Getting bored of gaming..help?

[AlexanderKira]

Hello, I've been a gamer all my life. First console was the N64, and Pokemon Stadium was the best game. I loved Pokemon for a long time, but then I found Mario. Then the PS2 consumed me, Jak and Daxter, Sly Cooper, Ratchet and Clank, Ty the Tasmanian tiger, just all great. I then got an Xbox 360 and played Halo offline with my bros, no internet till 2011, and Oblivion. Oblivion remains among my top favorite. I've since then gotten Xbox Live and a PS3. I've played COD online since BLOPS, BLOPS 2 was amazing at first, but I've gotten so bored with it, same as Hallo 4. Skyrim's just killing guards now. The only game that I've beaten, and liked in recent memory is The Walking Dead. I decided I needed a change, so I bought a 3DS for Christmas, got Pokemon Black 2, DQ 9, and Super Mario 3D Land, all in an efgort to have "fun". Pokemon was fun, then it became very repetitive, same for DQ 9. I read so many reviews on Super Mario 3D Land that said, "It's hard to play this game without a smile on your face." So I sat down to play and I enjoyed the levels but realized as I was floating in a Tenuki suit that in the 2 hours of playing... I hadn't smiled, grinned, or chuckled. Farcry 3 has been entertaining, but haven't picked it back up in a week, gonna play Hitman Absolution soon. I cancelled my Xbox live today, I need to have fun on my PS3 and 3DS, I'm scared that I am getting bored with games, I wanna make' em when I'm older. I'm 17...help?

 

[Sparkie]

Dude. Seriously. Pick up a book. Take a walk. Chat with friends. Write. Do whatever, but give yourself a break. Video games are not the only pastime in the world.

If you really do want to create your own games in the future, fine. Spend time playing them, a lot of time if you're so inclined. Just remember that even the very best game developers don't play video games all the time. Widen out your interests.

 

[danr62]

Gaming gets to be a bit old after a while. I mean sure, it's fun and all but too much of anything and you soon get tired of it. Games are one of those things that get old faster than some other things, especially if you don't have anyone to hang out and play with.

Instead of frantically trying to find a new game that will reignite your love for the medium, try something else for a while. Read a few books. Go for a walk. Do something active. Or, something that engages your imagination, maybe try writing your own game plot or a fanfic based on one of the games. Variety is the spice of life and all that.

 

[AlexanderKira]

I do read..a lot. Read every book of A Song of Ice and Fire, Patrick Rothfuss, love Brandon Sanderson's stuff, and Michael J. Sullivan. Even some Ayn Rand. I hang out with friends and play cards, do creative writing excercises, and even tabletop roleplaying. I love Breaking Bad, Mad Men, and Walking Dead. I do a lot of imaginative stuff, I just.. don't get it.

 

[Sparkie]

I do read..a lot. Read every book of A Song of Ice and Fire, Patrick Rothfuss, love Brandon Sanderson's stuff, and Michael J. Sullivan. Even some Ayn Rand. I hang out with friends and play cards, do creative writing excercises, and even tabletop roleplaying. I love Breaking Bad, Mad Men, and Walking Dead. I do a lot of imaginative stuff, I just.. don't get it.

Great! Now, concentrate on the above activities and ignore video games for a while. Do not allow yourself to pick up a game controller for a set period of time (maybe a month or two... or longer). There's an old saw that's appropriate for this situation: Absence makes the heart grow fonder. Put some time and distance between you and gaming, and you'll eventually get back to playing and enjoying video games.

 

[CupofJoe]

And I'd drop the Ayn Rand - no good will come of it...

 

[Philip Overby]

I have similar "phases" of sorts. I'm much older than you, and I've gone through these phases my whole life. I've been an avid game since I was about eight and have since always owned some kind of console. Even though I have loads of games, sometimes I just start playing them and I get bored, even really awesome games. I'd do what Sparkie suggests: take a break.

If you take a break for a while then come back and play some of your old favorites, you'll probably feel better about it. I love ice cream. But if I eat ice cream all day everyday, I'm going to get bored of it. Same goes with me and reading, writing, watching movies, and every other thing I like. Sometimes I just need to take a break and focus on something else.

Taking a walk is awesome by the way. I try to do that once a day and it gives me time to reflect on things and even gives me story ideas.

 

[Reaver]

Want a little excitement in your life? I don't know how old you are, but when you turn 17, do what I did: Enlist in the Marine Corps. It's called the Delayed Entry Program.

If the Marines aren't for you, the Army has a Delayed Entry Program too.

Hope this helps.

 

[Shockley]

It seems to me like you are engrossed in pop culture, based on the gaming and what you described as your other past times.

Do something completely different. You described what books you liked - read 'For Whom the Bells Toll.' You described your shows - watch 'Cosmos.' Make new friends, meet new people, join a social club, etc. You have a new chunk of time in your life - don't waste mourning it for what could have been.

