So, it has come to this...

[Norska]

A few days ago, I was playing Day Z joyfully with the cats crew. We got whiped out by a well timed bandit ambush, and a good degree of laziness on our part (I'd say we started feeling cocky and sure no one would mess with us so we slacked). I've been doing editing work for a friend, and we were meeting up the next day but I still had a handful of short stories to work through. I logged off the game, and got to editting. The next day we meet up and go through our usual ritual of drinks, food and more drinks. During the course of the night she asked me why I haven't written anything recently. To preface this question, I've never been published or anything so grand, but I have submitted short stories (which I feel have been complete and horrid crap) over the years to various online sites. I told her I just didn't have the time anymore, that work had been busy, life had gotten in the way so to speak. She said it was a shame because she enjoyed what I wrote (in fact, that was one of the reasons she even approached me to edit her stuff) and wanted to see more of it. This conversation stuck with me, and I've given it a lot of thought the last week or so.

What I told her was a lie. Work, life, hadn't gotten in the way. I just chose to play video games over persuing other activities. If it was just writing I might not have worried so much, but my workout routine took a nose dive the past half a year that I've really started gaming again. I have whole outlines of stories that have been sitting in my file cabinet just waiting to be written from 8 months ago and haven't been touched. I've barely touched my bike, and I can count the number of times I've gone on a serious hike on one hand.

See, I hadn't played games from about 2009-2011. I focused on getting in shape and writing. During that period, precisely so I could kick my video game habit, I used the shittiest laptops you could ever imagine (I mean, one of them was literally held together by ducktape and would be stable only on a nix os, I took a sledgehammer to it when it died for revenge. It was worth it.) or just didn't have a computer at all besides my phone. For my birthday in 2011 I decided to get a new laptop, solely for writing. Marou linked me to one with a good price, and I grabbed it. The whole reason I even thought about it was so that I'd have a machine of my own to write with again. Literally a week after I got the laptop Skyrim came out. I figured I could never run it, but I'm a sucker for the series so I dl'd a cracked version "just to see." Imagine my surprise when the game worked great. This ballooned into me redownloading steam, downloading old games, and during the crhistmas sale buying all the titles I've missed in the last few years for like $2.50.

Essentially I lost track of my goals. I know I have an addictive personality. I also take things to the extreme. I've been spending so much time gaming it's ridiculous. It's one thing if that's fine for you. It's another if, like me, it's taking up valuable time that you want to spend on something that has more meaning for you.

So, I'm deleting steam, and all games off my compy. Just wanted to give a heads up so you guys know why I'm not, and haven't been, logging on.

IIRC, Zavon posted somethng very similar a little while back, though he at least had the smarts to only be addicted to a shitty mmo about old guys screwing young apprentices. I went full gang bang.

[Boxy Brown]

You know what's weird? I quit smoking weed a while back, and as a corollary I stopped playing games for about a month. It wasn't intentional, but the two kind of went hand in hand for me. Anyway, getting outside and hanging with people instead of just getting torched and gaming in my room all day as a seriously nice change of pace. Now, however, I feel like I've found a great balance between everything. I wake up before 10 every morning, I have 3 jobs this summer, I go to the gym, and I still have time to own up, down and all around.

[VKhaun]

Good for you. So many people fall into the 'do something stupid->feel guilty" cycle and never actually take that step back to stop what makes them do the things they can't control.

[Andile™]

Good on you, Norska. Shame that we won't get to chat on Steam anymore though. How else am I supposed to haunt you with my visions of little Norskies running around your house and generally ending what you call life?

[Marou]

Games are there for when you *don't feel like* doing anything productive. Just like books, music, movies, etc. I often work 12 hour days, yet I still might spend 3-5 hours gaming with Aeinna before we head to bed. It's about what you want to do. Not all time is productive *uptime*. I don't really understand how some of you guys can't balance it against all other entertainment. When you've spent 12 hours of the day being productive your motivation to *keep being* productive is going to be zero. If that void isn't filled by video games, it will be filled with something else that will likely have less value and merit.

