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It looks like it's coming towards the end of the line for me, as far as gaming goes. It's been going down hill ever since... well... ever since either Goldeneye or Pokémon Red... or maybe WWF No Mercy...
I can't remember the exact ups and downs, but I remember there being about 6 months between finishing Conker's Bad Fur Day and getting my mitts on the Gamecube, and by then something had changed.
Gaming stopped being THE most important thing in my life and from there, although I didn't really notice it at the time, I slowly started losing all interest.
Infact, the most fun I've had from gaming recently is a heavy hit of nostalgia (although Metroid Prime has managed to very pleasantly surprise me, but I know that if I'd played this game 2 years ago, pleasantly surprised would be the biggest understatement ever).
I just don't enjoy games like I used to.
And I know why.
It's because I've more or less seen it all now.
I rememer when I first played Goldeneye, it was all fresh and exciting.
Sure, I'd played FPS before but they were crap and lifeless in comparison.
The 4 player splitscreen multiplayer, the intense single player missions which changed drastically with each difficulty setting.
But that wasn't it.
Because I'd never played a game like this before everything was new and unexplored. Everything was interesting and intruiging.
Shooting glass and watching it shatter. Shooting a guards had off, sniping unsuspecting guards from a distance, playing with glitches, exploring all possibilities with cheats (sending guards flying with explosives was HILARIOUS) and messing around with the AI.
Perfect Dark came along and nearly bettered it in nearly every way.
There were almost infinately more possibilities, only... other than the parts that were completely new from Goldeneye (like the Carrington Institute target range), I'd seen or done it all before.
And besides, when it came to FPS, I was an expert gamer now. Now I played to win, to beat it, more than I played for fun.
Sure, it had moments where I would mess around, but very few compared to Goldeneye. I'd become too experienced to enjoyed the simple pleasures in the game.
Take Pokémon Red.
The first RPG I ever played through.
This game also had it all.
Sure, the fighting system was fairly simplistic to the likes of Final Fantasy, but with so many monsters with so many different strengths and weaknesses, this sort of made it work better.
I must've spent over 500+ hours on that game (the in game clock stopped working after 256 hours and I think I passed that atleast twice - two play throughs).
Even after I finished the story, I then went about tracking down the rare Pokémon (like Zapdos and Mewtwo) and catching every single last Pokémon in the game (unlike that amature Ash, I DID catch them all! - although due to the nature of the game, I DID have to trade for some of them...).
And while I mastered the entire game, gradually learning about all the different types of Pokémon, their strengths and weaknesses, what moves they learn, where you can find them, I also spent countless hours training my super-teams to level 100.
Yeah it sounds sad now, but at the time I was totally hooked.
Sure, I got Pokémon Gold before it even reached our shores (regional lock-outs on the Gameboy! :-) ) and it was better in almost every way (starting with the fact that it was in beautiful full colour rather than everything in shades of red! :-D) but when I'd finished the story, I still spent countless hours finding the last Pokémon and training more "super teams" but the new one never made it to Level 100, and although I caught all 251, most of them were traded from my old Red game, and throughout the whole game, rather than simply enjoying the adventure, I'd, in many places, been playing to beat it, scouring for secrets and basically playing like the pro-gamer I'd become.
Such has been the nature of all games I've played before.
With Mario 64 I spent hours playing with Mario's 3D jumping tricks. With Mario Sunshine, I did that a fair bit at first (that Delphino City place is great fun for jumping on roofs) but the novelty wore out faster.
With Zelda 64 I scoured the landscape for every last heart piece and Skultula.
With Majora's Mask I didn't bother with the last heart pieces and Windwaker I stopped playing once I beat the story (I did briefly start again for a re-run with the special "hero of time" mode but got bored quickly).
The original Smash Brother's was played to death as I mastered every last character and got a high score for all of them (getting over a million points of each of the 14 - and NGC gave a raving mention + prize to an amature who only managed it with 13! :-P).
Smash Brother's Melée had more moves and modes of play and infinite possibilities and has probably clocked up the most gameplay out of all my Gamecube games but was barely played compared to the exstensive play it's predecessor got.
