While reading Juul’s article I couldn’t help but agree with a majority of his ideas about the casual gamer. Most importantly, I believe that his idea about the difficulty of a game is key to the casual gamer’s experience. As I consider myself a casual gamer, the difficulty and time spent playing a game are the fundamental problem I have with many videogames. I dislike spending hours trying to unlock the new level, mission, item, or world and become frustrated and eventually quit playing the game

Expanding on this issue, I believe casual gamers despise the stress and time spent playing the game that “hardcore” games require. The reason for this may be that stress and time use parallel real life feelings that people experience in the workplace and classroom. I personally experience the exact same stress and pressure level while playing a “hardcore” game as I do while writing a paper before a deadline or studying for a big test.

This could certainly be similar for adults in the workplace. The demands they face throughout the day may feel the same as those involved in game play and the reward they receive by being able to go home is similar to that of beating a level in a “hardcore” game. When a game parallels the stress to reward ratio of real life I think casual gamers do not enjoy it. Instead, casual gamers want to achieve a feeling of accomplishment quickly without the long term sense of being weighed down.