As you get older are you playing less video games?

[Ultimate]

It seems like someone should have made this topic already...but I couldn't find one when searching so here goes. I know about the "Video games - A waste of time?" but that's not quite what this topic is about.
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Well, I used to be extremely addicted to video games, but I'm currently not playing any games, and hope to never play again, unless I know with complete certainty that I won't get addicted again.

There were quite a few things that caused me to play video games less and less, I'll name a few of the most important ones.

- I used to play piano a lot, but once I found out that I could download games online, I became completely obsessed with them, and practiced less and less piano. I wasn't ever the best at piano, but I was pretty decent...but soon I kept falling further and further behind. But I said to myself, "I'd be as good as them if I practiced as much as they did". One day after a friend of piano prodigy friend of mine performed, someone asked him how long he practiced per day. He said very simply, "6 hours". It was then that I realized that it doesn't matter how long you practice, it's the outcome. What if I had spent those endless hours on video gaming in piano practice? Where could I be now?

- A guy from my church was telling my brothers and me about how he used to be in the top clan in the US for the original Team Fortress. When he showed us a video on youtube of TF he said, "Ah...the memories". And that scared me...I don't want to live a life where the only memories I have are of video games.

- Well, I used to be the most obsessed with video games in my family, but now both my younger and older brother play so much more than me. And honestly, when I watch them play for hours on end it seems like such an empty life. They get annoyed at the smallest things just because they can't play.

- Just 2 hours of video games a day is a whole month of the past year spent on games.

 

[Autosaver]

"Ah...the memories". And that scared me...I don't want to live a life where the only memories I have are of video games.

That doesn't mean its your only memory. >_>

For me...yes, because sometimes I just get sick and tired and when I get older games that I used to play are way to childish! (Club penguin...)

 

[Jellybones]

I played games a LOT when I was younger. I still play them, but less, because I have some other things to do now. Like nap.

 

[clairebun]

Playing games less? Hahaha. Perhaps I should wish that was the truth.

 

[BlueZero4]

When I create memories of playing videogames, it's always when I have my friends around. It might be different with PC gamers, but playing alone isn't always fun.

 

[Blitzzo]

I play less video games now in part because of my growing interests in more advanced computing (Linux), and part due to there being, you know, no good games out there anymore.

 

[Eblo]

I actually play videogames more now that I'm older, but still not by much. At first I started playing less, but when Kingdom Hearts came out......

And then I bought the ol' 64.........

 

[super]

I'm playing less and less as I am going out more and more, an I'm loving it.

 

[Mystic]

I play less, but that's because when I was a kid I literally got up, went to school, played video games, and then went to bed.

 

[Spazzo]

I have to say, I am playing far fewer video games that I did in my past years. Now I basically only play a console if I have a friend over, or if I'm staying someplace away from home. Heck, the only REAL PC games that I can say that I play regulairly are SRB2 and TF2, and even TF2 isn't that frequent anymore.

I find that as time goes on, I find more and more things that I can do with my PC. As a kid, I'd just solely play video games, but now I'm balancing my social life, composing tunes, frequenting blog pages, coding, photoshopping, and tons of other things. It's no longer just about playing games.

I'll still play my DS on occasion, though. Helps a ton on long plane rides. Call me crazy, but I think I'm becoming a casual gamer (I've had Clubhouse Games in my cartridge slot for the last week!).

 

[Cue]

I play more games when my relationship status on Facebook says single, I remember once playing 12 hours of Halo 2 with only a couple of hours for food and stuff.

Relationship status spends less time being single as I get older, no doubt.

 

[Sonict]

Lately for me, I haven't being playing games as much as I used to. Granted, my RL stuff outside my laptop isn't very good either. I hope in the upcoming months, I get a job and get moving on RL stuff more. I have been browsing the internet quite a bit in the past couple of months.

 

[Eidolon]

I game a whole lot and I go places with my friends. Probably moreso for both than in the past.

Contradiction! D:

 

[MasterJace]

I played more when all I had was a NES. Now it's kinda like, bleh, leaving my PS2 on for a few weeks straight, returning to the game every once in a while.

 

[Ritz]

advanced computing (Linux)

Haha, Linux. Advanced computing. Oh man


It's pretty ironic how I was actively denigrating myself for being such a terrible gamer as of late just yesterday, and then someone goes and creates a topic on the very same subject on the one day of the year that I actually do bother <strike>inserting my head betwixt the musty folds of this tepid, festering</strike> checking this forum out.

