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It can be annoying sometimes, stuck doing a boring task while your consoles sit, gathering dust. It's happened to me many times, especially now I have a garden (sorry, jungle) to look after.
Now, pulling up weeds is not exactly a fun task, but the other day I managed to get in a game of Halo before going out to the great outdoors for a spot of uprooting and it gave me an idea. I started to set goals, similar to checkpoints in a game, so that I could complete one section of the garden before carrying on. If I did this in a certain time limit I would get bonus points and if I found a snail then I would get even more. Every time I couldn't pull up a weed (and believe me, some of those weeds are monsters out there) I lost a life, after five lives I was dead and would have to start again.
Now, obviously, I got a few funny looks from the wife when I shouted 'yey! 10 points' after finding a snail, but hey, it was much more fun than just plodding through the gardening. A couple of neighbours came out during my task and heard the grunting and shouting, but for some reason went back inside soon afterwards.
Well, it got me thinking, as these things do, why not apply this to any other task that you find boring or monotonous? Perhaps you work in a petrol station, you could have points for every car you get to press the button for (2 points for red, 5 points for black etc) or you could work in a supermarket on the till and every time you get a cash paying customer you would get points, losing lives if they paid by cheque or bought a corgette. Anything can be turned in to a game, and it would be even more fun if you could play 'multiplayer' with a friend, just make sure they're not going to find the whole idea a bit insane first.
Okay, it's no substitute for true gaming, but pretty soon even the most mundane tasks will seem fun. Trust me!
Now, pulling up weeds is not exactly a fun task, but the other day I managed to get in a game of Halo before going out to the great outdoors for a spot of uprooting and it gave me an idea. I started to set goals, similar to checkpoints in a game, so that I could complete one section of the garden before carrying on. If I did this in a certain time limit I would get bonus points and if I found a snail then I would get even more. Every time I couldn't pull up a weed (and believe me, some of those weeds are monsters out there) I lost a life, after five lives I was dead and would have to start again.
Now, obviously, I got a few funny looks from the wife when I shouted 'yey! 10 points' after finding a snail, but hey, it was much more fun than just plodding through the gardening. A couple of neighbours came out during my task and heard the grunting and shouting, but for some reason went back inside soon afterwards.
Well, it got me thinking, as these things do, why not apply this to any other task that you find boring or monotonous? Perhaps you work in a petrol station, you could have points for every car you get to press the button for (2 points for red, 5 points for black etc) or you could work in a supermarket on the till and every time you get a cash paying customer you would get points, losing lives if they paid by cheque or bought a corgette. Anything can be turned in to a game, and it would be even more fun if you could play 'multiplayer' with a friend, just make sure they're not going to find the whole idea a bit insane first.
Okay, it's no substitute for true gaming, but pretty soon even the most mundane tasks will seem fun. Trust me!
Or a long distance driver could play the number plate game...
Starlight wrote:
> Did you carry them above your head once uprooted too? ;)
Not with the amount of worms and beetles we have in our soil {shivers}
> Did you carry them above your head once uprooted too? ;)
Not with the amount of worms and beetles we have in our soil {shivers}
Heh, I quite liked the snail rule.
I imagined you running around the garden attacking those weeds, it reminded me of the ol Mario games where he would pull up vegatables to attack with.
Did you carry them above your head once uprooted too? ;)
I imagined you running around the garden attacking those weeds, it reminded me of the ol Mario games where he would pull up vegatables to attack with.
Did you carry them above your head once uprooted too? ;)
Sounds like the games we used to play in the car on long journeys.
10 points for a bus! :-)
10 points for a bus! :-)
It can be annoying sometimes, stuck doing a boring task while your consoles sit, gathering dust. It's happened to me many times, especially now I have a garden (sorry, jungle) to look after.
Now, pulling up weeds is not exactly a fun task, but the other day I managed to get in a game of Halo before going out to the great outdoors for a spot of uprooting and it gave me an idea. I started to set goals, similar to checkpoints in a game, so that I could complete one section of the garden before carrying on. If I did this in a certain time limit I would get bonus points and if I found a snail then I would get even more. Every time I couldn't pull up a weed (and believe me, some of those weeds are monsters out there) I lost a life, after five lives I was dead and would have to start again.
Now, obviously, I got a few funny looks from the wife when I shouted 'yey! 10 points' after finding a snail, but hey, it was much more fun than just plodding through the gardening. A couple of neighbours came out during my task and heard the grunting and shouting, but for some reason went back inside soon afterwards.
Well, it got me thinking, as these things do, why not apply this to any other task that you find boring or monotonous? Perhaps you work in a petrol station, you could have points for every car you get to press the button for (2 points for red, 5 points for black etc) or you could work in a supermarket on the till and every time you get a cash paying customer you would get points, losing lives if they paid by cheque or bought a corgette. Anything can be turned in to a game, and it would be even more fun if you could play 'multiplayer' with a friend, just make sure they're not going to find the whole idea a bit insane first.
Okay, it's no substitute for true gaming, but pretty soon even the most mundane tasks will seem fun. Trust me!
Now, pulling up weeds is not exactly a fun task, but the other day I managed to get in a game of Halo before going out to the great outdoors for a spot of uprooting and it gave me an idea. I started to set goals, similar to checkpoints in a game, so that I could complete one section of the garden before carrying on. If I did this in a certain time limit I would get bonus points and if I found a snail then I would get even more. Every time I couldn't pull up a weed (and believe me, some of those weeds are monsters out there) I lost a life, after five lives I was dead and would have to start again.
Now, obviously, I got a few funny looks from the wife when I shouted 'yey! 10 points' after finding a snail, but hey, it was much more fun than just plodding through the gardening. A couple of neighbours came out during my task and heard the grunting and shouting, but for some reason went back inside soon afterwards.
Well, it got me thinking, as these things do, why not apply this to any other task that you find boring or monotonous? Perhaps you work in a petrol station, you could have points for every car you get to press the button for (2 points for red, 5 points for black etc) or you could work in a supermarket on the till and every time you get a cash paying customer you would get points, losing lives if they paid by cheque or bought a corgette. Anything can be turned in to a game, and it would be even more fun if you could play 'multiplayer' with a friend, just make sure they're not going to find the whole idea a bit insane first.
Okay, it's no substitute for true gaming, but pretty soon even the most mundane tasks will seem fun. Trust me!