ORIGINAL: Silentbomber

I like your avatar.

" ... but it was the mastering of a game / gaining knowledge of how a game worked and having fun with that, which ultimately drove you to excessively buy more and more consoles and consoles games to look for more experiences / games to master (nitro)."


You' re somewhat changing what you originally said. I spend 10X more time reading and talking about videogames than I do actually playing. And most of the time I don' t even finish the games that I do play, let alone play to be the best. I don' t spend so much time reading about videogames because I want to be more competitive, it' s because I genuinely enjoy videogames as an artform.

The difference between a hardcore gamer and a casual is that the hardcore gamer is experienced enough to know what he wants, as opposed to the casual gamer that can be pursuaded by little hooks. The casual gamer won' t spend time at gaming sites and wouldn' t be able to hold a conversation of gaming. They are more likely to make buying decisions based on commercials, price, word of mouth and accesibility. The casual gamer walks in Walmart to buy a game looking at the game cases that catches their eyes wondering what the game is about. The hardcore gamer walks into EB games to pick up the game they' ve been waiting for for months. They already know what to buy and what it' s about, the casual gamer needs to play the game before knowing if they' ll like it.

Saying that pro gaming is what defines a Hardcore gamer is like saying that Red and Green is what defines Christmas. Pro gaming is associated with hardcore gaming but is not primarily what defines it.

I enjoy the competition in online play, but my motivation for spending so much time talking and reading about videogames has nothing to do with mastering the games. Mastering the games is a side effect, not the cause or primary motivation.

There are many Hardcore gamers that suck at most games they play, often because they play so many games. You can be a hardcore player of a specific game, or you can be a generalized hardcore gamer. You don' t need to focused on a few games to be a hardcore gamer.

Agent you' re spot on man bravo, damn i enjoy reading post like that which don' t make my blood boil. i think that most people here are hardcore gamers even if they don' t play a lot... hardcore gamers don' t play crap, and quality games are rare.

You' re somewhat changing what you originally said. I spend 10X more time reading and talking about videogames than I do actually playing. And most of the time I don' t even finish the games that I do play, let alone play to be the best. I don' t spend so much time reading about videogames because I want to be more competitive, it' s because I genuinely enjoy videogames as an artform.

The difference between a hardcore gamer and a casual is that the hardcore gamer is experienced enough to know what he wants, as opposed to the casual gamer that can be pursuaded by little hooks. The casual gamer won' t spend time at gaming sites and wouldn' t be able to hold a conversation of gaming. They are more likely to make buying decisions based on commercials, price, word of mouth and accesibility. The casual gamer walks in Walmart to buy a game looking at the game cases that catches their eyes wondering what the game is about. The hardcore gamer walks into EB games to pick up the game they' ve been waiting for for months. They already know what to buy and what it' s about, the casual gamer needs to play the game before knowing if they' ll like it.

Saying that pro gaming is what defines a Hardcore gamer is like saying that Red and Green is what defines Christmas. Pro gaming is associated with hardcore gaming but is not primarily what defines it.

I enjoy the competition in online play, but my motivation for spending so much time talking and reading about videogames has nothing to do with mastering the games. Mastering the games is a side effect, not the cause or primary motivation.

There are many Hardcore gamers that suck at most games they play, often because they play so many games. You can be a hardcore player of a specific game, or you can be a generalized hardcore gamer. You don' t need to focused on a few games to be a hardcore gamer.

Pro gamer?? where did that come from? who mentioned gamers who play for money?

And where did this start from? Did you wake up one day and decide to do follow the industry? Or did it stem from a game you' ve mastered and found how fun the experince was?

And where did this start from? Did you wake up one day and decide to do follow the industry? Or did it stem from a game you' ve mastered and found how fun the experince was?

It probably wasn' t one experience. Another analogy would be to compare a hardcore gamer to a wine connoisseur, you don' t have to be an alcoholic to know what the best bottles are. Nor does a wine connoisseur find himself by winning a drinking competition.

A hardcore gamer becomes such because they have had good experiences playing games, and want to have the best experiences by learning more about the industry and the games. That' s the catalist, like anything else. The drive to master games the way you descibe is a branch that stems after this happens, and not neccessarily for everyone.

Pro gamer?? where did that come from? who mentioned gamers who play for money?

I used the term loosely, I was talking about competitive gamers.

connoisseur

it' s " connaisseur" actually, a french word.

