Best genre to introduce someone to gaming, poll and topic

[J T]

A good intro game right now is Poker Night at the Inventory.

It's just Texas hold em, which everyone can enjoy, but with four great videogame characters from various franchises: Strong Bad, Max (from Sam & Max), Heavy (from Team Fortress 2), and Tycho (from Penny Arcade). This game is fun and the characters are funny with lots of personality. It would be easy to get a person to enjoy this game and then get them to branch out into trying the games that these characters come from. I'd start with Sam & Max games or Strong Bad's Cool Games for Attractive People for Point & Click games, then Penny Arcade's On The Rain Slick Precipice of Darkness for RPGs, and finally Team Fortress 2 for online FPS mayhem.

[MrPopo]

Eroge!

JT wins the thread.

I'd say platformers are the best, though I also think you could get some milage out of a top-down shooter, as long as you pick an appropriate one. The home conversions of some Cave games have a good novice mode that makes the game play more like older shmups such as 1941, but with the bright Cave bullets that are much easier to see and dodge.

[avrame]

I'm sad to see the lack of casual up on that list.

Games that hooked my fiancee were:
Tetris, Animal Crossing, Sims 2 and Peggle

Now she plays Gears of War with me... figure that leap out

[J T]

One thing that my wife said to me was that she doesn't like games where "you have to make a character walk around". This rules out about 95% of games. She likes old Atari games though. I've realized that this is really a visuo-spatial thing. My wife, despite being exceptionally intelligent (she has a PhD), has a hard time with directions and finding her way around. Whenever we go for walks in the woods, she relies on me to get us out because she gets easily turned around and doesn't know where to go. In general, men often score better on visuo-spatial talks. There are also differences in how men and women prefer directions. Men like to know North West East South directions, whereas women prefer to be told about landmarks to recognize along the way (there's a 7-11 on the left, go 3 blocks past that until you reach the post office, etc.) I think part of why my wife doesn't like videogames is because she just gets lost in them quickly and stops having fun. I think it is for this reason that when she does like a game, it is usually one that has everything you need to know about the game world appearing on one screen. She likes trivia games and rhythm games mostly, and the occassional old school arcade game like Yar's Revenge or Space Invaders. This may be true for a lot of people that don't like video games. It is harder to find your way around in a virtual world, particularly one where all the walls look basically the same.

[YoshiEgg25]

Have her play shmups or rail-shooters then.

[Gamerforlife]

This may be true for a lot of people that don't like video games. It is harder to find your way around in a virtual world, particularly one where all the walls look basically the same.

This is an interesting point. Personally, my sense of direction isn't the greatest. I actually tend to think in the whole landmark way. So I guess I'm an exception to the rule you mentioned. I can usually find my way around in games, but there are times where I get temporarily lost and it usually is due to the fact that many games have environments that just look too similar. You look around and one hallway looks like the other. Every door looks the same, etc, etc. I've always found that really annoying so I really appreciate it when a game has a good map and waypoint system. She should try games with those. A lot of games I've played recently have been made much less annoying for me due to effective maps and waypoints

[Vetus]

Simple yet addictive puzzle games like Tetris and Picross are the first, classic choices. Then follow simple, entertaining party games like Wii Sports, Wii Party, Bomberman, Mario Kart Wii...you know, the classic Wii stuff that everyone in the family and the company can enjoy, both hardcore and casual gamers. Then we have 2D platform games like New Super Mario Bros Wii. And finally don't forget to mention music games like Wii Music, Dance Dance Revolution, Elite Beat Agends and racing games like Outrun.

[Gamerforlife]

Lot of interesting thoughts here. Seems like platformers are getting the most votes so far. That's in line with my thinking, but I have seen some good points for other genres too. Sometimes I run into situations where I have a chance to break someone in and I always ponder what type of game to go with. So I like seeing other people's ideas

[Jrecee]

I don't agree with platformers at all. It seems to be that about 99% of 'non-gamers' actually play games, and the games they play would be in the music/puzzle genre.

My dad sucks at platformers and doesn't get into them at all. But he likes old arcade games like space invaders and pacman. He also likes puzzle games like tetris.

Platformers require more in depth understanding of games and usually have more complicated details. In tetris you just move the blocks left and right and try to fit them together. That's all you need to know. In mario you have to move left and right, use a run button, jump (hold to jump higher), know what the powerups do, have the coordination to land on enemies, jump over pits, know things like "the flower won't come out of the pipe if he's standing on it", and get accustomed to the acceleration/deceleration of the character.

The question would be, why in this day and age DOESN'T someone play games? After figuring that out you'd look around for an example of someone who doesn't play MANY games and look at what the games are that they ARE playing. I can say almost 100% that I don't think any non/casual gamers are playing platformers exclusively.

[futuramaguy42]

For adults I would say puzzle games like Tetris and Bejewled. For kids I would recommend a platformer like one of the Kirby games.