Gaming is a strange mistress; a double-edged sword if you will. It’s a storytelling medium, just like film, but unlike film, most video games require massive investments of both money and time. Money and time that some of us just don’t have to waste. But still we play. Why? Because we simply cannot help ourselves.
I’ve been gaming – a lot – since I was knee-high to a grasshopper, since the NES first hit shelves and was considered nothing short of a powerhouse gaming system. And I’ve never looked back. Over the years, many people have asked me “why do you still play so many games, you’re 20/21/22/23/24/25/26/nearly thirty”. My answer is always different and almost always a lie, not just to the questioner but to myself.
And the worst lie is the one we tell ourselves. I’ve been thinking back over my gaming career and I realised that gaming makes me lie to myself a lot (see, calling it ‘my gaming career’ is in and of itself a barefaced lie – I’ve never earned a single penny gaming and highly doubt I ever will). And I know for a fact that it’s not just me either. So then, naturally it seemed the next logical step in the though process was to write a piece on the very subject.
So, without further waffle, let’s dissect and discuss the 10 biggest lies gamers tell themselves (that I tell myself, some on a weekly basis). Be aware, the truth hurts, but I say what I say out of love. Honest…
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28 Comments
Great article even though it got very, very depressing at the end there which I think is untrue and harsh. But I got one you forgot.. how about the way we always have a go at our girlfriends by saying that games are “interactive” rather than just staring at the tv. tee hee
Don’t forget when you do go out to a relative’s house (or friend) and asking what is the WiFi password before anything else. [I did this almost all the time without even knowing it but I am getting better at not upsetting the people I visit]
Oh so true. I quit gaming when I realised, at 3,000 hours, that I could have written some music, worked, read something, repaired the house, improved my engineering skills etc. Gaming is the old man’s poker machine addiction geared for youth. If you’re young, you’re at your prime. Use your mental and physical abilities to the extreme while you can – because age will take them away from you much as age took it from your parents, their parents, their parent’s parents……………..
Oh, I know many older people who still achieve a lot and have lots of energy.
Don’t scare people getting older =)
And even if you should loose some energy when you are older, you can compensate it with your life experience. I mean look at all those dumb young things out there who have no clue about life :)
(No offense meant, its great to be young and innocent)
Gosh, we old un’s have really had it haven’t we? I’m fifty-eight. This year I completed a novel I started in October 2012, ghosted an actress’s autobiography and delivered six episodes of a Radio 4 sutcom. Coincidentally I clocked around 150 hours on Skyrim, hit level 50 on Guild Wars 2, saw most of The Secret World and made progress in many other games.
Yet as you reckon I’m past it I suppose I’ll have to accept that I can’t do anything like that any more, start living on mush and spend so long in an armchair that my shape is impressed into it, whilst ensuring there’s a perpetual wet patch in the cushion where I pee myself.
World of Warcraft 2 will not even be able to kill World of Warcraft. I can’t remember any big MMO sequel that ever exceeded its predecessor. The predecessor becomes so huge and full of expansion content that no game the publisher could sell you at retail for a mere $60 could ever hope to compete with it. I think a MMO would have to release little to no expansion content if it hopes to follow up with a whole new game.
Everquest II wasn’t as popular as Everquest, Asheron’s Call II wasn’t as popular as Asheron’s Call, and World of Warcraft 2 (if they are silly enough to make one) won’t be as popular as World of Warcraft. The new installation will always seem thin on content by comparison to its older brother so a huge population of the playerbase will refuse to change. This is also part of the reason nothing can really compete with World of Warcraft. The game just has too much content for any newcomer MMO to match.
Guild Wars 2 > Guild wars 1
Also Everquest 2> Everquest.
Took time, but it was.
However, the market’s changed, there’s a lot of negative feeling towards WoW in these Kung fu panda days and there’s musch more competition, and for those reasons I believe the only way WOW2 would outdo its predecessor is by adopting the Guild Wars finance model.
luckily i never got into MMOs.
if you guys want to lower your gaming time, have a kid. my gaming time is effectively about 2 hours a week now, tops.
Don’t say that. There’s too many idiots that neglect their kids as it is. It’s great that you cut back on playing games to take care of your kids. But there’s plenty of people who wouldn’t/haven’t. Don’t encourage them.
Nice list. While most of you reading this comment will say I am still lying to myself but points 8/10 do not apply to me. Maybe I am not a l33t gamer but as I have been playing games since 1985 and its the only thing I consider as my hobby I think I am at the least a Gamer nerd.