It probably wasn' t one experience. Another analogy would be to compare a hardcore gamer to a wine connoisseur, you don' t have to be an alcoholic to know what the best bottles are. Nor does a wine connoisseur find himself by winning a drinking competition.

Lol that' s more of an analogy for a Gaming journalist, not a hardcore gamer.

A hardcore gamer becomes such because they have had good experiences playing games,

Gottcha!!!!!

And the only way you' ve had such good experiences is because you' ve mastered them? right? Surely no one has had an enjoyable experience with a game they haven' t a clue with.

ORIGINAL: Abasoufiane

connoisseur

it' s " connaisseur" actually, a french word.

Actually it' s connoisseur, and Agent is French Canadian so he should know.

sorry didn' t know this word exist in english ... but the translation in french is " connaisseur" and this is originally no english word so i don' t know where they brought that " connoisseur" .

Hm, I believe the French word connaisseur became the word connoiseur in English. Strange actually that it got changed in such a small way. So connoiseur was correct since we' re busy in English here. But Aba was right in a way when he said what the French word was ;)

Edit : I just noticed Aba answered. It' s a bit strange indeed that the loan word got changed so slightly. Since I guess that the original pronunciation was kept.

Odd, i wonder whether French Canadians use the English language version or the original French version!?

they should kept it connaisseur, lame to change a word in a small way to make it belong to the english language... i just think it' s lame... anyway sorry agent didn' t know that connoisseur exist.

You see, this is why the English language contains more words than any other; we just steal words fro other languages, change them slightly and then call it our own...

It is a french word, but words are not always spelled the same way. You can imagine how much fun I had with vocabulary tests growing up. An english kid in a french province...***.

Connoisseur-English spelling

Connaisseur-French spelling

Both are acceptable in english, the french spelling would have been a bit pompous if I' m speaking english. But that' s the shit I have to deal with. I have to learn how to spell all the words in my vocabulary twice. I' m fine if the word is completely different but if one language borrowed a word from the other it' s easy to make a mistake. Even if the spelling is the same, I might spell it using rules that apply to the other language...

For the record, I' m not French Canadian. I would be if french was my first language but it' s my second. Canadian is fine .

Lol that' s more of an analogy for a Gaming journalist, not a hardcore gamer.

To me there is not much difference. A gaming journalist is a hardcore gamer with writting skills that gets paid for their opinion.

Gottcha!!!!!

And the only way you' ve had such good experiences is because you' ve mastered them? right? Surely no one has had an enjoyable experience with a game they haven' t a clue with.

Now you' re just being stupid. You can' t master a game before you understand how to play. If you can play, you can have fun. So no, you don' t need to master them to have a good experience. You were originally talking about winning tounaments (that' s what I' m refuting) so don' t pretend like you don' t know what mastery means. I love playing Geometry Wars but I still haven' t reached 1 million. The top players have well over 300 million. No one said casuals don' t know how to play, they are still gamers after all. Casuals will understand what they' re playing they just might not understand what they are not playing. Hardcore gamers have a wide grasp of all the games available and the ones that will be available.

Talking about harcore gamer vs. casual gamer does not refer to a single game, it refers to all games in general.

Maybe some people reached a turning point when they first got into competitive gaming but that' s beside the point as it' s not neccessary to be a hardcore gamer. I never played against people until I started playing online which only happened when the 360 came out. Yet I consider myself to have been a hardcore gamer when I still had my NES hooked up to my TV. I saw a demonstration of the N64 for the first time on TV, seeing Mario 64 in action blew my mind. That' s the moment if such a thing exists where gaming stopped being casual for me. I wasn' t even holding a controller at the time, I was watching TV.

If I had to name a criteria for a hardcore gamer it would be that gaming plays a big part in that person life.

Simple but good definition actually. Taking part in discussions on forums now and then and actually caring about some gaming news might be some other signs. I don' t think many casual gamers do this.

Agent, i think you and I have two definitions of mastering a game.. When i say ' Mastered' i didn' t mean ' Perfected' Or completed, Just grasp the game enough to understand what it offers or at least the basics. Anyway.. my head hurts..

If I had to name a criteria for a hardcore gamer it would be that gaming plays a big part in that person life.

That' s certainly a good way of putting.

OK but you... ah fuck it. Good night, I' m going to bed.