 

[Chilari]

Indeed, Shockley's hit the nail on the head - don't mourn the video games, celebrate the time you now have for other things. Delve into the depths of knowledge. Find out things you never knew. Click Random a few times on Wikipedia then research anything that sounds interesting. Learn to do something you've never tried before. Read a book about a culture you don't know much about, the history of a country you've never been to. Prussia might be a good start. I can guaruntee you've never been there. It hasn't existed in a while, but it was a major player on the world stage in the 18th and early 19th centuries. Or try the city of Corinth, which had a pretty turbulent history, a powerful archaic Greek city before being superceded by Athens in the classical period, destroyed by Romans then rebuilt as a Roman colony by Julius Caesar, occupied by Byzantine and Frankish empires, destroyed by the Ottomans, rebuilt, destroyed again, rebuilt, and even considered for the capital of the new nation of Greece in 1834.

Basically, find out about something new. Learn about the infinite variety of the world you live in. It's addictive, and far more interesting than video games (and this from someone who would play from 7pm til 2am on the original Civilization every night for weeks when I was your age, though it was then an old game, and still plays hours a day on Minecraft, Guild Wars 2, Pokemon Soul Silver, F1 2012, TF2, Portal 1 & 2, Left 4 Dead 1 & 2, and a fair few besides).

Edit: and if Corinth does interest you, I have written on the topic myself here.

 

[Zero Angel]

Wow!

It sounds like you play too much. I wish I had time to play games that much, but I don't ever get tired of games, I just don't have time to play them anymore.

I'm not saying it like "you should be doing other things" when I say it sounds like you play too much (because I think video games are freaking awesome), but it sounds like your threshold is lower than what you've been putting into your hobby. To put it in economics terms, you've inflated your video game economy.

Ignoring being able to afford all of the games that you are playing (I assume you have the means and are not going into debt), what about video games draws you in? What experiences do make you smile? Is it the challenge? The stories? The unique experiences? Figure out what about games draws you in and gets you to feel that sense of satisfaction while simultaneously makes you want more and then go after those qualities in other games.

And when/if you are making games of your own, make sure that you incorporate what you love the most about them. Good luck!

 

[Anders Ämting]

Let me get this straight. You are seventeen years old and you consider "getting bored of playing video games" to be an actual problem?

o__O

...Okay, look. There is this thing called "habituation." It basically means that the more you experience a certain stimuli, the more desensitized you become. It applies to basically everything. For example, if you watch a lot of horror movies, eventually you stop being afraid, because your brain gets used to it. Or if you eat a lot of spicy food, you start craving stronger spices, etc. The same thing applies to video games - eventually you get fed up. It's not at all strange or unexpected. It's what always happens when you do a certain thing over and over for a very long time.

It doesn't have to be a bad thing, though. If you are a productive type of person, it tends to spurn you on and make you less likely to stagnate. It's a source of inspiration: The main reason I want to write books is because nobody is writing the kind of really awesome books I'd like to read, so I have to do it myself. As for you, if you find all games to be boring, you can probably think of ways to make them more interesting.

I do read..a lot. Read every book of A Song of Ice and Fire, Patrick Rothfuss, love Brandon Sanderson's stuff, and Michael J. Sullivan. Even some Ayn Rand. I hang out with friends and play cards, do creative writing excercises, and even tabletop roleplaying. I love Breaking Bad, Mad Men, and Walking Dead. I do a lot of imaginative stuff, I just.. don't get it.

Having an imagination and doing creative stuff is fine and all but... Well, do you have any skills actually related to making video games? Like, writing code or something? Can you at least put together a decent mod for Skyrim? Because my impression of the video game industry is that "having played all the games" is not really the kind of experience game developers normally covet.

You want to make games "when you're older"? What, is that before or after you become an astronaut? Do you realize that you'll be considered legally adult in one year? Cut down on the pastimes and aquire skills that make you useful!

 

[Cinninamon]

Personally, I haven't played many "new" games besides Pokemon, Mario and Twilight Princess. My personal console of choice forever will probably my PS2 because it was the first console I ever got. Currently, I'm playing through The Legend of Spyro series because I've only played the first one, but I should also get around to downloading some Doom 2 WADs to play on Skulltag since I've only ever played Doom 2. Maybe find some older games you've never played?

 

[Zero Angel]

Personally, I haven't played many "new" games besides Pokemon, Mario and Twilight Princess. My personal console of choice forever will probably my PS2 because it was the first console I ever got. Currently, I'm playing through The Legend of Spyro series because I've only played the first one, but I should also get around to downloading some Doom 2 WADs to play on Skulltag since I've only ever played Doom 2. Maybe find some older games you've never played?

There are emulators you can download that are rather functional for older systems if you're craving some retro style. I'm no lawyer so I do not pretend to know the legality of such machines; although most people that get them argue if you already own the consoles/games it's OK, there is no test to prevent people that don't own them from downloading emulators and games for the emulators.

 

[Chilari]

Yeah, I pay Pokemon on an emulator. I have the game somewhere, but it has an existing save on it and I wanted to do a Nuzlocke run.