Heck, Timesplitters 2 had it all, but bar the few new twists (mostly involving that genius flaming system) I'd played it all before.
The game I've enjoyed the most recently, were ones that I'd not played anything like - Metroid Prime, Commandos and Pikmin namely.
Even then, they would've impressed me a lot more in the day.
I'm too experienced.
After all I used to say on here about never growing up, that's what happened. I never quite left Cloud Cuckoo Land... Cloud Cuckoo Land just gradually turned into a whole new place...
Time for something fresh, something new, something I've not done to death.
And yeah... I resultantly got a life... shame on me! :-S
It's not that I've given up games, or that I don't still enjoy them.
I do. I still play them a little more than I should...
But there WAS a time when a new game would be the important thing in my life, would capture my mind in a way that I could not think of anything else (VERY dangerous during exam time! :-S).
now they're just games.
So how experienced are you?
I can't remember the exact ups and downs, but I remember there being about 6 months between finishing Conker's Bad Fur Day and getting my mitts on the Gamecube, and by then something had changed.
Gaming stopped being THE most important thing in my life and from there, although I didn't really notice it at the time, I slowly started losing all interest.
Infact, the most fun I've had from gaming recently is a heavy hit of nostalgia (although Metroid Prime has managed to very pleasantly surprise me, but I know that if I'd played this game 2 years ago, pleasantly surprised would be the biggest understatement ever).
I just don't enjoy games like I used to.
And I know why.
It's because I've more or less seen it all now.
I rememer when I first played Goldeneye, it was all fresh and exciting.
Sure, I'd played FPS before but they were crap and lifeless in comparison.
The 4 player splitscreen multiplayer, the intense single player missions which changed drastically with each difficulty setting.
But that wasn't it.
Because I'd never played a game like this before everything was new and unexplored. Everything was interesting and intruiging.
Shooting glass and watching it shatter. Shooting a guards had off, sniping unsuspecting guards from a distance, playing with glitches, exploring all possibilities with cheats (sending guards flying with explosives was HILARIOUS) and messing around with the AI.
Perfect Dark came along and nearly bettered it in nearly every way.
There were almost infinately more possibilities, only... other than the parts that were completely new from Goldeneye (like the Carrington Institute target range), I'd seen or done it all before.
And besides, when it came to FPS, I was an expert gamer now. Now I played to win, to beat it, more than I played for fun.
Sure, it had moments where I would mess around, but very few compared to Goldeneye. I'd become too experienced to enjoyed the simple pleasures in the game.
Take Pokémon Red.
The first RPG I ever played through.
This game also had it all.
Sure, the fighting system was fairly simplistic to the likes of Final Fantasy, but with so many monsters with so many different strengths and weaknesses, this sort of made it work better.
I must've spent over 500+ hours on that game (the in game clock stopped working after 256 hours and I think I passed that atleast twice - two play throughs).
Even after I finished the story, I then went about tracking down the rare Pokémon (like Zapdos and Mewtwo) and catching every single last Pokémon in the game (unlike that amature Ash, I DID catch them all! - although due to the nature of the game, I DID have to trade for some of them...).
And while I mastered the entire game, gradually learning about all the different types of Pokémon, their strengths and weaknesses, what moves they learn, where you can find them, I also spent countless hours training my super-teams to level 100.
Yeah it sounds sad now, but at the time I was totally hooked.
Sure, I got Pokémon Gold before it even reached our shores (regional lock-outs on the Gameboy! :-) ) and it was better in almost every way (starting with the fact that it was in beautiful full colour rather than everything in shades of red! :-D) but when I'd finished the story, I still spent countless hours finding the last Pokémon and training more "super teams" but the new one never made it to Level 100, and although I caught all 251, most of them were traded from my old Red game, and throughout the whole game, rather than simply enjoying the adventure, I'd, in many places, been playing to beat it, scouring for secrets and basically playing like the pro-gamer I'd become.
Such has been the nature of all games I've played before.
