Have you suffered gaming burnout before? I have had several aggravations or problems in the games I have been playing lately. I thought it could be because of a lack of mental energy when I go to play, my game choices, not giving it enough time in a session, or all of the above.
However, it may just be burnout. Games that used to bring joy and wonder, are now quit for the day if I feel I can't make any progress. Or some games I will be further on and I make myself feel obligated to play them just to advance. So I end up feeling "forced" to play.
So I guess the solution would be to take a break from gaming, but for how long? I know some people online have taken breaks for months at a time and then felt refreshed afterwards.
I just wonder if I can find a similar replacement to fill the void. Maybe online board games? Who knows..we will see. But I guess I should try at least a week to start.
I've been in the exact same spot (and still sort of am). I can't bring myself to enjoy the newer games, the mainstream games, FPS games, and even stuff I used to enjoy younger. I launched a game for like 20 mins and then I closed it, being like "... no. I don't want to play that." on loop on everything, staring at my screen for an hour or two wondering if gaming is even for me at all anymore. I took a break but it didn't really change much. I think the issue is that we once enjoyed gaming for reasons that are not replicable now anymore, because of all of the microtransactions, that the games cost 70$ +300$ DLCS, buggy and incomplete releases, early access that are eternally unfinished, or because we already played those games before so it's not the same feeling.
But I have found a replacement, maybe a cure indirectly. I've came to pick up a new way of approaching gaming, and that was to only play forgotten games, obscure games, obscure mods that were made with soul but never went mainstream because it didn't make the normies cheer in joy (which is generally a good indicator of quality). And since I record what I play sometimes, it feels less unproductive as well.
Or sometimes I try a visual novel that's not mainstream and even qualified as very weird and just out of curiosity, I tried it. It's things like that. You have to look outside of mainstream games if you want to find soul, innovation (because by definition what is mainstream just copies what already works/is trendy, which is partly what makes it popular). That and the fact I don't pay for any games generally, so that I never feel bad about a purchase (also considering that i'm running quite low on money right now). I generally always wanted a game to play for 300 hours (like Skyrim) but then applying that mindset I spoke of earlier, I don't mind playing a game just a few hours anymore, because it's a discovery after another, or rediscovery sort of, playing games that used to be popular but aren't anymore is also kind of cool. That and flash games, there's a lot of depth and soul in that too, I play them sometimes too.
But yeah personally it has been sort of the cure for me, reinstalling forgotten games, playing dead games, lost media games, obscure stuff. Maybe it will work or not for you, who knows until we try after all. Oh and I went back in a previous hobby of mine as well, chess, maybe that can also help.
I have the same issue these days, but in my opinion it happens because of my current life style. Growing up, having problems to cope with. I mean basically there are a lot of fragments that affect the emotion you have when gaming, if you feel like gaming is not fun but more like a job that you have to go 9 to 5 (in my case, that's how it feels) just leave it for some time, a few hours, days or maybe even months, because after the time needed is due, you will understand that you do want to play again.
I think this has a name: gaming fatigue. And this happens to me too. For six years, I've been running a website for which I've written many, many, many reviews. And it was probably too much. And I often reach the point of forcing myself to progress; the best choice is to take a step back.
Maybe it can help, this is what I do when this happens: replace gaming with reading for a few days. And when you feel like you want to play something, either choose an easy and short game, or something from your childhood as a comforter. Just beat a few levels, enjoy the music and that's it!
And of course, don't hesitate to give up on beating the games that you force yourself to play, if you don't find pleasure in them. It happened to me with Mother and Final Fantasy X-2 for example! I felt conflicted not to beat them but eventually, moving on to something else was the best choice.
I can only really play for articles or short bursts nowadays -- been burned out for a really long time and probably would have quit altogether if it wasn't for the kids. Too much of my life revolved around games.
Dude I just play games whenever I want until whenever I don't want. It really depends on the mood thingy. Some games are ok for you to play for 12 hours in one sitting, some games make you play them "episodically" (until the end of the current situation), some games are just for playing until you are satisfied for the day when you were craving for their fun gameplay.
I usually swap between tons of games, I never play only one game for long. Even as hobby I cannot do same shit for long time therefore I have tons of hobbies. This can be also said for spending time with people to. I love my loved ones, yet I cannot talk to them all the time which doesn't mean I don't like them anymore or something. It just means we are chemical beings and there are stuff we cannot always chemically react to produce chemicals or spend chemicals about so sometimes good change is needed to make your life stay fresh!!! I also never play a game if it's not fun. You don't have to finish any game if you really don't wanna but if you bought the game tables are turned yet don't push yourself too hard if the game really suck and dreadful. Fuck it lol.
