Gamer

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A "gamer" is someone who plays interactive games, such as video games or tabletop games. The term includes those who do not necessarily consider themselves to be gamers (i.e., casual gamers),^[1] as well as those who spend a significant part of their leisure time playing or learning about games. It also describes people who work on methods to gamify technologies relevant to gameplay .

There are many gamer communities around the world. Many of these take the form of discussion forums and other virtual communities, as well as college or university social clubs.

Types of Gamer

In the United States, the average video game player is 30 years old and has been playing video games for over 12 years.^[2] In the UK as of 2007, the average video game player was over 23 years old, had played video games for over 10 years, and spent around 11 hours a week playing video games.^[3]

Dedication Spectrum

It is common for games media, businesspeople, and academics to divide gamers into two or three broad behavioral categories. These categories are sometimes separated by level dedication to gaming, sometimes by primary type of game played, and sometimes by a combination of those and other factors. There is no general consensus on the definitions or names of these categories, though many attempts have been made to formalize them. An overview of these attempts and their common elements follows.

Casual gamer

The term "casual gamer" is often a used for gamers who primarily play casual games, but can also refer to gamers who play less frequently than other gamers.^[4] Casual gamers may play games designed for ease of gameplay, or play more involved games in short sessions, or at a slower pace than hardcore gamers.^[5] The types of game that casual gamers play vary, and they are less likely own a dedicated video game console.^[6][7] Casual gamer demographics vary greatly from those of other video gamers, as the typical casual gamer is older and more predominantly female.^[8] "Fitness gamer"s, who play motion-based exercise games, are also seen as casual gamers.^[9]

Core gamer

A core or mid-core gamer is a player with a wider range of interests than a casual gamer and is more likely to enthusiastically play different types of games,^[10] but without the amount of time spent and sense of competition of a hardcore gamer. The mid-core gamer enjoys games but may not finish every game they buy, doesn't have time for long MMO quests,^[11] and is a target consumer.^[12] Nintendo president Satoru Iwata stated that they designed the Wii U to cater to core gamers who are in between the casual and hardcore categories.^[13]

A number of theories have been presented regarding the rise in popularity of mid-core games. James Hursthouse, the founder of Roadhouse Interactive credits the evolution of devices towards tablets and touch-screen interfaces, whereas Jon Radoff of Disruptor Beam compares the emergence of mid-core games to similar increases in media sophistication that have occurred in media such as television.^[14]

Hardcore gamer

Ernest Adams and Scott Kim have proposed classification metrics to distinguish "hardcore gamers" from casual gamers.^[15] They assert that hardcore gamers:

• prefer action games
• are very competitive
• often have the latest consoles and/or high-end PCs
• are usually technologically savvy
• prefer to play games that have depth and complexity
• often seek out game-related information and participate in gaming communities

However, others have attempted to draw the distinction based primarily on which platforms a gamer prefers,^[16] or to decry the entire concept of delineating casual from hardcore as divisive and vague.^[17]

Pro gamer

Professional gamers play video games and deeply study the game to master it and usually to play in competitions. Professional gamers don't necessarily play for money or earn a salary, but many do.^[18] A professional gamer may also be another type of gamer, such as a hardcore gamer, if he or she meets the additional criteria for that gamer type. In countries of Asia, particularly South Korea and Japan, professional gamers are sponsored by large companies and can earn more than $100,000USD a year.^[19] In the United States, Major League Gaming has contracted electronic sports gamers with $250,000USD yearly deals.^[20]

Newbie

"Newbie," (commonly shortened to "noob", "n00b", or "newb") is a slang term for a novice or newcomer to a certain game, or to gaming in general.^[21][22]

Retrogamer

A retrogamer is a gamer preferring playing and collecting retro games - older video games and arcade games. They may also be called classic gamers or old-school gamers, which are terms that are more prevalent in the United States. The games are played either on the original hardware, on modern hardware via console emulation, or on modern hardware via ports or compilations.^[23]

Girl gamer/Gamer girl

A girl gamer/gamer girl is any female who regularly engages in playing video games. According to a study conducted by the Entertainment Software Association in 2009, 40% of the game playing population is female, and women 18 or older now comprise 34% of all gamers. Also, the percentage of women now playing online has risen to 43%, up 4% from 2004. The same study shows that 48% of game purchasers are female.^[24][25]

Usage of the term "girl gamer" is controversial. Some critics have advocated use of the label as a reappropriated term, while others see it as nondescriptive or perpetuating the minority position of female gamers.^[26] Some critics of the term believe there is no singular definition of a female gamer and that they are as diverse as any other group.^[27]

Some girl gamers have been subject to sexual harassment while engaged in online play or tournaments.^[28]

Gaymer

Gaymer, or gay gamer, is a term used to refer to the group of people who identify themselves as LGBT (gay, bisexual, lesbian, or transgender) and have an active interest in video games.^[29] This demographic has been the subject of two large surveys, one by Jason Rockwood in 2006,^[30] who noted the level of prejudice that gaymers endure,^[31] and another in 2009, focusing on the content that gaymers expect in videogames, the results of which were not published.^[32][33]

The gaymers community provides a "safe place" for LGBT gamers^[34] apart from the isolation they feel from both the heteronormative gaming community and the gay community.^[35] They also believe that as homosexuality in video games increase, there will be an increased normalization of homosexuality in general.^[35][36][37]

Avatar

An avatar, username, game name, alias, gamer tag, screen name, or handle is a name (usually a pseudonym) adopted by a video gamer, used as a main preferred identification to the gaming community. Usage of user names is most prevalent in games with online multiplayer support, or at electronic sport conventions.

Similarly, a clan tag is a prefix or suffix added to a name to identify that the gamer is in a clan. Clans are generally a group of gamers who play together as a team against other clans. They are most commonly found in online multi-player games in which one team can face off against another. Clans can also be formed to create loosely based affiliations perhaps by all being fans of the same game or merely gamers who have close personal ties to each other. A team tag is a prefix or suffix added to a name to identify that the gamer is in a team. Teams are generally sub-divisions within the same clan and are regarded within gaming circuits as being a purely competitive affiliation. These gamers are usually in an online league such as the Cyberathlete Amateur League (C.A.L.) and their parent company the Cyberathlete Professional League (C.P.L.) where all grouped players were labeled as teams and not clans.

Clans and guilds

A clan is a group of players, most of time founded by a leader or an administrator. Other names for clans are guilds. Clans can also make tournaments and play for real money. Sometimes a clan can be a kind of professional or semi-professional gaming team that make money out of tournaments.

See also

• Consumer
• Entertainment Consumers Association
• Gamergate controversy
• Gamers Outreach Foundation
• Going Cardboard (Documentary)
• List of gaming topics
• Player (game)
• Video game addiction

References