After a long and drawn out process of research into mid-core I happened upon this article quite by accident, the information within is very concise and 'final' in its own way, agreeing with my own research into the subject.
It seems that although mid-core is a good for product specific engagement and commitment characteristics where it is valid, it is also used as demographic characteristics, where it is not valid. It is interesting to think that at the moment games are marketed as if only one type of people play casual games and another play hard core games, as an extension of that it seems to have been assumed that a totally different group of people will only play mid-core games. This is of course a false idea, people are diverse and play different types of games all the time depending on what directly takes their fancy.
"To make a game more casual is to make it more accessible; to make it hardcore is to make it more engaging. Good casual design increases a player’s willingness to play but does nothing to increase their desire to play. Good hardcore design improves a player’s desire to play but does nothing to increase their willingness to play." (Kevin Gliner, Gamasutra)
This article has critically summed up the issues that the concept of mid-core games face. While the idea of a game that sits between the engagement model of a casual game and a hard-core game is a great idea in theory it ill only create a new type of engagement for computer games, it will not actually work if used as a demographic for games.
With this information in mind I think I will, instead of seeking to create games that fall into this model, seek to create games which have an equal balance of engagement and accessibility.
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