In the end instead of having "gamer burnout" I play games more to avoid having burnout or I fell to the abyss of burnout syndrome which fortunately didn't happen since I was in high school which really suck at as much as panic attack shit.
I've been in the exact same spot (and still sort of am). I can't bring myself to enjoy the newer games, the mainstream games, FPS games, and even stuff I used to enjoy younger. I launched a game for like 20 mins and then I closed it, being like "... no. I don't want to play that." on loop on everything, staring at my screen for an hour or two wondering if gaming is even for me at all anymore. I took a break but it didn't really change much. I think the issue is that we once enjoyed gaming for reasons that are not replicable now anymore, because of all of the microtransactions, that the games cost 70$ +300$ DLCS, buggy and incomplete releases, early access that are eternally unfinished, or because we already played those games before so it's not the same feeling.
But I have found a replacement, maybe a cure indirectly. I've came to pick up a new way of approaching gaming, and that was to only play forgotten games, obscure games, obscure mods that were made with soul but never went mainstream because it didn't make the normies cheer in joy (which is generally a good indicator of quality). And since I record what I play sometimes, it feels less unproductive as well.
Or sometimes I try a visual novel that's not mainstream and even qualified as very weird and just out of curiosity, I tried it. It's things like that. You have to look outside of mainstream games if you want to find soul, innovation (because by definition what is mainstream just copies what already works/is trendy, which is partly what makes it popular). That and the fact I don't pay for any games generally, so that I never feel bad about a purchase (also considering that i'm running quite low on money right now). I generally always wanted a game to play for 300 hours (like Skyrim) but then applying that mindset I spoke of earlier, I don't mind playing a game just a few hours anymore, because it's a discovery after another, or rediscovery sort of, playing games that used to be popular but aren't anymore is also kind of cool. That and flash games, there's a lot of depth and soul in that too, I play them sometimes too.
But yeah personally it has been sort of the cure for me, reinstalling forgotten games, playing dead games, lost media games, obscure stuff. Maybe it will work or not for you, who knows until we try after all. Oh and I went back in a previous hobby of mine as well, chess, maybe that can also help.
Thanks for your suggestions and sharing some of your experience. I used to be kind of like that too, but I was forced to not play for awhile because of wrist pain. Then when I could play again, I wanted to do it more often. That and putting HEN on my ps3 is how I got the monster I have created haha. Before also, my discs would read only part of the time, which caused me to only play a couple times a month. But I fixed that issue now haha.
I have done some chess lessons on Duolingo. I still am just learning the very basics.
I think this has a name: gaming fatigue. And this happens to me too. For six years, I've been running a website for which I've written many, many, many reviews. And it was probably too much. And I often reach the point of forcing myself to progress; the best choice is to take a step back.
Maybe it can help, this is what I do when this happens: replace gaming with reading for a few days. And when you feel like you want to play something, either choose an easy and short game, or something from your childhood as a comforter. Just beat a few levels, enjoy the music and that's it!
And of course, don't hesitate to give up on beating the games that you force yourself to play, if you don't find pleasure in them. It happened to me with Mother and Final Fantasy X-2 for example! I felt conflicted not to beat them but eventually, moving on to something else was the best choice.
Thanks for your suggestions and sharing your experience. Funny thing is I actually love reading and read twice a day every day haha. So it is my most consistent hobby and one I always get something out of.
I am starting to draw though and can probably do more there. I just have to go without gaming for some time so the body doesn't crave the stimulation in my free time, and instead I will want to do more of the low stimulating activities. Easier said than done. But I do enjoy reading and meditating which helps balance things out a lot of the time.
I can only really play for articles or short bursts nowadays -- been burned out for a really long time and probably would have quit altogether if it wasn't for the kids. Too much of my life revolved around games.
Dude I just play games whenever I want until whenever I don't want. It really depends on the mood thingy. Some games are ok for you to play for 12 hours in one sitting, some games make you play them "episodically" (until the end of the current situation), some games are just for playing until you are satisfied for the day when you were craving for their fun gameplay.
I usually swap between tons of games, I never play only one game for long. Even as hobby I cannot do same shit for long time therefore I have tons of hobbies. This can be also said for spending time with people to. I love my loved ones, yet I cannot talk to them all the time which doesn't mean I don't like them anymore or something. It just means we are chemical beings and there are stuff we cannot always chemically react to produce chemicals or spend chemicals about so sometimes good change is needed to make your life stay fresh!!! I also never play a game if it's not fun. You don't have to finish any game if you really don't wanna but if you bought the game tables are turned yet don't push yourself too hard if the game really suck and dreadful. Fuck it lol.