My explanation by the numbers.
10. As a kid when my parents told me to turn my machine off. It got turned off, right then no if,buts or just wait till, OFF. As an adult I now can just pause and do what I need to do then unpause. The joys of paying your own electricity bill.
9. Never bought a bad game. Never had enough money to waste.
8. See 10
7. I have owned COD 3 and MW2 both quite different but due to point 9 this hasn’t been such a problem.
6. Never played a MMORG. I played Neverwinter Nights with 9 buddies on my own server for 3 months they all moved onto EVE and asked me to follow them. I declined mainly due to point 9. Another monthly bill is a step too far.
5. Been outside the MMORG bubble has made me aware this just wont happen. If Star Wars cant do it then I’m afraid that Blizzard are quite safe in there fully functioning life destroyer.
4. Once again re point 9. I’ll buy the game but the T-shirt sorry bub I already have one that fits just fine.
3.Ah a point that hits home, I have 1000′ed bio shock, assassins creed, Oblivion & Mass effect but the ridiculous achievements required in some games, I’m looking at you Cliff Bleszinski & Gears of War put a stop to this once I knew I needed to put several hundred hours into on-line multi-player to get 1000 points my journey stopped. I didn’t lie to myself I just came to the realisation that it aint gonna happen.
2. I’m not l33t, I’m not even great, I’m average and I’m happy with it. I really enjoy playing games and pulling off the odd moment of genius (luck) but I don’t play to exert my dominance over anyone else.
1. Now this point is just mean. I started in 1985 at the age of 7, every Christmas and birthday since then I have received/bought a game. In 1996 I spent most of my life savings building my own gaming PC (due to this I didn’t learn to drive till 27 #idiot). On Oblivion alone I have spent 200hrs, Skyrim much the same I loved Mass Effect so much I played through it 3.5 times and these are games that tell you how long you have played I didn’t record my playtime on Chase HQ, North & South, Moonstone, Command and Conquer, Streets of Rage, Sonic ect. I figure that this time used more wisely could have meant me knowing how to code in several computer languages I could be Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer both things I aspire to at work but by hometime I see my xbox and….
Well done you got me in the end, I thought I was clever enough to escape the pitfalls of gaming but in the end.
One Point to rule them all, One Point to find them,
One Point to bring them all and in the darkness bind them
#Nerd
Really and truly, you have to sit on the couch and do nothing sometime. That’s why you buy a tv right? Whether you’re watching tv, movies, surfing the net, or gaming, you’re not exactly changing the world. You are relaxing, and that’s a good thing. Our generation is really the first to have an alternative to just watching tv during that time, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
It’s true and same goes for drinking, watching tv, porn, sex, taking drugs, wasting money on slot machines in a casino, food,…
Gaming is highly addictive and costs me 2-6 hours daily. I can only do it because I’m rich and don’t have to 9-5 work. So I somehow managed to do the important stuff first (create my dream life) and then go back to gaming, because I now have time for it and it’s fun.
Advice: If you want to accomplish something in your life, get a good book about goal setting or something that will help you and encourage you and motivate you, to stop gaming and rather do the next steps towards your dream. But you have to set your goals first and set first steps to do, to approach your goal. Without a game plan (life plan) you loose motivation very soon and you loose sight of your goal very soon and you will soon fall back to old habits like gaming. Maps are great. Create your life plan or life goal maps that will motivate and help you and keep you from gaming :-)
Thank God I’m only a casual gamer, who has about 20 games because I’m so picky and precise in taste.
i like the list, but not all thankfully applies well lets say 5 lol.
About the last one , thats really down to the individual. Dont forget most gamers play due to hobbies, after all other things done. Their are some who play constantly regardless, but whats important is this.
Contentment. Its how happy you are , not about what youve achievied. Because thats the ego , talking to you.
ask people like alexander the great lol , he conquered the world and then never took any of it with him.
do what you can , rather than give yourself fals hopes, and dreams. live day by day.
Just face it, Captain America wasn’t that bad…at all! i loved it, as much as the movie.
Btw I’m not even american ;)
ya movie games are truly surprisingly lame. how ever batman is a heavy exception to the rule
A well written article. I enjoyed and agreed with most of it. Good job.
This guy is a severe Debby downer. if he had any self control he would have wrote the screenplays or whatever the hell he does. I play a lot, of course I do I’m a teenager and that’s what I like doing, not complaining on what I could have been doing.