With Mario 64 I spent hours playing with Mario's 3D jumping tricks. With Mario Sunshine, I did that a fair bit at first (that Delphino City place is great fun for jumping on roofs) but the novelty wore out faster.
With Zelda 64 I scoured the landscape for every last heart piece and Skultula.
With Majora's Mask I didn't bother with the last heart pieces and Windwaker I stopped playing once I beat the story (I did briefly start again for a re-run with the special "hero of time" mode but got bored quickly).
The original Smash Brother's was played to death as I mastered every last character and got a high score for all of them (getting over a million points of each of the 14 - and NGC gave a raving mention + prize to an amature who only managed it with 13! :-P).
Smash Brother's Melée had more moves and modes of play and infinite possibilities and has probably clocked up the most gameplay out of all my Gamecube games but was barely played compared to the exstensive play it's predecessor got.
Heck, Timesplitters 2 had it all, but bar the few new twists (mostly involving that genius flaming system) I'd played it all before.
The game I've enjoyed the most recently, were ones that I'd not played anything like - Metroid Prime, Commandos and Pikmin namely.
Even then, they would've impressed me a lot more in the day.
I'm too experienced.
After all I used to say on here about never growing up, that's what happened. I never quite left Cloud Cuckoo Land... Cloud Cuckoo Land just gradually turned into a whole new place...
Time for something fresh, something new, something I've not done to death.
And yeah... I resultantly got a life... shame on me! :-S
It's not that I've given up games, or that I don't still enjoy them.
I do. I still play them a little more than I should...
But there WAS a time when a new game would be the important thing in my life, would capture my mind in a way that I could not think of anything else (VERY dangerous during exam time! :-S).
now they're just games.
So how experienced are you?
Page:
Strafio wrote:
> :-)
Not you Dan, it was directed at SafeDisk who was being patronising.
> :-)
Not you Dan, it was directed at SafeDisk who was being patronising.
:-)
Shut the hell up.
er-yes wrote:
I'd love to use it as my
> form of escapism. Yet I've grown up, and as I've grown games have
> become visually more adapative, but less imaginative.
And at only 18, you still have so much more growing up to do my friend.
A point that is blatantly clear by reading your post. I am not saying you are wrong, as your opinion is your own, but what I am say is that by reading what you have said, it’s obvious that you still have some growing up to do. You should save what you have written and read it again in a few years – you’ll probably laugh at it as much as I have just done.
So you started playing games when you were 3 years old - did you know what you were doing at that age, could you enjoy the game for what it was? I think not. Sounds to me as you just want to try and boost the amount of years you have been playing.
Surely you can't really say you were playing a game until you can actually understand what you are doing - and pointing a plastic gun at a dog because you are so young you don't know what else to do with it doesn't count!
Realistically if you started playing when you were say 8, an age where you could appreciate the game, understand what you were doing and as such enjoy the experience as intended, you have still been playing games for 10 years! Which is a load of time.
Why do kids always seem to want to have more experience, always want to seem like they have been playing games longer than the next person? 10 years is a long, long time. Hell, I wish I was 18 again and only had 10 years gaming behind me. It's funny, before you turn 18-ish you want to be older, hit 24 and all you want it to be younger.
Oh well.
I'd love to use it as my
> form of escapism. Yet I've grown up, and as I've grown games have
> become visually more adapative, but less imaginative.
And at only 18, you still have so much more growing up to do my friend.
A point that is blatantly clear by reading your post. I am not saying you are wrong, as your opinion is your own, but what I am say is that by reading what you have said, it’s obvious that you still have some growing up to do. You should save what you have written and read it again in a few years – you’ll probably laugh at it as much as I have just done.
So you started playing games when you were 3 years old - did you know what you were doing at that age, could you enjoy the game for what it was? I think not. Sounds to me as you just want to try and boost the amount of years you have been playing.
Surely you can't really say you were playing a game until you can actually understand what you are doing - and pointing a plastic gun at a dog because you are so young you don't know what else to do with it doesn't count!