In the end instead of having "gamer burnout" I play games more to avoid having burnout or I fell to the abyss of burnout syndrome which fortunately didn't happen since I was in high school which really suck at as much as panic attack shit.
Good to hear! I think I put a lot of pressure on myself when I try to stick to one game or two. I will see more progress, but it doesn't always lead to enjoyment as I am seeing now.
It happens sometimes to me too. I usually try to rotate the type of games I play, different genres, modern vs retro, long-form games vs quick arcadey games etc to keep things fresh. When that doesn't work, I take a breather from games and focus on other hobbies for a bit, and that usually refreshes me when I come back.
I've been in the exact same spot (and still sort of am). I can't bring myself to enjoy the newer games, the mainstream games, FPS games, and even stuff I used to enjoy younger. I launched a game for like 20 mins and then I closed it, being like "... no. I don't want to play that." on loop on everything, staring at my screen for an hour or two wondering if gaming is even for me at all anymore. I took a break but it didn't really change much. I think the issue is that we once enjoyed gaming for reasons that are not replicable now anymore, because of all of the microtransactions, that the games cost 70$ +300$ DLCS, buggy and incomplete releases, early access that are eternally unfinished, or because we already played those games before so it's not the same feeling.
Yes that's a big thing but them for example I can blame how sucks new games are but then old games sucked hard too for different reasons. In the end I didn't play most of the games same as most of the games being released now. In the end it's a perception thingy to find a reason for a concept to make sense the concept, and to do that people find "new reasons" for it because they forget their old reasons. Because people forget without they are being aware of it they constantly change their way to live. That's why I always remind myself that I played really bad games and I remind myself Crazybus exist before I be too harsh on games, and I remind myself why I play games (it's better than doing tons of shit in life) and I remind myself what makes me play games (my mood). In the end yep tons of shit sucks hard in video game industry but it doesn't really prevent me from exploring what new games have to offer. Sometimes I end up playing really rubbish new game normally I wouldn't because I had the mood for it and that's all about it. However as people get old they get logical but it's more like they get more emotionally sensitive because as you live long expressing tons of BS take a toll in your soul as you get charged with emotions you sucked all up living that long, and then they hide their emotions behind their stubborn logic without even realizing that they believe they made logical decision but it's actually a "controlled" extreme emotional decision as a self defense mechanism to prevent themselves from exploding which usually a small trigger can make people end up murdering each other and fucked up shit, and as they try to get logical they start to limit themselves with their convictions ("New games suck hard anymore because they do what insane kids on Twitter wants" and whatnot justifications) and it can make people who getting old being less of a human who ignores the fact that they are a chemical being and their mood really matters and it's okay to do lots of stuff that their harsh beliefs and logic prevent them from. For example currently I think Expedition 66 suck hard for how junky the game is but as soon as I have the mood for the game I know I'll enjoy it. That's the way it's.
But if you wanna get deep into psychology behind it here it goes!!! Geronimo!!!!:
Human brain did evolve to support abstract concepts and imagination that is not like how real life is, yet most part of the brain and especially how your body works is still in the way of cavemen lifestyle. Constantly looking for gain and loses to prevent enemies and ally with friends. In this context why old times are always good is because it's past. Past cannot hurt you and therefore past cannot be your enemy. When something cannot be your enemy your brain stops filtering out good aspects to make you focus on bad aspects so you can survive which is a fundamental defense mechanism. That's why you do forget whatever that was bad in old days unless that bad aspects still effect your "now" and probably "future" too and this is the act of learning humans evolved with. In short being young and having da energy and power you hope for good future and you think past drags you down. And as you get old and life shit on you you start to see future is an enemy and live for present. After you get old and you can hardly deal with present you start to escape to a nostalgic romantic sense of a past as if past is your safe-haven and it makes you hate now and future more for whatever excuse you find. You get old and weak, you have less energy and less power to deal with lots of things and therefore as self-defense mechanism your brain does either of these things: You became so carefree you wouldn't care about clear danger signs or you are so hyper focused about finding negative aspects in anything that make you complain to complain and being angry and annoyed for nothing.
