We recently re-ignited our work with “casual” and Expanded Game Experience model (EGE). After presenting the article “Casual Games Discussion” at the Future Play 2007 in Toronto, I have been working tentatively with heuristics concerning the design of casual games. I set up an internal blog for our team and started writing down the thoughts about “casual in games” in the form of design heuristics. Since then we have had also two internal brainstorming sessions concerning the topic. We are now working towards a new comprehension of the Expanded Game Experience as well, since the understanding the wide spectrum of casual in games seems to require wide perspective and holistic view on the game experience design.
One of the comments at our internal brainstorming session was quite humorous: “It is far more complicated to design a casual game than a hardcore game”. That is propably true in the end. But that was a thought sprang from our first draft and we are working towards a modular and easy-to-use heuristic set. We also experienced that even though brainstorming problematic subject as “casual” can be very fruitful, it seems to be very energy-consuming. Hard work indeed.
Pictures of us working with the model and the heuristics:
AaKoo's Game Lab 