To remedy this, I played Wild 9 for the first time since I encountered the demo over a decade ago, and I think it's safe to say that I'm on the road to a gradual recovery. Forget you lamers.

 

[clairebun]

Ritz FTW.

 

[Chibs]

Spazzo pretty much summed up how I fit into this topic.

Throughout the years, I've found that there's so much more you can do with PCs than just waste space on them putting games on them. That's not to say I still play games on PC, really that's only SRB2 and maybe an emulator or two.

 

[JEV3]

I cannot say whether it is more or less, but I am more responsible with the time spent playing games... though to be fair, I spent a huge chunk of my "game" time in a level editor of some kind. (Whether it was Starcraft or Loderunner) This has actually not changed, as I am and always have been or will be more a designer at heart than a gamer. Oftentimes I'll find myself admiring the textures, level design, or other aspects of the level itself more than actually enjoying the end-product.

That said, I play games from time to time to avoid getting burnt out. Steam has been a most fortunate discovery for me because I've been able to try some new games without having to pay much for it. Meanwhile I can play through games I enjoyed the first time around looking for more secrets (Metroid Prime 3, Braid, Tomb Raider), trying to get a better time (Sonic and the Secret Rings, Sonic Rush Adventure, Sonic Black Knight), or just reliving the experience (Zelda, Portal).

While my gaming philosophy is more like the one you'd generalize into the category of "casual gamer" I can get into a game, and often I'll find myself investing a LOT of time into a brand new game, however I enjoy games most when I've already beat them the first time around and I'm coming back for the fun. As such, I refuse to categorize myself as either "casual" or "hardcore", I play for fun, or I modify the games for fun.

 

[Billy]

Let me put it this way, if you were to record the average amount of time I have spent playing video games every year, starting at when I was 5 to now, it would be a linear graph upwards.

 

[ZarroTsu]

Personally, I find the farther away from the NES era we go, the less and less enjoyable games get to be as a whole. Sure there's a game still there, and it's quite playable, but a HUGE majority of what made games fun in the past (to me) was the way the difficulty was set up, for example, Battle Toads.

Initially games didn't have a save system because they couldn't, until around the time when Final Fantasy/Dragon Warrior came about (probably earlier), to which they used a battery to keep energy fluent in the game, enough so to prevent the data from erasing itself.

Anywho, in this era of gaming, games were hard, AND FOR A REASON. And the way this is set up, the reasons sure as HELL weren't marketing purposes, like they are today. *COUGHHALOCOUGH*

Think about it: If the game was immensely hard, you had to play it religiously to get past a new checkpoint. If the game didn't have a save system, you'd play for several times longer to have to get back to where you were before -- While this SOUNDS tedious as heck, "back in the day" games were set up like this:

Level 1: Learn the game. There were never any on-screen tutorials; if you didn't read the instruction booklet, you were fucked. But in any case, the first level was forgiving enough to let you beat it on the first or second try.

Level 2 onward: COMPLETELY UNFORGIVING. Now, this isn't because the developers were assholes, it was because they knew that you'd constantly revisit level 1 and onward over and over. As such, each level was a checkpoint on it's own accord, and every new level after the checkpoint is a "what you have learned" session, with zero forgiveness.

And you know what? We played and we played, and when we got to the final boss, we KNEW it was the final boss. When we FINALLY beat the final boss after more hours with the game than months of our life spans, you bet your damn ass it was rewarding. As a kid beating a NES game, you'd sure as fuck cry tears of joy beating a game. (Of course, its hard to say if the joy is from finally beating the game, or if the joy is from finally being free from the game)


While there are still good games out there that can be a decent challenge, as of late they are becoming more and more forgiving, and leave you beating them in under a day. Did we pay $50 for something we can finish in 20 hours (today), or did we expect 80 hours (yesteryear)?

Games have become far too easy for a number of reasons; perhaps they're all alike, perhaps every game mechanic has been used: but there is ALWAYS something new out there to try, and it seems like nobody is willing to look for it. But as far as we've come, games refuse to get harder; only easier. Easier to learn, pickup, and play. Beating these games? There is no feeling of reward, because you didn't LEARN anything, and you sure as hell weren't challenged.


And you know what? People still scoff in your face if you claim a NES was the best game of all time. And to that they reply that any game on the XBox360 is better. They've never played the NES game, and all they hear from "NES" is "old piece of shit". And that's FAR from the truth.

Besides, I'd much rather play an 'old piece of shit', than a 'new piece of shit'. At least if my NES dies, I can blow in the cartridge 10 or 20 times and it'll work again. Xbox360? Not so much.