That wind down period at the end of the day is when you game. Everyone has that period outside of fitness nuts and other mentally unhealthy people. Taken as a period when you're either going to sit on your ass and do nothing, or do a passive activity anyways, gaming becomes one of the more rewarding things you could do with that time.

I'm forced to think and create all day. If I work 12 hours, that was 12 hours of creatively solving problems and devising clever code. I don't want to think when I'm done with all that; and about the only thing that can creatively recharge me so that I can stay motivated to work is good gaming time with friends, a great book, or copious amounts of copulation.

So, seeing as how you will not in spite of efforts spend 18 hours a day working, being creative, and doing "productive" things, how will you spend the 5-6 hours of unproductive time? Reading? How is that any better than gaming? Watching stuff? How is that any better than gaming? Wall staring?...

Ok, so you worked 9 hours, worked out an hour, wrote for 2, that's 6 hours more of being awake. Not sure what you guys are looking for in that time. Go out with friends for 2 hours? Ok, now you got 4...and then?

[Norska]

See Marou, I'm one of those "metally unhealthy" people. In my gaming lifestyle I literally eat, sleep, breath games. When I'm not playing them, I'm thinking about them, I'm looking up resources on them, I'm theory crafting. I'm... thinking of ways to skip work and play more, skip exercise and play more, skip writing and play more. I take my activities to the extreme. I always have, it's how I've learned to excel. Focus everything into them. I've been playing about 48 hours of games a week for the past 8 months. I've got over 1200 hours logged on steam, and then you have to add in my non steam games, in this short period of time. That is a lot. And as you can see, it isn't "down time" while I recharge, I'm still thinking, still "working" while I play games. To add to this, the enjoyment I get from the medium has dwindled immensely. I'll play for hours with the "why am I doing this, I'd rather be doing xyz.... but one more game but maybe the next one will be better" mentality. Every once and a while something awesome will happen (like that day I first played DayZ) but they are so rare now it just isn't worth it.

As far as your time breakdown goes, it's incorrect. 1 hour of exercise is insuffecient for what I want to achieve. 3 would be more realistic for my current level. I'll need more as time progresses. Same with 2 hours of writing. I'll never achieve the level of writing I want if I'm spending such little time on it. A whole day wouldn't be enough, so I have to give as much as possible if I want to excel at it. Ideally I want to get to the point where I can drop my job, and make money with writing/physical pursuits. In regards to reading, it actually helps with writing quite a bit. Now, video games in their own way can help with my writing as well, and I even used that as an excuse to justify my continued playing at one point. They give me ideas, I said. Concepts, plots, settings... Reading gives me ithese deas as well. So does hiking. So does going to the beach. But to get back to reading, it also exposes me to other writers. It lets me analyse how they brought the plot points together, how believable their characterization was, or if their vocabulary was bland and composition was crap. On the flip side, when you read great books you can see what they did, how it flowed, what made it work so well. I must have read the intro to "The Name of the Wind" a half a dozen times. because I've never seen a more effective, catching and downright amazing one. A silence in three parts. It was beautiful. I've never done that with video games.

Really, it all comes down to "what do I want to achieve with this limited time I have here?" It's a long list, and "spending a lot of time on video games" isn't one of the items on it. If I could effectively limit myself, it would be a different story. But as I said, I take things to the extreme, and every time I've forayed into video games it has consumed me at the cost of other activities that I wanted to pursue more.

[Boxy Brown]

3 hours of workout? I'm going to the gym for an hour and climbing for an hour every day. I can't imagine doing another hour of hard exercise every day, but then again I'm an incredibly lazy and unmotivated person.

[Norska]

Right now I'm doing an hour of calisthenics focused heavily around pushup and pull up variations, followed by two hours of cardio (which I alternate between biking, jogging and swimming), every morning. I'd love to climb, but there are no climbing gyms close by, and the rock in Hawaii is bad. I've done a bit of bouldering though, and want to get more into it. I'm not a fan of using equipment aside from the very basic, so I don't usually go to a gym. Honestly, I'm not in great shape, I'm only in decent shape. But I love to eat, and if I don't exercise this much I gain weight. So I just kept upping my exercise amount until my weight stabilized, and now I'm focusing on strength/cardio. Once the exercises get too easy I'll start adding on more difficult variations, and more of them, which will increase the time I spend yet again. Honestly, I don't mind, the buzz I get from exercising is amazing. I'd also like to get back into a martial art, been thinking about boxing, sambo or muay thai.