Realistically if you started playing when you were say 8, an age where you could appreciate the game, understand what you were doing and as such enjoy the experience as intended, you have still been playing games for 10 years! Which is a load of time.
Why do kids always seem to want to have more experience, always want to seem like they have been playing games longer than the next person? 10 years is a long, long time. Hell, I wish I was 18 again and only had 10 years gaming behind me. It's funny, before you turn 18-ish you want to be older, hit 24 and all you want it to be younger.
Oh well.
AHem. Er-yes, I don't think you read my topic, because you argued with me by repeating what I said in different wording! ;-P
Yep, experience takes all the flash out of gaming and you get bored of seeing the same thing again and again.
Don't worry though. Safe-disc assures us that when we get bored of girls and clubbing, games suddenly become appealing again.
Not that they'll ever be as mind blowing as your "first time", but there's other "first times" to give you that in life! ;-)
Yep, experience takes all the flash out of gaming and you get bored of seeing the same thing again and again.
Don't worry though. Safe-disc assures us that when we get bored of girls and clubbing, games suddenly become appealing again.
Not that they'll ever be as mind blowing as your "first time", but there's other "first times" to give you that in life! ;-)
Experience doesn't completely cure my dyslexia though.
Whoops :(
Whoops :(
Videogaming isn't about experience?
It's about enjoyment and satisfaction?
Gaming is totally like all the other entertainment industries in the world, and infact within the next few years it'll probably grow to become the biggest. We go to the movies to enjoy a film and if we know we aren't going to enjoy it there better be a damn fine lass making your trousers tight in the back row - because that's your only excuse I'll accept. As for gaming, we practise and play at a game we love and when we don't enjoy it anymore we stop playing it.
I hate doing that.
Growing up has caused me to ever so madly lose my grip on what I enjoy and my tolerance level for all things entertaining. When I was younger I could enjoy a game which wasn't really that great. Now I am older I find a game has to stimulate me as well as challenge and reward. If the challenge is too great and the reward too small I don't feel like playing it. It's simple - experience only makes us less tolerate whilst playing games.
Hell, in that last sentence just change it a little and you'll have most of the meaning of life and experience. We get numb if we keep experiencing the same thing over and over. I just to love orange chocolate. I ate too much of it in a short period of time and now I really do deteste it.
I wanted something.
I had it.
I grew bored.
I wanted something new.
Bringing gaming back into the subject, although I doubt I have to as my clever use of placing chocolate in the post has made all you little scriptkiddy pigs out there peckish and your probably looking at Lara with your fireman out whilst munching on a piece of Terry's. You sicken me.
Erm.. Back to the point. I'm an experienced gamer, I've been playing games for 15 years and I'm only 18. The first game I played was Duck Hunt and I preferred to shoot the dog instead of the ducks... The last game I played was Prince of Persia and I preferred to try and complete the game as fast as possible instead of fighting most of the enemies. I just get bored of all the stupid repetivetittititititiviy in games these days. Duck Hunt had an excuse! It was made when 3D graphics were primitive. Prince of Persia is a great game, but it could be a lot better.
I guess at the end of the day it's my fault. I'd love to enjoy games in the same way I did all those years ago. I'd love to use it as my form of escapism. Yet I've grown up, and as I've grown games have become visually more adapative, but less imaginative.
At the end of the day. I've had a great time with all my games, as I stop buying them I shall never forget... because at the end of the day. Isn't that what it's all about?
Don't forget what made you smile.
It's about enjoyment and satisfaction?
Gaming is totally like all the other entertainment industries in the world, and infact within the next few years it'll probably grow to become the biggest. We go to the movies to enjoy a film and if we know we aren't going to enjoy it there better be a damn fine lass making your trousers tight in the back row - because that's your only excuse I'll accept. As for gaming, we practise and play at a game we love and when we don't enjoy it anymore we stop playing it.
I hate doing that.
Growing up has caused me to ever so madly lose my grip on what I enjoy and my tolerance level for all things entertaining. When I was younger I could enjoy a game which wasn't really that great. Now I am older I find a game has to stimulate me as well as challenge and reward. If the challenge is too great and the reward too small I don't feel like playing it. It's simple - experience only makes us less tolerate whilst playing games.
