. Utilise le jeu vidéo pour jouer avec des amis.

Dormant gamer : Egalement un joueur passionné, mais ne joue pas beaucoup à cause du
travail ou de la famille. Préfère les titres à « challenge ».

Leisure gamer : Joue beaucoup pour se distraire. Principalement à des jeux simples en ligne.

Incidental gamer : Joueur « accidentel », joue seulement quand il s’ennuie. Joue

peu, principalement à des jeux en ligne.

Occasional gamer : Joueur « occasionnel », joue peu, principalement à des puzzles ou jeux
de plateaux.

Nombre et pourcentage de foyers ayant des joueurs de différentes typologies (2006)

Le magazine en ligne Suite101.com relèves d’ailleurs quelques points intéressants de l’étude :

 Le « power gamer » représente seulement 11% du total. La plupart des foyers sondés
contiennent des « dormant gamers », représentant 26% du total.
 53% du marché (Dormant / Leisure / Social) est (en 2006) inexploité.
 Nintendo est actuellement le mieux placé sur ces catégories de joueurs, et le faible prix
de leur matériel pousse les joueurs occasionnels à investir.
 Les joueurs « hardcore » rechignent sur les séries de type « Mario Party », mais
jouent régulièrement à des jeux dit « sociaux » (Mario Kart, Super Smash…) après
avoir consommé beaucoup de bière. (véridique)

Les ventes des consoles Nintendo Wii et Nintendo DS, viennent confirmer la volonté d’une
partie des joueurs à bénéficier de jeux « casuals » comme le prouve ces statistiques provenant
du site de statistiques vgchartz.com :
Nintendo et son public plus "casual" domine actuellement le marché du jeu vidéo (novembre
2009)

Pour conclure sur cette première approche typologique des joueurs, il est important de
remarquer les limites d’un tel sondage :

 L’étude est strictement basée sur le public américain. Si le public est sensiblement le
même, ou du moins plus proche du marché européen que japonais, il est toutefois
possible de trouver quelques divergences.
 L’étude a été réalisée en 2006. Depuis les joueurs ont encore évolué et les nouvelles
consoles Nintendo ont touché un public qui n’était pas, en 2006, considéré comme
« joueur ». On peut alors facilement imaginer que le taux de joueurs occasionnel ai
augmenté.
 L’étude ne prend pas en compte la forte montée des jeux mobiles. Les nouveaux
supports de téléphonie mobile et plus singulièrement l’iPhone couplé à la plateforme
Apple Store ont fait du jeu mobile un marché de plus en plus important. On peut alors
imaginer la création d’un 7ème profil : Le joueur « casual mobile », privilégiant
l’achat de jeux légers et peux onéreux sur son téléphone portable.

Tags : casual, ds, hardcore, microsoft, nintendo, playstation, sony, statistiques, Typologies,
wii, xbox