Why I Dislike Addictive Games

[guest509]

I've been playing Terraria. Or rather I have been playing the skinner box that is Terraria. What a chore man, a huge chore.

I like to pick up a game and just play, then put it down. No, with Terraria you need to grind repetitive shit for FOREVER just to get anywhere. You have to go online and find the secrets so you can build what you need to build to advance, or to figure out how to make a boss appear to advance. Pretty soon you've ground away for like 20 hours. Mindless. Hoping for that next raisin.

Sandbox games have a lot of appeal to me. Choice. Freedom. Fun. But I'm just too old now to put my efforts into a game I have to build up over weeks and weeks of play. Even the multiplayer fragfests I get into with my friends, like Call of Duty, require dozens of hours of play to unlock all the little goodies. Even Starcraft has little goodies if you grind away your time like a good little rodent. Not to mention it takes FOREVER to learn all the little things. I like a good online sport game maybe but the time commitment to even be mediocre at Starcraft is just enormous. I find myself watching strategy videos and stuff to learn more. And I've played at least a hundred hours of that game.

Enough. I'll no longer play games like that. Ever.

A good roguelike is great, I can play for an hour and ascend (or die over and over and over and over) and then just be done. No coming back to level up my guy more and more.

Even the strategy games I've been playing can work similarly. Just a huge time suck. This was cool when I was sick and couldn't do much else, or when I was a kid and had nothing else worth doing. But anymore man these games are just too much.

Imma stick with arcade style and roguelikes from now on. Short sessions. Nothing with a continuous grind. I think my easy test will be 'can you speed run it'. If no, the I'm not interested. I may even put a one hour time limit on it, that's freakin' long for a speed run.

BTW anyone know what the speedrun record is for Nethack? ToME? Adom? Crawl? Those games might be right out the window as well.

[Holsety]

Imma stick with arcade style and roguelikes from now on. Short sessions. Nothing with a continuous grind. I think my easy test will be 'can you speed run it'. If no, the I'm not interested. I may even put a one hour time limit on it, that's freakin' long for a speed run.

Huzzah! Consider playing actual arcade games through MAME. They don't make nearly enough arcade style games nowadays.

[guest509]

Lol!

I went to the bank to start up a savings account and they asked me what I was saving up for.

"I'd like to create a stand up arcade machine based on MAME."

Banking lady = 

Me = 

[TheCreator]

I went to the bank to start up a savings account and they asked me what I was saving up for.

"I'd like to create a stand up arcade machine based on MAME."

Next time you visit the bank, "Not your business" should be accepted as a satisfying and polite answer .

[guest509]

Well I pulled that when they asked me "where do you work?"

Me <shakes head in silence>.

[Darren Grey]

Over here at least there are companies that sell pre-built MAME arcade units. They cost around £850. nice thing is if the controls go wonky or anything it's on warranty for at least a year so you can get it repaired for free.

Anyway, most games are a bit shite, yes. But some roguelikes are a bit shite too and grindy too. The thing is to be picky about what you play.

[guest509]

Grinding is fine Darren. The search for the epic loot pinata is fun if done right.

My beef is with the addictive effect of the never ending grind. Where TIME SPENT is the determining factor in advancement.

I want FUN not addiction. Sex not Crack.

Think of FTL. How long does it take to beat? Can I play again after beating it and still have fun? Contrast that with WoW or Terraria or Starcraft or Call of Duty. They are like a lifestyle.

Roguelikes are not infinite raisin machines. So nearly the entire genre is a nonaddictive just for fun genre. Though I guess fun can also be addictive. Arcade game are the same way.

Darren have you played Terraria? It's ten bucks on steam. Or try some Diablo III.

Then play ANY Megaman game, or ANY roguelike. You'll end up playing tons of hours on Diablo or Terraria but then think back on the experience and realize that killing Dr. Wily or ascending was a far better experience that didn't have to suck you in so bad it impacted you social/domestic/professional life.

[Vanguard]

I think I hate the skinner box trend in gaming more than any other.  Either that or the idea that if you can't save everywhere or the developer didn't put a checkpoint every five steps, then that's "fake difficulty."

Things have gotten so bad that I think the skinner boxes now outnumber games about skill and learning.

[Anvilfolk]

This is one of the reasons I've mostly stopped playing certain genres offline. I force myself not to play certain games. Some I know are going to suck me in for hours on end... and get me a meaningless piece of loot.

Sharing the experience online, especially with VOIP, makes these experience social though. And social activities are, to me, a good thing. I do not feel I have wasted away time if I'm bonding with someone else over that activity.

For offline, the game has to offer some challenge, or some form of "content". Strategy games, turn-based or RTS, with significant difficulty, make you think constantly and outdo yourself. That's another activity I consider worthwhile. Others train your reflexes... Certain grognard games have historical content that makes you realise what a lot of people went through in this or that war, so that's another reason I'd play offline.

RPGs typically have little of this, if played offline. Click click click click clickityclick. Minecraft and Terraria, or world-building games in general, give you an open world to exercise creativity, and that's OK offline, but definitely better when bonding over it with friends.

Nice to see someone who feels the same way about modern games!

[ekolis]

Roguelikes are not Skinner boxes too? The only difference is in a roguelike, your character dies, but the same mechanic of grinding (this time for knowledge of the game mechanics, not for XP or gold or ph4t l3wt) is still there...

[guest509]

Don't get hung up on the skinner box metaphor.

The real question is this, does your game reward simple TIME or SKILL.

If you are just grinding away the hours, getting further simply by playing, that's what I mean. That's very addictive and though it can be fun it leaves you empty.

But if you are gaining skill in the game, learning and getting better. That's great.

[Vanguard]

In that case, quicksave games should be counted just as much as Skinner box games.

[Holsety]

If you are just grinding away the hours, getting further simply by playing, that's what I mean. That's very addictive and though it can be fun it leaves you empty.

Yeah, I know that feel. It could just be a sign you/we're getting older 
When I was younger I'd play almost anything, but now I'd rather play things  that give me the most game in the shortest amount of time... Mostly because I don't have the time to level all the classes in Disgaea to levl 9999 anymore... If the fancy grabs me I'll give it a try, but it's such a sour feeling if real life gets my attention again and I come back to the game four weeks later thinking "I can't remember what the fuck I was doing and going to do in this game when I stopped playing.".
Don't get me wrong, sometimes I still get the itch to go and just lose some days of my life in a certain game, but when I aks myself "Do I have it in me to invest another 800 hours in Morrowind?" I can only answer No.