Hell, in that last sentence just change it a little and you'll have most of the meaning of life and experience. We get numb if we keep experiencing the same thing over and over. I just to love orange chocolate. I ate too much of it in a short period of time and now I really do deteste it.
I wanted something.
I had it.
I grew bored.
I wanted something new.
Bringing gaming back into the subject, although I doubt I have to as my clever use of placing chocolate in the post has made all you little scriptkiddy pigs out there peckish and your probably looking at Lara with your fireman out whilst munching on a piece of Terry's. You sicken me.
Erm.. Back to the point. I'm an experienced gamer, I've been playing games for 15 years and I'm only 18. The first game I played was Duck Hunt and I preferred to shoot the dog instead of the ducks... The last game I played was Prince of Persia and I preferred to try and complete the game as fast as possible instead of fighting most of the enemies. I just get bored of all the stupid repetivetittititititiviy in games these days. Duck Hunt had an excuse! It was made when 3D graphics were primitive. Prince of Persia is a great game, but it could be a lot better.
I guess at the end of the day it's my fault. I'd love to enjoy games in the same way I did all those years ago. I'd love to use it as my form of escapism. Yet I've grown up, and as I've grown games have become visually more adapative, but less imaginative.
At the end of the day. I've had a great time with all my games, as I stop buying them I shall never forget... because at the end of the day. Isn't that what it's all about?
Don't forget what made you smile.
If you are gamer at heart, and anyone who was really into them when they were a kid would certainly fall into this category, then yes, games will certainly make a comeback in your life. When the time is right.
Once you have 7+ years of clubbing, pubs, chatting up random girls, throwing up and generally being young, you'll find that life begins to settle down a bit, yes of course you'll still have a social life, but not to the same radical extent you have when you are 18-26 (or so).
However, once you get a house of your own, have bills to pay and a GF etc - you'll start to realise gaming does again have a part in your life again.
See, it's not so bad being 32* ;-)
* for the record I don’t even believe that myself
Once you have 7+ years of clubbing, pubs, chatting up random girls, throwing up and generally being young, you'll find that life begins to settle down a bit, yes of course you'll still have a social life, but not to the same radical extent you have when you are 18-26 (or so).
However, once you get a house of your own, have bills to pay and a GF etc - you'll start to realise gaming does again have a part in your life again.
See, it's not so bad being 32* ;-)
* for the record I don’t even believe that myself
No, that was good.
So you're even MORE experienced. :-)
I've gone into a phase of playing them a lot over the last few weeks (although before that I barely touched them for about 6 months) so it's not all gone, and I think I'm like you said. 18 now, still a "gamer" as I sort of keep up with it and talk about it, just going off games and getting into a more social life.
So you're saying that games make a comeback when you're past expecting them to blow you away, and just enjoying them here and there for what they are.
Still, I bet that even you miss the days of innocence, when what seems like the simplest thing now seemed so amazing... :-)
Great way to top the topic off though.
Thanks. :-)
So you're even MORE experienced. :-)
I've gone into a phase of playing them a lot over the last few weeks (although before that I barely touched them for about 6 months) so it's not all gone, and I think I'm like you said. 18 now, still a "gamer" as I sort of keep up with it and talk about it, just going off games and getting into a more social life.
So you're saying that games make a comeback when you're past expecting them to blow you away, and just enjoying them here and there for what they are.
Still, I bet that even you miss the days of innocence, when what seems like the simplest thing now seemed so amazing... :-)
Great way to top the topic off though.
Thanks. :-)
So how old are you guys? Specifically Pandaemonium and Strafio?
19? 20?
You see, what you need to understand is that your interest in gaming, and I guess the level of addiction you have toward it, is all relative to your age. It changes many, many times as the years go by. I am 31 (32 in a months) years old now, and have been playing games for as long, if not longer than, any members of this website*, so I will use myself as an example...