Another thing is being old means being weak, that means having less energy and having sensitive mind and body. That's why as you get old you think a lot about gain and loses to see if whatever you wanna do would worth it. And then having an adult life with limited time makes you be careful on what you spend your time on. In the end these all makes you focus more on bad aspect of anything and make your emotionally more react and in gaming context it's why it make you think how a new game doesn't worth your money, time and energy because you are old and you lack time and energy when that new game wasn't that bad as the old games you played, but then you spend your hours in your bed thinking how good gaming was decades ago but it wasn't "that good" actually. And then it causes an ignorance to see good aspects in new games that you will only notice after few more decades when they got old lol. That's why never let the kid in you die so you can stay as a sane healthy human!!!
Thanks for your suggestions and sharing some of your experience. I used to be kind of like that too, but I was forced to not play for awhile because of wrist pain. Then when I could play again, I wanted to do it more often. That and putting HEN on my ps3 is how I got the monster I have created haha. Before also, my discs would read only part of the time, which caused me to only play a couple times a month. But I fixed that issue now haha.
I have done some chess lessons on Duolingo. I still am just learning the very basics.
You're welcome! Damn yeah I can imagine having only one hand to play with can be a bit tricky to play most videogames. And congrats on getting started with chess! It's quite hard to progress in without the passion, but anyone can improve if they're dedicated! Can't wait to see you evolve in chess, feel free to hit me up whenever you'll want to play a match or something. Currently though if you're just beginning I think that'd be a bit too one-sided, I don't want to crush your will to play that incredible game. Word of advice though, you'll likely have to learn twice or thrice as more as people used to do at low levels back then, because the elo (at least on chess.com) has been facing a deflation because of how many people discover chess courses, tutorials, and as such people at 700 elo play like 1500 according to the chess engine, in summary it basically means that people now play at a higher level than what it was back in the day, even at beginner level. So you'll have to learn most if not all lessons to avoid being hardstuck (at least if you care at all about elo, which in my opinion, you really shouldn't, focus on the process, not the goal).
I agree with the psychology part, but for the rest I think you are mistaken, including the implications and what you assume I imply in my post, even if your statements make sense. I don't praise that all old games were better on all aspects, if anything I hated most NES games and SNES games. With emulation certain old games really aged poorly and that's why I mostly play PC games. What I mean by "new games suck" is not about a binary comparison of old = good, new = bad automatically; but instead I take into consideration that the videogame industry changed priorities, work mindset, and even was officially called an "industry" where it used to be about passion instead of the sales team pressuring the dev team to release the game early riddled with bugs and encouraging to fill it with microtransactions. Games did not have 40$ skins, hundred dollars DLCs (i.e Paradox Entertainment), were not riddled with bugs on release because there were no auto-updaters, were not injected with DEI politics at every corner, the devs generally were more invested in the product that they made rather than just wanting to get paid at the end of the month (the Elder Scrolls Oblivion dev team interview is a good example) and the game reviewers (IGN) were not bribed to make positive reviews even if the game itself is broken and unfun.
I used to be a Game Reviewer myself but got restricted for being too honest about the real quality of the games, and the whole devs approaching you to make a positive review in exchange of money IS real.
If you take the current timeline, with most new steam releases you always have a shitstorm one way or another and yet it doesn't stop the game from selling well thanks to 'influencers' and the 2 hours refund window. Mass-psychology is indeed a thing when it comes to the game industry, and you bet they know well how to abuse it (trailers containing 'this footage does not represent the gameplay of the game' or something along those words).
It was unacceptable to release a buggy games with 1/10 of the features promised, but now it has become the norm because the clientèle changed, the ethics changed and the consumers are not the same. Devs had every interest to make their game unique, innovative, and as high quality as possible because that's what people cared about, quality, otherwise they wouldn't want to buy the game; and not caring if their favorite Markiplier-type, extremely fake and emotionally exaggerated youtuber made a 1 million views video of it and thinks in a herd-like way of thinking "oh this is popular so i should play it" even though the game is pretty atrocious, such as Lethal Company or the flavor-of-the-month games. FNF never would have become popular without youtubers because it was based on a flash game and flash games do not get real widespread influence in 2025. I get why youtubers make the content that they do being one myself, prioritizing CTR and engagement, as such they will have all interest to depict games in a glorified manner, most flavor-of-the-month game videos can be taken as examples.
So let us avoid the strawman fallacy and Dünning Kruger effect by putting my statements in the basket of a disilusioned boomer (which I am not) that intentionally avoids the negative points out of a sense of confirmation bias.
For better game comparisons of what the new games have lost, I recommend watching Crowbcat's channel.
Still, I appreciate the effort you have put in your post and it does not go unnoticed.
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