[Andile™]

I used to have a healthy lifestyle but then I took an arrow to the knee.

[Andile™]

Marou, I read your reply again and... Well, if I put aside the equation of hours since I seem to be hitting the negatives by the time I fit sleep in, I'd argue that this isn't a case of "gaming is bad, mmkay" but more so "there are other things that I'd rather do for now". Reading, watching tv, doing sports or wall staring don't need to be better than gaming. All it takes is for someone to choose one of those over this and spend the rest of the day doing that. Or the rest of the week. Or the month. Year?

Then eventually download Steam again and be all like ZOMG LOOK AT ALL THESE SALES! NOM NOM NOM

There, Norska, I said it. You will be back.

[Aeinna]

Yeah, sorry guys, I don't get it either. I mean, don't you just get bored?

Look, I love gaming, it is number one on my list of favorite activities to do for entertainment but there are times when I just stop. I will have periods where I will read for a few weeks instead or do many other things that I also enjoy. As much as I said I love it, there comes a point where I need a break. I even get to points where I wont game for a month or more. Sometimes I will game for a week and then take a few days off.

I guess I don't understand how it can take over your life to the point that you are unable to do anything else you want to do. I see y'all posting about how even while gaming you want to do something else and can't make yourself stop. Maybe that is the part that confuses me the most. Maybe its just that nothing that is solely for entertainment can grip me that way. Hell I can't even finish a season of a TV show if I become interested in it. Somewhere along the way I go, "Meh, wanna do something else" and walk away. Does it mean I will never finish the TV show? ...Actually, yeah but the point is I will eventually try to watch something else and not just cut it out of my life because it does entertain me occasionally.

[Sillywilly]

Yeah, sorry guys, I don't get it either. I mean, don't you just get bored?

Look, I love gaming, it is number one on my list of favorite activities to do for entertainment but there are times when I just stop. I will have periods where I will read for a few weeks instead or do many other things that I also enjoy. As much as I said I love it, there comes a point where I need a break. I even get to points where I wont game for a month or more. Sometimes I will game for a week and then take a few days off.

I guess I don't understand how it can take over your life to the point that you are unable to do anything else you want to do. I see y'all posting about how even while gaming you want to do something else and can't make yourself stop. Maybe that is the part that confuses me the most. Maybe its just that nothing that is solely for entertainment can grip me that way. Hell I can't even finish a season of a TV show if I become interested in it. Somewhere along the way I go, "Meh, wanna do something else" and walk away. Does it mean I will never finish the TV show? ...Actually, yeah but the point is I will eventually try to watch something else and not just cut it out of my life because it does entertain me occasionally.

This. I don't understand how someone can actually want to be doing something and still doing it when THEY are the only reason they are doing it in the first place. That part throws me for a loop.

[Norska]

Marou, I read your reply again and... Well, if I put aside the equation of hours since I seem to be hitting the negatives by the time I fit sleep in, I'd argue that this isn't a case of "gaming is bad, mmkay" but more so "there are other things that I'd rather do for now". Reading, watching tv, doing sports or wall staring don't need to be better than gaming. All it takes is for someone to choose one of those over this and spend the rest of the day doing that. Or the rest of the week. Or the month. Year?

Exactly.

Then eventually download Steam again and be all like ZOMG LOOK AT ALL THESE SALES! NOM NOM NOM

There, Norska, I said it. You will be back.

First you scare me with stories of little Norskies running around and ruining my life, now you scare me with prophecies of gaming consuming my soul. Andile, you are a bad bad orange. I will not give in, I will remain strong! And if I do suddenly have a little Norsky running around I'm shipping him to you and saying you're the other father. IF I GO DOWN YOU GO DOWN!

Yeah, sorry guys, I don't get it either. I mean, don't you just get bored?

