Mini-game experience packs big punch with kids

Depicted as the next hot niche for the gaming industry, purveyors of kids IPs have been hopping on the casual online bandwagon. In the past 12 months, Nickelodeon pledged to spend US$100 million developing its casual game offering and Electronic Arts established EA Casual Entertainment to capture part of the estimated US$2.25-billion casual market. So it's no wonder that video game publishers have been tapping into the casual gaming ethos to amp up their console titles. In fact, including mini-games in kid titles is becoming a standard operating procedure and is helping gamecos widen their reach beyond the core gamer to bring in families and girls.