我们的游戏产业是否正走向一个拐点？游戏行业专家、Games4Girls\Games4women的资深编辑根.卡茨似乎正是这么认为的，下文是她参加2010年Casual Connect大会后所作的一篇新闻通讯。

social gaming

从洛杉矶的E3展会（The Electronic Entertainment Expo，中文名为电子娱乐展览会）到西雅图的Casual Connect大会，这两者的差别好比是火星到金星，如果真有什么共同点的话，那就是它们都靠游戏谋生。与E3展会热热闹闹的大众规模不同，Casual Connect的与会对象主要锁定游戏开发商和制造商，这些持邀请函入场的专业人士个个成熟年长，衣冠楚楚，正襟危坐。“Connect”，顾名思义，就是沟通和交流。大家坐下来，齐聚一堂，探讨行业相关话题。你也可以转移阵地，到会场后室与他人进行更少数人参与的讨论。尽管规模远逊E3展会，但所有与会者都受到了很好的招待，并且可以自由选择会议讨论群。

社交游戏是Casual Connect大会今年关注的重点，该游戏可以在手机平台上运行的便携式特点，也恰好与休闲游戏所倡导的理念不谋而合，并且正逐渐改变休闲游戏的发展格局。这次大会吸引了不少行业重量级选手的参与，包括收购了休闲、社交游戏生产商Playfish的电子艺届（EA），以及老牌休闲游戏生产商、刚刚归入Playdom麾下的Merscom公司。不过也有些挂了名号的公司，只是来围观和旁听而已。

免费体验是休闲游戏的核心要义，因此本次大会讨论的焦点就是社交游戏的“营收”问题，这是我之前还从来没有留意过的概念。如何让玩家在1小时内就产生愿意为游戏付费的冲动，往往取决于这款游戏设计的成败，这些虚拟商品果真值得玩家慷慨解囊吗？事实证明，游戏运营的极大部分利润正是来自这些热情高涨的死忠粉丝。另外，“品牌塑造”也在会上被数次提起，人们普遍认同打造品牌游戏对留住玩家至关重要这一说法。

逾4500万名35岁以上的女性是休闲游戏的玩家主力军，这类游戏取悦她们的不二法则就是：缓解压力、有趣不枯躁、循环体验，不耗时等。当然，精彩的故事背景以及唯美的视觉效果同样缺一不可。这类游戏通常会包含游戏指南，游戏攻略，标注位置的地图界面，以及任务开始、结束之后弹出的帮助列表。玩家并不一定非使用这些选项不可，但成功的游戏就是得提供这类成套的功能，才有可能保证服务不出纰漏。目前最潮最高级的当属那些探索、历险题材的休闲游戏，尽管在整个行业看来，这些游戏的发展并无多大前途，但它们现在就是受到了不少玩家的热捧。

对我来说，我倒是很乐见这群上了年纪的男人四处兜售女人们数十年前就已经提出的，但当时并不被重视的想法和建议。如今，已经有不少女人进入游戏行业高层，相信这些女当家们制定的目标客户定位、取悦玩家手段等决策，必将深刻影响游戏行业的未来走向。

From E3 to Casual Connect: When Hardcore Meets Social Gaming

Are core and casual games at a crossroads? Gen Katz, industry veteran and editor of Games4Girls/Games4Women, seems to think so. She’s graciously given the ‘Goose permission to share her latest gaming newsletter, which discusses some new and old revelations from Casual Connect 2010.

Bopping from E3 (in LA) to Casual Connect, July 20-24 in Seattle, is like going from Mars to Venus. The only thing that two organizations share is that they make money by making games.

The attendees at Casual Connect are very different — mostly developers and producers – older, and suits are not looked at askance. As the name says – Connect – is the operative word here.

Everyone is available – sitting behind a table. For meetings you pull up a chair and try to get out of the stream of traffic. Occasionally there is a back room available for a quiet conference.

Attendees are well fed and partied-up and while the attendance doesn’t anywhere a match E3′s – it’s top cream – all those you want to meet.

This year the hot item is social gaming – a perfect match for casual games and their portability to all the new mobile devices. Already it has begun to transform the casual game landscape. It has attracted Electronic Arts, who has purchased Playfish, a casual/social gaming company and Merscom, an old established casual game producer, has been acquired by Playdom – a heavy hitter in the social gaming area. Name tags indicate that some of the core establishment are attending for a look-see.

Free-to-play is currently a central core to casual games. And so the concern is monetization – a term previously not in my dictionary. How to get players to pay for content after 60 minutes is important as to how the game is designed. Can players be tempted to buy virtual goods? A big fraction of the income comes from a very small number of players. Branding came up in a couple of sessions as a way to attract and keep customers – Diner Dash; Wedding Dash – is a way to keep a product name in front of customers.

The Casual approach is concerned with pleasing their players – who happen to be largely women over 35 – around 45 million of them. The abiding rules are – eliminate frustration, no dying and starting over, games in the short bits of time available to the players – oh yes, and good stories and great graphics. Games that follow this mantra will include guides, contain help lists on goals required and accomplished; a help screen that indicates the hot spots for each scene; and an in game WALKTHROUGH. None have to be used, but they are there for the player. New Premium casual games are surfacing – games that link seek-and-find games with the adventure genre, or are simply an adventure game. Adventure games may be dead in the core gaming industry but they have been welcomed by the casual players.

For me, it is very satisfying to see an older group of men, touting the requests that women made ten years ago that were simply brushed off. More women are in high levels in this industry and their concern about knowing who their customers are and how to please them is what is directing the casual game industry.(source:frisky mongoose)