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posted by martyb on Monday January 07 2019, @07:43PM   Printer-friendly
from the Figured-it-out dept.

ArsTechnica:

Gaming was like breathing. It was the biggest part of my life as a teenager, one of my priorities as a college student, and eventually one of my most expensive “hobbies” as a young professional.

Then all of a sudden, after thousands of hours spent playing across genres and platforms, boredom hit me hard for the very first time in my early thirties. Some of my favorite games soon gave me the impression of being terribly long. I couldn’t help but notice all the repeating tropes and similarities in game design between franchises.

I figured it was just a matter of time before I found the right game to stimulate my interest again, but time continued to go by and nothing changed.

Is it that games have failed to innovate, or that real life is ultimately more engaging?


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  • (Score: 2) by TheFool on Monday January 07 2019, @09:18PM (7 children)

    by TheFool (7105) on Monday January 07 2019, @09:18PM (#783377)

    I share most of this guys feelings, but instead I've found that I just play the games I like differently rather than tossing them entirely.

    For example, these days you can find "randomizers" for many games. A randomizer will do like it sounds - randomize some element of the game to give you a very different experience each time. Super Metroid is kind of the classic example. Because of how the mechanics in that game are, you can (mostly) move all the items into random locations and still complete the game, although it's likely going to require a few tricks. There is even a Super Metroid + A Link to the Past randomizer [speedga.me] now that combines the two games into one. The item pool is randomized between both games, so you'll find SM items in ALTTP and the other way around, with a few modified doors to take you between the games. Quite fun if you know both games well enough that it's not just confusing.

    Even if you aren't doing something like that, you can do other things like challenge runs or speedrunning. It's the same game data, but you are playing a very different and probably much harder game. And if you aren't taking it too seriously it's a fairly low-stress hobby.

    Is it productive? Well, no, but as a result I don't really watch TV or movies. I can't imagine it's worse than killing time with Netflix or something.

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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Monday January 07 2019, @09:25PM (6 children)

    by JoeMerchant (3937) on Monday January 07 2019, @09:25PM (#783383)

    I have a PS3 - I used to spend hours and hours waiting for it to update - I thought that Sony misinterpreted the mission statement: "Owner wants to waste a ton of time using the device..." Now I just watch it collect dust.

    --
    🌻🌻 [google.com]
    • (Score: 2) by Freeman on Monday January 07 2019, @11:30PM

      by Freeman (732) on Monday January 07 2019, @11:30PM (#783461) Journal

      I discovered Steam Sales and GOG. That's when I stopped playing my PS3 and not too long after that the PS4 was released. I bought into VR when I could and it's been a blast. Though, I still have more Non-VR game time through the week than I do VR game time. VR is lots of fun, but you can get tired of having a hunk of tech strapped to your face. Usually, I just get tired from standing, ducking, and turning. So, I end up quitting and playing something not as physically intensive. It's probably good that at least some of my game time is spent active like that, though.

      --
      Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
    • (Score: 2) by kazzie on Tuesday January 08 2019, @03:05PM (4 children)

      by kazzie (5309) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday January 08 2019, @03:05PM (#783678)

      Our PS3 (bought second-hand long after release, to access some platform-exclusive titles) saw a lot of service as a video streaming server (BBC iPlayer). It also gets used for streaming old downloaded content from a RasPi home server via dlna. It can probably still play games, but it's been a while since anyone put a disc in it.

      • (Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday January 08 2019, @04:56PM (3 children)

        by JoeMerchant (3937) on Tuesday January 08 2019, @04:56PM (#783729)

        We used our PS3 as a media center back in the 200x years, got tired of listening to the fans, even the new ones drew an unreasonable amount of power for what they did - replaced it with a NUC running Kodi/Ubuntu - never looked back.

        --
        🌻🌻 [google.com]
        • (Score: 2) by kazzie on Tuesday January 08 2019, @10:21PM (2 children)

          by kazzie (5309) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday January 08 2019, @10:21PM (#783867)

          We found that sitting the PS3 horizontally helped with the airflow, and reduced the fan's rpm to a quieter setting. But with young kids in the house, it's nice to have a room quiet enough to hear fans in the first place!

          But in all honesty, it's only used for perhaps a dozen hours a month, so I've not found the need to invest the time/money in a replacement solution.

          • (Score: 2) by kazzie on Tuesday January 08 2019, @10:26PM

            by kazzie (5309) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday January 08 2019, @10:26PM (#783870)

            A clarification (as my two posts appear contradictory): The PS3 did all our video streaming at first, but we've now got a Freeview box that does live and catch-up television, so the PS3 is only used for streaming off our local media server.

          • (Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday January 08 2019, @10:39PM

            by JoeMerchant (3937) on Tuesday January 08 2019, @10:39PM (#783872)

            Back in the day, we also had some kind of Western Digital streaming device that was semi-competent, but ultimately underpowered and frustrating. I also had a Kill-a-watt device that cooled my enthusiasm for the PS3 - If I Recall Correctly:

            2007 42" flat panel TV 70W

            WD media center widget with hard drive 10W

            1st Gen PS3 250W standby, 350W playing hard

            2nd Gen PS3 200W standby, 300W playing hard

            Kodi on NUC with 2TB external drive 20W while playing back video

            the 2nd Gen PS3 was quiet enough, but at $0.1141/kWH (coincidentally, about what we pay around here) every watt consumed 24-7-365 costs a dollar, so you're looking at a $200 annual standby cost for the PS3 vs a $20 cost for the NUC...

            --
            🌻🌻 [google.com]