Playing WoW is pretty much the definition of hardcore gamer to me;

Female gamers are sometimes stereotyped as playing WoW, so maybe that’s why WoW is not considered hardcore. Because if many women are playing it, then it must not be hardcore, but mainstream.

The first one talks about how some people who consider themselves hardcore gamers are also rather awful people: lots of racism/sexism/profanity to be seen and heard especially in online games. The commenter asserted this was a property of gamers, but I’m more of the opinion that this is a property of anonymous losers on the internet, as succinctly explained in this comic.

However, it did raise an interesting point: a lot of the things associated with gamers is that they are Not Nice. Aggressive, argumentative, heavy on the swearing, etc. All of which are… you guessed it: not very ladylike. Are girls and women being sidelined as hardcore gamers because we aren’t supposed to be competitive or aggressive?

The other comment talked about gaming as an addiction, and suggested that my question trying to prime people to think of unusual folk, including myself, as hardcore gamers was much like trying to get people to admit I was an alcoholic. While gaming addiction can be a problem, I think that’s a little unfair. It’s much more like trying to get someone to admit that I could be an athlete, and having them claim that people who play Ultimate Frisbee are some how Not Athletes, and even if I played every week last summer, it wasn’t athletic. You can be addicted to sports to the point of damaging your body (Ultimate is actually particularly bad, and I personally stopped playing after an innocuous accident left me limping for the rest of the summer), but I don’t think getting people to admit that you have impressive skills in an area is at all like trying to get them to admit you have a problem. You’d want someone to acknowledge that you were a great quarterback and asking them to do so would not somehow be akin to getting them to acknowledge that you were likely to have suffered some brain damage from playing football!

I also don’t understand why people who spend hours typing and working in programs like Photoshop think they have terrible hand-eye coordination. I can’t play ball for shit, but I can do anything I need to do on a computer.

Then again I thought I sucked at math till I realised how much math I do when I make and/or resize dress patterns and have to figure out not only how many inches to add and subtract to each dimension of the garment but also where the inches need to be added/subtracted based on the shape of the body I’m dealing with.

I’ve logged over 500 hours on Pokemon Diamond. I play a variety of genres — MMOs, jRPGs, strategy, city-building, puzzle, action-adventure, p&c adventure, and the occasional fighter. More than a handful of those games require good hand-eye coordination. I have learned about invisible gameplay mechanics of at least a couple of these games in order to master them (AC: gridding for a perfect town, Pokemon: IVs and EVs). I have had those long all-night gaming sessions. I have probably had cheeto dust on my shirt more than once. I betcha a lot of guys would still say I’m “casual”. ‘Cos I don’t play L4D. Or something something something.

In case you weren’t already aware, online magazine The Escapist intermittently releases excellent articles & issues dedicated to the topic of female (“girl”) gamers. The Google search string I found some of them at was:
site:escapistmagazine.com girl gamers hardcore

I know I’m quite late, but I want to offer my definition nevertheless, although not many people are likely to read it. After all I’m commenter number, what? 60? ;)

Anyway, to me, the difference between Casual and Hardcore Gamers are whether they think about “their game” without actually playing it or not.
So, if someone defines “playing a game” as “I start the console/the *.exe/visit the website and play the game. When I exit, I stop playing”, then that’s casual. It doesn’t matter how complex this specific game is – if one stops caring after quitting, then that’s casual. It doesn’t influence other parts of one’s life / free time.
Otherwise, if, even after exiting the game, one looks up skill trees, or if one should’ve selected that male dwarf noble, because he would be more fun to play, or when the next map pack arrives on Steam… well, that’s pretty hardcore.
If you spend time with games without playing them, then that’s hardcore to me – after all, you don’t even need the games to “waste” (*cough*) your time with them any more!

This means that yes, you Terri and me (Game Engineering & Simulation (Master Study), 1st semester) are, per definition, automatically Hardcore Gamers, because we are even talking about them w/o playing them. And making money. Well, you, not me. Pretty Pro, actually ^^

I don’t have any interest in “mastering” a game, I just want it to be an experience if that makes any sense at all.

I think it makes perfect sense. I feel much the same way about other entertainment: sometimes you just want to read and enjoy the book, sometimes you just want to watch the movie. You’re not always interested in the English class/film studies critique. Sometimes the deeper meanings add something, and sometimes you’re just reading teenage vampire smut because sparkles are fun and you’re bored. ;)

And of course, just like books and movies, my interest in going deeper, whether that’s being completionist and seeing every single level, or even just thinking about how this game reflects society… well, it all depends on the game I’m playing, or the book I’m reading, or my own mood of the moment.