Look, I love gaming, it is number one on my list of favorite activities to do for entertainment but there are times when I just stop. I will have periods where I will read for a few weeks instead or do many other things that I also enjoy. As much as I said I love it, there comes a point where I need a break. I even get to points where I wont game for a month or more. Sometimes I will game for a week and then take a few days off.

I guess I don't understand how it can take over your life to the point that you are unable to do anything else you want to do. I see y'all posting about how even while gaming you want to do something else and can't make yourself stop. Maybe that is the part that confuses me the most. Maybe its just that nothing that is solely for entertainment can grip me that way. Hell I can't even finish a season of a TV show if I become interested in it. Somewhere along the way I go, "Meh, wanna do something else" and walk away. Does it mean I will never finish the TV show? ...Actually, yeah but the point is I will eventually try to watch something else and not just cut it out of my life because it does entertain me occasionally.

Nah, I don't get bored doing the activities I enjoy... if anything I got bored playing games, hence why this whole post came about. Like I said the time spent to the enjoyment gained was just too disproportional. It was the same when I stopped MMOs all those years back. That was one genre, but the feeling has since moved to encompass all games, and the situation was very similar. Spending an obscenely large amount of time focusing, thinking about, and actively engaging in an activity that ultimately wasn't accomplishing what I wanted.

Hell, I haven't even watched TV in half a decade, and by that I mean I don't even dl shows or anything... it's just blah. That was probably the first entertainment medium I stopped partaking in because of similar reasons. I used it as "background noise" for a few years before that decision but... why waste the money on cable bills and electricity? I mean, hey, they just aren't my cup of tea anymore.

The real issue is that it took me so long to realize I was falling into old patterns that negatively effected me.

[Zavon]

Listen there are things in life that you have to do that, you may not want too for a better life in the long run. Exercise, and work for instance.

If you enjoy gaming so much that it interferes wrih doing those things, then you have to stop. Its classic escapism, and it can severely and negatively impact your life.

Its really simply, a cost analysis judgment on the long term quality of your life.

[Norska]

Listen there are things in life that you have to do that, you may not want too for a better life in the long run. Exercise, and work for instance.

If you enjoy gaming so much that it interferes wrih doing those things, then you have to stop. Its classic escapism, and it can severely and negatively impact your life.

Its really simply, a cost analysis judgment on the long term quality of your life.

Whew, for a second there I thought you were going to tell me I had to have little Norskies in the future.

But back to srs mode, you are absolutely right.

Unless you were talking about Norskies.

Then you are wrong.

[Aeinna]

Nah, I don't get bored doing the activities I enjoy... if anything I got bored playing games, hence why this whole post came about. Like I said the time spent to the enjoyment gained was just too disproportional. It was the same when I stopped MMOs all those years back. That was one genre, but the feeling has since moved to encompass all games, and the situation was very similar. Spending an obscenely large amount of time focusing, thinking about, and actively engaging in an activity that ultimately wasn't accomplishing what I wanted.

Hell, I haven't even watched TV in half a decade, and by that I mean I don't even dl shows or anything... it's just blah. That was probably the first entertainment medium I stopped partaking in because of similar reasons. I used it as "background noise" for a few years before that decision but... why waste the money on cable bills and electricity? I mean, hey, they just aren't my cup of tea anymore.

The real issue is that it took me so long to realize I was falling into old patterns that negatively effected me.

That isn't what I meant. When I asked if you got bored, I meant of games. Because that was what I was getting at, I get bored of games too. When I get that bored and sometimes restless feeling, I just stop. Immediately. There isn't this pattern of doing the same thing over and over even though I am not having any fun.

Listen there are things in life that you have to do that, you may not want too for a better life in the long run. Exercise, and work for instance.

If you enjoy gaming so much that it interferes wrih doing those things, then you have to stop. Its classic escapism, and it can severely and negatively impact your life.

I also don't understand that if you really love playing games, you can't find a balance to where you can do what you enjoy without it taking over.

I love cookies but am I gonna sit and eat the whole bag? No.

