The idea of a core gaming provider on mobile devices may seem strange to some people–after all, aren’t mobile devices really the provenance of casual gamers?–but it’s definitely not strange to either Nonstop Games, or to the two firms that, earlier today, put $2.9 million worth of investment into Nonstop Games’ upcoming plans to bring traditional "core" gaming to the casual gaming platforms.

Nonstop Games, formerly known as GamesMadeMe, announced the successful fundraising efforts earlier today, which will allow it to build out a new line of releases geared toward the core gaming market, like its upcoming "Heroes of Honor" title, a strategy game geared toward fantasy gamers. Nonstop Games’ history as a games maker goes back well into the GamesMadeMe era, where it made a variety of HTML5 games for several different platforms like Chrome, but under the Nonstop Games banner, it will be leaning more toward the native languages on iOS and Android (News – Alert) devices.

Basically, the decision to at least temporarily forgo the HTML5 that got it where it is today is one that’s more temporary than anything. Nonstop Games’ chief executive, Juha Paananen, elaborated, calling the app stores "the main distribution channel at the moment," while acknowledging that "HTML5 might happen at some point."

"Heroes of Honor," meanwhile, is offering up what looks to be a pretty potent experience in terms of gameplay, with free-to-play overall gameplay mingling with simultaneous connections for the multiplayer side of things. It’s not turn-based, but rather all at once, which is the kind of gameplay of which "StarCraft II" users are proving to be quite fond, not to mention all those gamers involved in "League of Legends".

Since Nonstop has locations in both Helsinki and Singapore, it’s looking to take advantage of the different gaming climates in both areas. Reportedly, Paananen is looking to Singapore as a way to get a new kind of mobile real-time strategy game with free-to-play functionality in place.

There’s no denying that core gaming is a big market. There are three entire console systems going after that market–more if you count the PC and the upcoming legions of set-top gaming boxes out there like the Ouya or the Steam Box–and casual gaming, as a market, might well prove even larger than the core gaming market, especially in terms of numbers. Trying to bring core gameplay and gaming mechanics to the casual market might well wind up being well-received. The core gamer market could certainly do with a bit of expansion, not to mention some fresh players. Using HTML5 gaming to get there certainly would have been more welcome, but HTML5 is still in its early stages, so turning to the app stores for the time being is a prudent enough move.

It will be interesting to see just how this all works out in the end, but certainly, a little more intermingling between the two markets couldn’t hurt, and might well give developers more to work with overall.