In the months since the launch of Kinect, Microsoft has been very careful not to use the term “hardcore” when referring to games being developed to support the device, and that’s definitely a fair shout. After just a few brief moments of searching though, you can find the self-proclaimed hardcore gamers (that Microsoft haven’t even been thinking of trying to sell Kinect to), taking aim at the device, dismissing anyone who’s purchased one as an idiot and declaring that they’d never buy it in a million years. Including some self-proclaimed “industry experts” who should know better.

The reason? None of the available games are “hardcore” enough for them.

When it comes to the way in which we control games, a decent percentage of us dismiss the idea of motion gaming out of hand, deeming devices such as the Wiimote, Move Controller and Kinect to be nothing more than children’s toys. Products that – in the view of the sneering naysayer – every parent and teenage girl in the country is liable to own by the end of the year, given their inferior knowledge of gaming. This group of players won’t be associated with any such device, and they certainly won’t buy one. What they will do though, is sit up on their high horse and throw buckets of abuse at those who have taken the plunge, or who dare to claim that – shock, horror – they actually enjoy playing Dance Central or Kinect Sports.

I contest that this percentage of people may well be the sort of people who will complete Hyperdimension Neptunia on the PS3 in less than five hours, but that they aren’t hardcore gamers at all. Not only that, but I contest that they fail to understand the industry that they claim to be on the bleeding edge of in the slightest.

I don’t really know what they expected from Kinect, to be frank. Did we really ever imagine a first-person shooter working well without buttons or peripherals? How about a driving simulation game? A platformer such as Banjo-Kazooie, perhaps? Realistically, there’s no conceivable way that many of the tried and tested videogame genres will be able to make the jump to Kinect with any success, but given that we can play thousands of games set in those baseline genres on the Xbox 360 anyway, does it really matter? Kinect is being used to generate new and innovative experiences, and in my eyes, that’s a good thing.

Gamers – TRUE gamers – actually WANT new experiences. Consider for a second, if you will, why it is that year after year, we all flock to the stores to buy the latest Call of Duty title, or FIFA, or Need for Speed? If playing the first Need for Speed: Underground was good enough for most gamers to enjoy for twelve months, why would they go and waste money on another game that’s essentially the same no more than three months later? Hell, go back further! Why aren’t we still playing Chase H.Q. on the 2011 reboot of the Sega Master System? It was released to rave reviews back in 1988 and is a fantastic game, after all. The reason – as if it wasn’t obvious – is that we’re looking for something better, something more realistic and most importantly, something different. Each year, we open our wallets and hand over bundles of hard-earned money to see if the developers of our favourite franchises have created the game that we ourselves would have created, had we the skill and the chance. We take risks on buying new titles such as Brink, Vanquish, L.A. Noire, RAGE, Split/Second, and Enslaved, in the hope that the games in question will provide interesting and exciting new experiences that not only provide entertainment, but that further our videogame education.

Interesting new methods of control are an incredibly good way of providing new experiences – much better than polishing up a product’s graphics for the fourteenth year in a row, that’s for sure – and to pooh-pooh the idea of getting off your backside and moving about in front of the TV screen in order to play a game, JUST because you consider something to be beneath you and your skills, is to deny yourself those opportunities as a gamer. I don’t really see how you can call yourself a hardcore gamer, if you’ve never used a motion gaming product for any longer than five minutes. It may well be that you do end up thinking that Kinect is nothing but a child’s toy, but how do you know until you get in an actually use it? And if you’re the type of gamer that spends all year getting positively horny at the thought of a new Call of Duty game – with that game being the only one you’ll buy all year – I don’t see how you’ve got room to even comment.

So, to that hardcore gaming crowd who take a potshot at Kinect every time it’s mentioned, I do nothing other than turn my back. If – in your eyes – playing Kinect, Move, or indeed some of the more casual titles on the Nintendo Wii is enough to disqualify me from your ranks, then so be it. If you get a cheap thrill from leering down your nose at me and my like and branding me a “casual” gamer, then go to it. If that’s the worst I have to put up with in order to have the opportunity to take on new gaming experiences as and when they arrive, then I’m more than happy with that.