[Alex Mars]

I game a lot, it is my primary entertainment, and I tend to be a hermit. I have spent the last 36 years or so in the Marines or driving extensively (I can do 75-100 miles a day plus my service calls easy) and having to deal with a lot of idiots and asshats as client and employers, mostly in technical field support (including 9 years of corporate hell at Xerox). I have had to face traffic, crowds, parking nightmares and more in all my civilian jobs. I also danced and did stunt fighting for over 20 years at ren faires. I'm fucking tired and I hate people now. I do everything I can to isolate myself from the world and indulge my amusements, laziness, and indolent tendencies. I wake and bake on weekends and stay toasted all day and play video games or read or write and feel very satisfied with my life. Sometimes I don't leave my apartment all weekend, sometimes I don't even look out the window even once.

[Norska]

I game a lot, it is my primary entertainment, and I tend to be a hermit. I have spent the last 36 years or so in the Marines or driving extensively (I can do 75-100 miles a day plus my service calls easy) and having to deal with a lot of idiots and asshats as client and employers, mostly in technical field support (including 9 years of corporate hell at Xerox). I have had to face traffic, crowds, parking nightmares and more in all my civilian jobs. I also danced and did stunt fighting for over 20 years at ren faires. I'm fucking tired and I hate people now. I do everything I can to isolate myself from the world and indulge my amusements, laziness, and indolent tendencies. I wake and bake on weekends and stay toasted all day and play video games or read or write and feel very satisfied with my life. Sometimes I don't leave my apartment all weekend, sometimes I don't even look out the window even once.

You. I like you.

[Sillywilly]

lol I have to vegg out like that every now and then myself. Sometimes it's good to get some solitude.

[Zavon]

The cookie metaphor is flawed, but it shows what you are not getting about the concept of abstinant gaming.

The proper metaphor using cookies, is that you are fat as hell and need to get your weight under control, so you throw all the cookies out. This isn't a "sitting meal" discussion, its the needs of your entire dietary intake.

Would a cookie every once in a while bebad? Probably not, but if you are fat as hell already, then you don't need any more cookies. Not until you get that weight under control.

[Marou]

The cookie metaphor is flawed, but it shows what you are not getting about the concept of abstinant gaming.

The proper metaphor using cookies, is that you are fat as hell and need to get your weight under control, so you throw all the cookies out. This isn't a "sitting meal" discussion, its the needs of your entire dietary intake.

Would a cookie every once in a while bebad? Probably not, but if you are fat as hell already, then you don't need any more cookies. Not until you get that weight under control.

Your metaphor is more flawed because it focuses on an irrelevant part of the cookie metaphor. That being that it's *food*. Substitute cookie with stargazing and try to make it work.

[Aeinna]

The cookie metaphor is flawed, but it shows what you are not getting about the concept of abstinant gaming.

The proper metaphor using cookies, is that you are fat as hell and need to get your weight under control, so you throw all the cookies out. This isn't a "sitting meal" discussion, its the needs of your entire dietary intake.

Would a cookie every once in a while bebad? Probably not, but if you are fat as hell already, then you don't need any more cookies. Not until you get that weight under control.

Actually, if you wanna go that route, what you said is wrong because if you go by what most nutritionists/doctors say, denying yourself everything that can be bad for you the whole time you are trying to lose weight, more often than not makes you "fall of the wagon".

Kind of like going cold turkey with smoking. You have to learn how to control what you do.

[Marou]

Actually, if you wanna go that route, what you said is wrong because if you go by what most nutritionists/doctors say, denying yourself everything that can be bad for you the whole time you are trying to lose weight, more often than not makes you "fall of the wagon".

Kind of like going cold turkey with smoking. You have to learn how to control what you do.

Heh, so Norska and Zavon are the binge eaters/bulimics of the gaming world?

[Zavon]

Yes, exactly. I knew you'd get it eventually.

Though in my case, as long as I dont play mmos I can be just like you normal adjusted folks.

[Zavon]

Though, in fairness to Norska, if I didn't have a job outside of home I would probably be just like him- sitting at home gaming my life away in an unhealthy swamp ass skulk. Completely ignoring responsiblity in a mindless hedonistic, yet ultimately unfulfilling relvery of sticky sweatcoverd keyboards.