Gaming and Getting Older

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Gaming and Getting Older

Postby gsides » April 6th, 2015, 6:04 am

this is something i've discussed with some friends of mine, some of which can relate and some which can't at all.

as some of you know, i play fighting games competitively, but i've been playing video games ever since my neighbor got an NES when i was 3. like many kids born my generation, gaming was a huge part of my life, hours and hours and hours spent in front of various consoles, tearing through various games.
as we get older, we become less able to binge-game due to the responsibilities life begins to throw at us, but that doesn't necessarily mean that we have any less desire or love for that form of entertainment we grew up with... which leads me to the predicament and question i'd like to pose for this thread:

finishing a game is a struggle for me, not because i don't have the time to play it, but i just lose interest ridiculously fast, regardless of the game. getting 60ish% in assassin's creed 4 is the farthest i have gotten in several years with a game that wasn't a fighting game and i am still having to really, really push myself to turn the console on and keep chipping away at it. most of the time, it feels like a chore, and something i'm doing just to get some gratification out of dropping $400 on a ps4. that being said, i used to sign on vgc over the past few years and see people even older than me with more real-life distractions tearing through games a week like i could when i was 13, and i'd be lying if i said i wasn't amazed. has anyone else noticed a significant declined in their motivation or desire to play video games over the years? and those of you that haven't, (teach me your secrets). Image
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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby Jesse Smith » April 6th, 2015, 11:54 am

Except for a year of two of playing Game Boy advanced, I stopped playing video games when I was 18, due to the internet showing up, way back in 1996! You can thank this for all of this starting, with the World of Nintendo site. Making the site is why I stopped playing. I preferred to make a Nintendo web site than play the games.
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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby Vivisect » April 6th, 2015, 1:42 pm

I stopped playing game when I started College. However, now I do have time, so I've begun playing again. Until my responsibilities become too much, then I guess I would have to stop. Unfortunately I love games and don't see me stopping anytime soon.
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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby Prince Shondronai » April 6th, 2015, 9:38 pm

I still play as much as I always have. My 9-to-5 job involves playing games fairly frequently. I'm a technician for an amusement company with arcade machines in bars and bowling alleys, so testing is all part of the job.

It helps that I've got a girlfriend who loves watching single-player games, so I get to replay some of my favorites and play any of the new games I want and still keep her entertained.
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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby Omni » April 7th, 2015, 2:22 am

I get to play often. I had stopped playing for a while a few years back, but I am back into it now.
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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby Jint » April 9th, 2015, 11:54 pm

Oh man, the feeling is mutual. I started playing at 11 now im 26, however, I'm not losing interest in games, but I do get massive urges to play and when I do, it's only a short burst of about 20 to 30 minutes even when I have to spare.
The odd thing is whenever I play a modern game like bloodborne I lose into interest fast.
But if im playing a kiddy game Pokemon or mario, I can go a bit longer. It's hard to explain.
I don't know, I don't think it has anything to do with responsibility, it's just that as we get older, our tastes change and we're forcing ourselves to like sometime that we did as a kid, all while not being aware that our tastes for that thing has change causing what you used to love feel more like a chore.
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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby Amber » April 14th, 2015, 3:20 pm


I just recently started experiencing this , I go to play games and after a few minutes I just want to stop. I feel like Im losing patience with having to level grind or wait for certain events to happen before I can progress through the story.
I kinda just want to watch other people play the games I like and I'll be content until I start feeling like gaming again.

When I play single player games, I get bored with not having anyone to share commentary with


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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby Infyrin » April 15th, 2015, 9:03 am

In my case, I feel rather intimidated by the number of games I even have. Notably, Steam, where I have over 152 games to count. But I know I have more in other places. I worry from time to time about my playing habits or whether or not I will have enough time to cover them all. Yet, I keep buying more and more games.

When I play games, I try to go in and beat them the best way I can. I don't have all the time in my life to truly master every game. I don't feel I have time to bother conquering hard modes or hardcore games or what have you. If I worry too much on how well I do in a game, then I know I'll never finish or touch it again with the fear of perfection. I also tend to avoid time sinking games, especially MMORPGs. I don't like games that don't have an end, so it wouldn't help my cause any if I touched one of them and it goes on forever and ever.

The other thing that intimidates me when it comes to playing habits, is feeling out with the times. I only had 8 months to experience the PS3 3 years ago and before then, it was already released for 8 years and everyone was anticipating the next gen consoles. I usually am not one to be so quick to be the first or so in indulging on the latest and greatest, I usually give a small waiting period before diving in. But damn...

