As far as I know "casual games" are games that are very easy and very rewarding, thus great for pretty much everyone that just wants to pass some time (a huge audience obviously). This article somehow manages to use "casual games" as separate category besides, say, "Cards & Casino". What's the difference? Almost all games I've tried from the Play Store are casual games, even all racing and almost all arcade games, and I gave up on mobile gaming because of that.
Well, almost: Final Fantasy III, Final Fantasy IV, Chaos Rings, Chaos Rings II, Chaos Rings Ω, Ingress, Grand Theft Auto III and Grand Theft Auto: Vice Cities wouldn't be 'casual'.
Then there's also: SMS, N, SG, SD, NES, SNES, N64, GB, GBA, DS, PSX, GC, Wii and PSV emulators that contain 'non casual' games.
Many of those games lose a great deal of interactivity and control when ported to a touch only interface though. Turn based games like Final Fantasy fair well though on touch interface, but real time games like GTA not as much. I wouldn't call games like GTA III casual on mobile, but I don't think they quite appeal to the exact same audience they did on consoles or PC.
GTA III and Vice City are actually surprisingly good on mobile. I bought GTA III on a whim when I got my Nexus 7 last year with the Play store credit that came with it, and I actually loved it. It took me probably 20 minutes to get a feel for the controls and ended up playing the game all the way through after a while (halfway through Vice City now). Rockstar really nailed the controls for the touch interface, at least on a tablet.
Totally agree. I'm entirely a casual game player and I exclusively play card and casino games. I'd play strategy and MMO type games if I had time, but a quick poker game or even solitare takes a few minutes. MMO and strategy is a huge commitment.