10-18 years old
I was totally addicted to games. Totally. It would be nothing for me to spend 8 hours a day playing games. Before I went to school, go home in my lunch hour and play some more, then spend from like 4pm until it was time for bed playing again. Sometimes I would have friends around, sometimes I play games on my own. Weekends were the same. Pretty much spend all day playing. To be fair the amount of time fell in the summer months as I did the usual things kids of this age do, playing football, mucking about, bike riding – that kinda’ thing. But I always played game a lot. For me (and most of my age group) this was, and always will be the golden age of gaming.
Basically this is stage one – you are a kid, you have loads of time on your hands and no responsibilities. It doesn’t matter if you experience this stage playing a Speccy, Megadrive Amiga or N64 (the actual machine is irrelevant) the fact is that everything you play is new, you are just learning about games, learning the idiosyncrasies of how games work. You aren’t gonna’ get bored as almost everything brings something new, some new challenge.
18-25 years old
Once you leave school, go to college, pass your driving test, games kinda’ go out of the window really. I pretty much stopped playing game between these ages as I just had better things to do – I mean, I still owned a console as I had lots of cash to waste (having a job is good), but buying a nice car, getting drunk and girls were far more interesting. This is when gaming became something that I did with my mates after the pub – I was still a gamer, and knew what was happening with the industry, but it wasn’t the life-consuming thing it once was. Also I got to the point where I kinda’ thought I has seen everything, yes there were classic games but on the whole it was all a bit flat.
I guess this is where you guys are now really. After being such big gamers, now you are in a situation where there seem like a million and one better things to do – and because of this, gaming seems flat. And once you would rather be doing something else, it’s very easy to get jaded with regard to games. Hence you feel you have seen everything – take it from me, you haven’t not by a long shot.
26+
This is kinda’ where I hooked back up with games. I had a GF, was living with her and as such the time I spent going out with mates, chasing girls and getting drunk was a lot less. This mean that I had loads of cash floating around, and not a great deal to spend it on. The PC got me back into games actually, I bought a nice PC, originally for recording music as I was in a band, but as I was still a gamer at heart I soon bought a few games and before I knew it, I was playing again. Then a couple of years later, I bought a PS2 and haven’t looked back since. I am not saying in anyway that I now play games as much as I did back in the helicon days, but I play for a few hours on the weekend and maybe a bit some night of the week – once the washing up is done ;-) (how old do I sound!)
Thing is, once you start to settle down, going out drinking and chasing girls isn’t really something you do, so gaming kinda’ had a place in my life again. I know this isn’t gonna’ be the case for everyone, but most of the mates I grew up with are in the same position. They now have a GF/wife/house and playing a few games is a great way to escape. And once you get back to feeling like this, games start to interest you again. Yes, I think I have pretty much seen everything that gaming can offer, originality is pretty much dead, but it’s still a great way to spend some time. And once you start enjoying it again, you can take this fact onboard and just go with the flow. Just enjoy the game in front of you. It’s nice to be able to think, I remember X game was just like this back in the day, but that doesn’t stop it being fun.
Maybe you will grow out of it totally – but I think for anyone who was really a gamer in their younger years, the love is always there. Its something you either have or don’t from the time you are a kid. It’s just a case of knowing this, and as you life changes, let your gaming habits, and feelings toward it change as well.
To say you have grown out of gaming at 19 or 20 is just a statement you can’t make with any kind of authority. As you are saying it you may believe it, but as time goes by, this feeling will change. It’ll never be the same as it was when you were a kid, but it’s still a damn fun way to spend you time.
Gaming is just fun – and as you get older you’ll realise this. And it’s certainly better than putting up those shelves that have been sitting in the shed for the last 3 weeks. ;-)
* Maybe not be true. But I would guess there aren’t many 32 year olds on this forum who have been playing since they were 8.
Sorry - this was was way to long. But as this is a rather interesting thread, i figured i would just go on and on and on....:-D
19? 20?
You see, what you need to understand is that your interest in gaming, and I guess the level of addiction you have toward it, is all relative to your age. It changes many, many times as the years go by. I am 31 (32 in a months) years old now, and have been playing games for as long, if not longer than, any members of this website*, so I will use myself as an example...