Another example is when I wasn't playing actively when Half-Life 2 was released, a game millions had played and I felt like I was the very few that had not touched it. It wouldn't be until 10 years later that I finally got it, played it and beaten it along with the two episodes, as well as the older expansions for the original Half-Life all done within a month and a half.

Regardless, I still play as much as I can. It's just I can't be bothered to spend my life mastering every single game.
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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby Jint » April 17th, 2015, 8:17 pm

Infyrin, I can relate to your entire post! Especially the closing..
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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby Yoshi[NX] » April 19th, 2015, 10:34 am

i don't even bother with new games anymore. i play older ones almost constantly.
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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby Amber » April 25th, 2015, 4:04 pm

But Yoshi , if you continue to play the same old games over and over,wouldn't you eventually get bored of them? Unless its a different outcome each time you play.

Skyrim is one game I never get bored of.



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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby Yoshi[NX] » April 25th, 2015, 4:18 pm

i play a lot of older rts'. sometimes i'll play a newer game, but i don't buy them when they come out.
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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby Slade » May 7th, 2015, 10:44 pm

I can't remember the source, but I watched a video where someone was explaining that games are more exciting when you're naive about them. It's an idea that I've thought about a lot. As a kid playing side-scrolling action/adventure games for the first time, anything could happen. Any cave opening or door could lead to unfathomable secrets. Your brain is firing nonstop. After a while, you begin to understand that most of those possibilities are actually just flat, decorative pixels. There are invisible walls separating you from the truly unknown. You come around to the idea that it's not unknown, it's actually unprogrammed nothing. Or repetitive filler.

Then you play around in your first 3D environments, and the world is full of possibilities again. It's not as magical as before because you have some idea of the limitations of programming in general, but there is a whole new axis to explore and you can actually look up and see the sky from the character's perspective for the first time. After a while, you understand that the sky is usually a flat image that moves slightly, or one that is static and just appears to move as you travel around. Instead of complex environments, you begin to see blurry skins up close. The new trick worked at first, but soon your brain unravels the fantasy just as it did the fake doors in the old games. Newer versions of 3D games require more processing power and use more resources to cover up unsightly, unrealistic edges with smoke and mirrors. Shadows and reflections make everything seem alive and real. Sound effects are recorded from Actual Things and implemented in the game with great skill. How long do those illusions last? Your brain is really good at figuring out the slight improvements, answering "how did they do that?" before the sentence is out of your mouth. Sometimes your sight distance is shorter, and you see complex polygons loading at the edge of your vision. If you move really fast, you can get there before the people in the game are complete and you can see right through them.

So many patterns are repeated across games. You can read an NPC's movement and immediately tell if they are pacing, sneaking, or acting aggressively. After encountering so many hundreds of NPCs nothing surprises you. Eventually they're using complex tactics to outsmart you. They can even sneak up behind you and attack. Your screen flashes at the same time you hear a loud sound and it makes you jump. Wow.

Rewards in the earliest games I played were usually treasure related. Coins, jewels, and other valued items. Maybe it's a secret area full of jewels, which is like a double reward. Later it's rewarding to do violent acts, like shoot someone directly in the face with a rocket launcher. Sometimes the bullets just feel good. Make it more complex and use a mine detonated by proximity to an enemy that is also near a pile of explosive material. You're not even there, but you can see and hear the explosion from far away. You can use a heavy weapon up close that slashes through torsos like meat. Bloodshed tends to increase, until it goes beyond reason into pure fetishistic violence. Eventually you've watched so many characters die in so many ways that it doesn't feel like much of anything to watch 50 or 100 die within minutes. You get the Really Big Gun that is skinned to look the most badass and kill 1000 and then eat something.

The reward can be keeping someone alive. It can be someone your character cares about, or someone you actually feel like saving because they have emotional value. Maybe someone else in the game saves your character. Your character can be saved and then betrayed, which is the worst way to be kept alive. Fast-forward through a few dozen games and you've run through so many combinations of killing, saving, and betraying that none of those things are new or different anymore. Things that are meant to be surprising are obvious. Any agenda that the game has seems so simple because in all the games you played most of the possibilities never happened, and every new experience feels like a conglomeration of old ones. Games live in a box. The caves were never endless.

