Stratus Games has launched a new marketing strategy, which it calls the "Casual Game Revolution."  ICv2 recently spoke to Stratus CEO Chris James about their new program, and the two new games planned for summer, 2012.

 

"We create games for a casual audience," James explained, "We believe that the identification of games as 'family games' is too broad a category for such a wide range of games that exist there.  So, we're creating games that are really more strategic than your light family games that are intended to play with their kids.  They're more like your gateway or your filler-type games, but we're calling them casual games because they're intended for an audience who may not be familiar with the term 'gateway' or 'filler' game."

 

James used the recent GAMA Trade Show in Las Vegas to approach retailers and other game publishers, hoping to convince them to push this category of games, which he views as being under-appreciated despite having very broad market potential:

 

"We want to make sure that retailers are catering their stores to the casual gamer, and creating a casual game shelf and filling it with games that the general populace is going to love."

 

James identified some other publishers that produce these casual-style games, similar to Stratus, that he believes define a category of games that may be family-friendly, but which are intended as "light adult games" rather than games for children.  His list included Griffon Games, Fireside Games, Looney Labs, and Playroom Entertainment.

 

Continuing its support of the casual games category, Stratus plans two new releases for this summer.

 

DiceAFARI is an area control and set collecting dice game.  Players have a map shaped like an animal, with tiles representing different types of terrain.  The dice determine where tiles can be placed on the board.  Players score points by controlling types of terrain on the board, and by collecting sets of matching photo tiles.

 

DiceAFARI is for two to four players, ages eight and up.  Supported by a $5,000 Kickstarter program, this game will have a suggested retail price of $24.95.  It is scheduled for a June release.

 

Off Your Rocker is a party game about psychiatric patients.  One player assumes the role of the psychiatrist, while the others each choose a "quirk" from the 800 included in the game.  By asking questions, the psychiatrist seeks to guess which quirk afflicts each player, scoring points as he does so.  Other players seek to stump the psychiatrist, while gaining points for humorous and clever answers.

 

Of Your Rocker is for four to twelve players.  The suggested retail price will be $24.95. It is scheduled for a July release.

 

Both DiceAFARI and Off Your Rocker were designed by Chris James, who also designed the board game Eruption (see "'Eruption' Board Game").