10-18 years old
I was totally addicted to games. Totally. It would be nothing for me to spend 8 hours a day playing games. Before I went to school, go home in my lunch hour and play some more, then spend from like 4pm until it was time for bed playing again. Sometimes I would have friends around, sometimes I play games on my own. Weekends were the same. Pretty much spend all day playing. To be fair the amount of time fell in the summer months as I did the usual things kids of this age do, playing football, mucking about, bike riding – that kinda’ thing. But I always played game a lot. For me (and most of my age group) this was, and always will be the golden age of gaming.
Basically this is stage one – you are a kid, you have loads of time on your hands and no responsibilities. It doesn’t matter if you experience this stage playing a Speccy, Megadrive Amiga or N64 (the actual machine is irrelevant) the fact is that everything you play is new, you are just learning about games, learning the idiosyncrasies of how games work. You aren’t gonna’ get bored as almost everything brings something new, some new challenge.
18-25 years old
Once you leave school, go to college, pass your driving test, games kinda’ go out of the window really. I pretty much stopped playing game between these ages as I just had better things to do – I mean, I still owned a console as I had lots of cash to waste (having a job is good), but buying a nice car, getting drunk and girls were far more interesting. This is when gaming became something that I did with my mates after the pub – I was still a gamer, and knew what was happening with the industry, but it wasn’t the life-consuming thing it once was. Also I got to the point where I kinda’ thought I has seen everything, yes there were classic games but on the whole it was all a bit flat.
I guess this is where you guys are now really. After being such big gamers, now you are in a situation where there seem like a million and one better things to do – and because of this, gaming seems flat. And once you would rather be doing something else, it’s very easy to get jaded with regard to games. Hence you feel you have seen everything – take it from me, you haven’t not by a long shot.
26+
This is kinda’ where I hooked back up with games. I had a GF, was living with her and as such the time I spent going out with mates, chasing girls and getting drunk was a lot less. This mean that I had loads of cash floating around, and not a great deal to spend it on. The PC got me back into games actually, I bought a nice PC, originally for recording music as I was in a band, but as I was still a gamer at heart I soon bought a few games and before I knew it, I was playing again. Then a couple of years later, I bought a PS2 and haven’t looked back since. I am not saying in anyway that I now play games as much as I did back in the helicon days, but I play for a few hours on the weekend and maybe a bit some night of the week – once the washing up is done ;-) (how old do I sound!)
Thing is, once you start to settle down, going out drinking and chasing girls isn’t really something you do, so gaming kinda’ had a place in my life again. I know this isn’t gonna’ be the case for everyone, but most of the mates I grew up with are in the same position. They now have a GF/wife/house and playing a few games is a great way to escape. And once you get back to feeling like this, games start to interest you again. Yes, I think I have pretty much seen everything that gaming can offer, originality is pretty much dead, but it’s still a great way to spend some time. And once you start enjoying it again, you can take this fact onboard and just go with the flow. Just enjoy the game in front of you. It’s nice to be able to think, I remember X game was just like this back in the day, but that doesn’t stop it being fun.
Maybe you will grow out of it totally – but I think for anyone who was really a gamer in their younger years, the love is always there. Its something you either have or don’t from the time you are a kid. It’s just a case of knowing this, and as you life changes, let your gaming habits, and feelings toward it change as well.
To say you have grown out of gaming at 19 or 20 is just a statement you can’t make with any kind of authority. As you are saying it you may believe it, but as time goes by, this feeling will change. It’ll never be the same as it was when you were a kid, but it’s still a damn fun way to spend you time.
Gaming is just fun – and as you get older you’ll realise this. And it’s certainly better than putting up those shelves that have been sitting in the shed for the last 3 weeks. ;-)
* Maybe not be true. But I would guess there aren’t many 32 year olds on this forum who have been playing since they were 8.
Sorry - this was was way to long. But as this is a rather interesting thread, i figured i would just go on and on and on....:-D
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