Deep thoughts on gaming/life - Random thoughts

[HTBandicoot]

It may be different for you, but I find I get the most enjoyment out of games whenever I ignore the percentage complete and just focus on the game itself and the experience. This isn’t easy to do, as we always want to feel productive etc. It may also be impossible for the completionist type.

I see this at work in GTA IV. I sometimes like going through missions, but I have the most fun when I explore the open world and see how far I can go and see the different types of people and features that went into the game.

Another example is Crazy Taxi. I could care less how many people I pick up. I have more fun when I just try to see the different places I can take the people, and laugh at the passengers jumping out of the car when I run out of time…or the people waiting for a taxi underwater. you can even turn on the chest and turn off the time altogether and just explore.

Lastly, I have found this to be true in NES and arcade style games. I know each time I’m liable to reach a “game over” screen before long. So I just play a few mins here and there to pass the time and see how the games were like back then.

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The same goes for my reading life. There used to be times when I would check the percentage left after each chapter. However, I enjoyed most the books that we’re so good I hardly checked how much was left until the very end.

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I guess it all comes down to mindset. If we can get ourselves to the point where we just play to have fun and a good time.

 

[Pandaprewmaster325]

So you are saying to enjoy the journey and you will get to the end eventually quite right.

 

[HTBandicoot]

So you are saying to enjoy the journey and you will get to the end eventually quite right.

In a way…but some games it’s better if I just play for enjoyment even if there’s no chance at reaching the end.

For example, Gran Turismo 4 I’ve played for a long time and am just 1% complete. If I think too much or am bothered about beating the game, then I’d never play it again.

 

[RanmyakuIchi's icon RanmyakuIchi RanmyakuIchi]

I totally agree with you on the completion thing. I continue playing a game as long as I'm having fun and move on if it starts to feel like work.

If we're sharing personal approaches to gaming, I love a good challenge and the feeling of getting better and improving. I'll bang my head against challenging stuff like Ninja Gaiden, Metal Slug, or Fighting Games, but I'm having the time of my life feeling myself improve and slowly bringing the challenge down to my level.

 

[HTBandicoot]

I totally agree with you on the completion thing. I continue playing a game as long as I'm having fun and move on if it starts to feel like work.

If we're sharing personal approaches to gaming, I love a good challenge and the feeling of getting better and improving. I'll bang my head against challenging stuff like Ninja Gaiden, Metal Slug, or Fighting Games, but I'm having the time of my life feeling myself improve and slowly bringing the challenge down to my level.

I can relate in trying Ninja Gaiden myself. Just progressing to the second level can feel like beating the game sometimes.

 

[Pandaprewmaster325]

In a way…but some games it’s better if I just play for enjoyment even if there’s no chance at reaching the end.

For example, Gran Turismo 4 I’ve played for a long time and am just 1% complete. If I think too much or am bothered about beating the game, then I’d never play it again.

I explore as im progressing doing both is always good you get to enjoy the side content and all fun mini games etc while also not prolonging story events so much that you start disconnecting from the story but thats just the way i play hmmmm in fact its a good idea for a thread or post "the way of the game" or something like that

 

[PurpleShoes]

I agree with you, but I'm such a perfectionist. It's hard not to really badly want to complete every single thing, but I gotta be mindful. Or if a game is super hard like Nocturne or Ikaruga, I don't feel so bad not completing every bit of it.

 

[HTBandicoot]

I agree with you, but I'm such a perfectionist. It's hard not to really badly want to complete every single thing, but I gotta be mindful. Or if a game is super hard like Nocturne or Ikaruga, I don't feel so bad not completing every bit of it.

I guess it can vary person to person too. For example, I have never really beaten a game before. So for me it’s not possible anyways.

 

[Ikagura Ikagura]

Sometimes I want to finish as quickly as possible because of spoilers and have to enjoy another but in the meantime I also end up being sad to finish one too quickly...

 

[CG4R12I4N]

This is exactly why long >60 hours RPGs are garbages most of the time. Not many people would like to waste their time doing the same thing over and over again for such a meager return of their spent time. The sweet spot is really about 30-50 hours, not too short to beat in just a few sittings but not too long that it'll feel like chores as well.

 

[Ikagura Ikagura]

This is exactly why long >60 hours RPGs are garbages most of the time. Not many people would like to waste their time doing the same thing over and over again for such a meager return of their spent time. The sweet spot is really about 30-50 hours, not too short to beat in just a few sittings but not too long that it'll feel like chores as well.

I assume that when a JRPG tells they have 100+ hours of content I assume post game/optional areas but I agree, a 35-40 hours main story is plenty enough imo.

 

[PrismRed]

Deep thoughts, huh, can't say I ever have any. One thing I know for sure, there are people out there who lived a better life than I do, but here, I don't play with girls, I don't gamble, I don't drink nor do drugs, I'm a simple homely man who spend his time with his one and only true love, video games.
And that's a good life, a better life.

 

[Antilocal123]

Guy above me is wrong, drugs > video games and I say that with no trace of irony. /j

Anyway, nice essay, I get that feeling as-well.

 

[Ikagura Ikagura]

Deep thoughts, huh, can't say I ever have any. One thing I know for sure, there are people out there who lived a better life than I do, but here, I don't play with girls, I don't gamble, I don't drink nor do drugs, I'm a simple homely man who spend his time with his one and only true love, video games.
And that's a good life, a better life.

I've never understood people thinking that "you don't actually live your life if you don't party, dring alcohol, do drugs and have fun with several girls" or think that being adult is doing these.

I can understand the carpe diem thinking but I'm thinking that it's because you have one life that you need to preserve it the best.

 

[PrismRed]

I've never understood people thinking that "you don't actually live your life if you don't party, dring alcohol, do drugs and have fun with several girls" or think that being adult is doing these.

I can understand the carpe diem thinking but I'm thinking that it's because you have one life that you need to preserve it the best.

On the flipside, you don't actually live your life if you don't play Scarface, Playboy The Mansion, and one of the raepy games from Illusion Soft, that's what being adult is all about!

 

[Captain Murphy]

Biotches dig my online video game trophies.

Games for me are more than games. They are windows into another world. Another life. They are changes in perspective waiting to be experienced. Video games are a form of high-art as they encompass all the artistic traditions, potentially to the extent that a game becomes more than a painting, more than a sprite-sheet, more than a song, more than a game. It becomes a life and sense of experience away from life. I have rode up great mountains on horseback. I have flew across great stretches of starry night. I have tamed dragons and made friends with giants. I have drank the blood of my enemies. I have opened up a Vinyard in Corvo Bianco. I have outswam sharks in the great wide expanses of the open ocean. I have defeated many gods and many monsters. I have cleansed the world of evil.

I think you can agree that with all my many OMGAMAZING accomplishments that fawning over internet trophies would kind of cheapen the sense of experience and perspective that video games are capable of being. I do have quite a few platinums but I am not proud of them. I save my praise for the developers of game that can get me to think outside of my comfort zone and allow me to experience beautiful, terrible, glorious little cuts of creation. There is spiritual growth there and though the experiences in games are simulated, that doesn't mean that they are not real. Anything that affects personal change or stimulates the imagination or the emotions in myriad ways elicits growth and growth is very real. The dimensions of which should not be underestimated.

Post automatically merged: Apr 21, 2025

Guy above me is wrong, drugs > video games and I say that with no trace of irony. /j

Anyway, nice essay, I get that feeling as-well.

Why not... both?