#10 is just silly. How is reading War and Peace a more valid or fulfilling use of your time than playing Bioshock or Planescape?
I think this is an example of the bias against gaming as an art form our culture seems to have, and even gamers don’t seem immune to it.
Gaming is a relatively new format, yes, but that doesn’t make it less respectable and worthy than cinema or literature. Sure there are fewer awe-inspiring or profound or life-changing games than there are movies or books, but movies have had a hundred years and literature has had thousands.
4 of the lies I’ve never used, 5 of them were true
But one of them wasn’t a lie, I actually am that 100% gamer, for example I have like a 100 games at home and those I’ve played I’ve finished to a 100%. For example, right now I’m playing AC Brotherhood and I feel like I can’t start playing Revelations until I’ve got those last multiplayer achievements.
Im 20 years old and this is so true.. in 2012, the whole year i have let myself having “fun”, 80 percent of that year is on my computer playing games, and the other 20 percent is 2 months of working only then quit that job and basic self preservation(eat, bath etc..) RPG has made a huge impact on my life, I have played mass effect series the whole year, skyrim took me a month to find all the map location and only the map location and a few side mission… and some other games… Its addictive and its hard to get rid of those feelings…
not only mmorpgs but also normal rpg are addicting just 2 days ago i found out i have put in nearly 200 hours on skyrim .
haha. It’s so true. I’ll laugh rather then how sad my life of playing games is
There was a time when subscription games were totally accepted, then f2p changed things, and quality f2p established the business model, more f2p is over saturated, gamers are pushing the boundaries and at some point even a quality aaa f2p mmo without pay to win will be successful. Whether you believe or not, IMHO even with all the big talk about awesome gameplay and kick the pay to win, the really successful mmo, that will definitively kill wow will be the one with not only superior gameplay, but extremely high focus on account and item protection, with a big brand to secure the users investments just for them to believe that will be around for long time, but also a fundamental component, real money involved. Once the majority of mmo players will really understand that we are at a point where a company cannot produce high value mmo, f2p without some sort of pay2win scheme, as if they put just non-gameplay related stuff, I doubt they will be able to make enough money to survive. The last example of hard to die perhaps will be path of exile, if well executed, the company is small, could sustain the mmo with relatively small revenue, if they are able to create value around the items in the game, without making it to difficult aka no fun, too easy aka no value everyone can get everything easily, and possibly if they will not pursue against real money buy/sell, and will be able to keep dupe/bots at bay in order to keep things valuable, then we have the recipe for success.
Obviously not everyone would be happy about the pay2win and real money available. But frankly once more and more high quality free to game will be available, to make the difference, the next big step, is making the online gaming able to make money, and I suspect that it’s where blizzard may go in the future, they have got the name, the experience, the money, the crazy fanboyism, to create a truly big sandbox world with the next gen graphics and gameplay, and money making included.
#1, as mentioned by other comments, is just stupid (telling people that they shouldn’t do something that makes them happy, but do something that people like you think important).
We’ll all end up in a coffin / urn, so it really doesn’t matter what you do with your life.
Though, personally, I’d rather be a happy gamer, than be lead by what others regard as meaningful and not being happy.
playing games isn’t a waste of time. Spending all your energy/money trying to impress girls is a waste of time.
There is a wow killer and its name is Guild Wars 2.
As for your last comment, it all depends on people’s worldview and absolute truth. If we exist for no purpose or reason, we die one day and that is that. Our achievements, how much money we have in the bank etc etc mean diddley squat. So if you spend all your time gaming and are having fun, why should you stop and go and do something ‘more constructive?’ The same can apply to a junkie. If we are a cosmological accident, who gives anyone the right to tell another what and what not to do? We should be able to do whatever the hell we want.
But, if life is no accident and we exist for a purpose, then how we spend our time is VERY important. I think this is why so many gamers feel this way you mentioned in the last parapraph, we know deep down inside we are wasting our time. We lie to ourselves over and over again and this false sense of accomplishment keeps us going. I have been gaming my whole life, and I spent YEARS playing WOW and Guild Wars. I look the time spent, and think what exactly have I gained grinding and grinding for years? I DON’T EVEN PLAY THOSE GAME ANYMORE!
Good article and something to think about. I have a son who is almost a year old. I think it’s time gaming took a back seat, and put my time into more important things like him.