Lately the games I play are based around a system that is fairly balanced, but challenging. X-COM: something something Inside comes to mind. Adventuring, running around and shooting, and exploring rarely feel good. But solving tricky puzzles still gives me a burst of dopamine, and I hope that will continue!
Last edited by Slade on May 7th, 2015, 11:04 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby Jint » May 7th, 2015, 10:54 pm

Slade, nobody can beat that intense post
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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby Slade » May 7th, 2015, 11:09 pm

Forgot about randomization. In the past it's kept me returning to games when it's implemented in small ways (like Timesplitters 2). When used in bulk, you end up with a Rogue-like or something like Minecraft or Terraria. It's fascinating, but I'm not sure exactly how I feel about it yet.
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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby gsides » May 8th, 2015, 1:58 am

love you Slade
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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby Zebro » May 24th, 2015, 12:53 pm

Very interesting topic, and I, too, have had similar thoughts and habits of both Gsides and Slade when it comes to how growing up has effected how often (or why) I still play video games. I feel as though the two biggest factors at play isn't related too much to having trained ourselves of breaking the illusion of immersion; more likely it's our appeal for less stressful escapisim (thus playing old games we know), followed by (for lack of a better word) maturity/experience of having beaten many games before that we know now it makes no difference when or if we beat a game.

As a kid, I remember trying to beat Megaman X2. Of all the things I saw as "a big deal", not being able to beat Megaman X2 was at the top of what I needed to change. This, ofcourse, has changed. As an adult, keeping my car running, paying bills, or figuring out my future career; in a way my life in itself is the big deal, video games then losing it's emphases on how I feel about myself regarding whether or not I beat ultra hardmode.

Besides, I already beat Megaman X2 years ago; along with many other games. There comes a certain point inwhich simply completing a videogame just leads to wanting to beat another game, having been more familiar with having beaten a videogame that we buy multiple games so when we actually do finally play and finish we avoid that dreadful "now what?" feeling. Also, being fully aware as adults, the last thing we want to deal with in our freetime is trying to optain a game, and thanks to steam sales and what not, we buy games we "might want to play if the mood is right" for the sake of a savings, meh, tangent. Plenty of reasons to explain why we buy more games we don't even start.

I also know how I can be when I really do get into a game. I can't afford to lose track of time and spend 10 hours playing through a game like I once did as a teen. This also plays a factor in putting it off. Do I know if the game will be that good? nope, but why risk the chance.

man, I could go on; but mainly just saying I relate quite a bit.
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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby Infyrin » June 3rd, 2015, 3:15 am

Zebro wrote:Also, being fully aware as adults, the last thing we want to deal with in our freetime is trying to optain a game, and thanks to steam sales and what not, we buy games we "might want to play if the mood is right" for the sake of a savings, meh, tangent. Plenty of reasons to explain why we buy more games we don't even start.


Good post, by the way, but I have to add some emphasis with that line. This is the harsh truth of the digital age with gaming, anyone could get carried away. I remember how I said I had like 152 games on steam, well, that was weeks ago. Now I'm up to 190 games, with freebies and working out deals to weed out my wishlist that piled up over the weeks. I'm even MORE feeling like I'm not going to ever to get even to half of them and I'm finding myself juggling 4 - 5 games at a time. I can't forget now, I have a machine to upgrade. Considering some of the games I reallllly want to play, require better GPUs and processing power to run properly. The machine I have now can run a good chunk of titles and I'm fine with that, just another goal and obstacle in my way.

But, can you imagine being in the shoes of someone with 2,000+ games? I've seen some profiles recently with that amount. Never fails do I ask in my mind "how can they swing this and manage?" and I just end up with the conclusion that they're probably hoarders. I look through their lists and they can only throw x.x time into a lot of games or 0.x amount of time into other games. While pounding like, 500 - 1,000 hours of DOTA 2 or Team Fortress 2. That's just crazy stuff and I personally hope not to be like one of them, though I'd like for my wishlist to be 0 someday too.
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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby Sapphire Rose » June 8th, 2015, 2:07 pm

Gaming has actually gotten easier as I've gotten older. It helps that I married a gamer and we don't have kids. But being able to put my own money towards it has made it less of a chore (and I don't have to go ask permission to play, hope little Jimmy gets permission, etc.) and more of just something I can do. As for my motivation to play, that sometimes comes in waves. It's not often, but sometimes I don't feel like playing anything.
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Re: Gaming and Getting Older

Postby Dexter » July 11th, 2015, 12:07 pm

I conquer nearly every game I start. The last game I found myself not wanting to go through entirely was ESO. It's all about finding a way to motivate yourself. For me, I hold off from starting a new game until I finish my last. Otherwise it gets really difficult to go back to an old game and relearn what the heck I was doing before.
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