Extreme Gamers

[thatstheguy]

What they Play did a blog on "Extreme Gamers"

http://www.whattheyplay.com/blog/2008/08/11/are-you-or-your-kids-extreme-gamers/

Can you Imagine playing 45 hours a week and buying 24 games in 3 months? I don't think I get that many games in a year. I highly doubt that very many people can play that long. And with the average game costing 50 bucks, that's nearly 1,200 dollars in that time! But what to you guys think about this and do you think there are a numerous amount who do fall in this category?

 

[Dudemeister]

Sounds like an addiction.
There's no way they could play all those games, it's just impossible.

 

[AwesomeHat]

I can say I've played 45 hours a week before, easily. When Oblivion came out, when Fallout 3 came out, stuff like that. Course, this depends on whether or not I had the time, being a interior renovator doesn't really give me set working hours.

Buying that amount of games though, no, that's just ridiculous.

 

[geldonyetich]

I was certainly an extreme gamer when I was young, and I think I did play a lot more games back then. I didn't buy them though, I largely pirated them. (Here's hoping I can't get prosecuted for admitting I pirated Commodore 64 games when I was half my age.) Chances are, these 12+ games a month kids are doing the same thing, unless their parents are loaded.

Funny thing is, I was able to play all those games. I guess it's a product of the younger mind's better learning drives. Then again, games were a lot shorter back then, and it's possible I'm just much more of a discerning gamer now - too easily bored of what I've already bored of in previous games to spend that much time playing the clones that pass for games anymore.

Though I no longer pirate games (as an aspiring game developer myself it's now offensive to consider ripping off the toil of another's labor without paying for it) I still spend some 45-90 hours a week on the computer. I'm fairly addicted, but it's more of a mental addiction, and apparently a pretty weak one considering how bored I am of it. Soon, should I get hired, I'll be heading back to full time work, and I can no longer claim such a status. I did hold down a full-time job once for over 3 1/2 years, and I'm only 12 credits short of a bachelor's at the community University, so it's a pretty tame addiction I guess.

What that report [http://www.whattheyplay.com/blog/2008/08/11/are-you-or-your-kids-extreme-gamers/] is basically saying is that, because I'm an extreme gamer who falls into about 3% of the demographics of players, I'm only worth about 9% of the potential target niche for those developing games (assuming I buy 3 times more than average). Because of this, the vast majority of games are going to be developed for the other 91% of the demographic, and consequently I'm going to spend a lot of time unsatisfied about the kinds of games I get to play.

That's more or less why I've finally got fed up and started "rolling my own." Granted, my procrastinator's tendencies from a lifetime of extreme gaming don't make it easy.

 

[xitel]

I've played 45 hours in 4 days before...

 

[SimuLord]

I've played 45 hours in 4 days...hell, I've played 45 hours in two days. When a good enough game comes out it pretty much consumes my life for the first week I have it in my possession, which is why I usually try to time my vacations around new game releases so it won't interfere with my work.

 

[sequio]

Extreme gamers burn out pretty fast. My experience is 50+ hours of Age of Empires 2 with 8 people. I say 50+ because although I'm sure it was 4 days straight none of us could remember anything about the last 2 days. What we ate, who paid for food, who won, why John wasn't wearing any clothes, why was there a baseball bat hanging from the ceiling, etc. nobody remembers.

 

[curlycrouton]

Notice the website's slogan, "The parents guide to video games".

According to the report, while the PC is used more than any single console for gaming, console gamers, young heavy gamers, and extreme gamers are more likely to use consoles than a PC to play video games.

What? I presume they've never heard of 6-day long LAN conventions.

 

[Dommyboy]

45 hours ey? Hmmm.. I'm not far off.

 

[ZacQuickSilver]

If it weren't for that "24 titles in the last 3 months" thing, I'd come close. I'm easily playing games that much (Not all electronic: I do 8-10 hour D&D sessions every week while in school, and often add close to 10 hours of card games/week to that).

However, in the past year, I've bought maybe 8 games. Maybe less. And that's computer games, board games, and the subscription to Pardus.

Such is the life of a College student.

 

[OneBig Man]

I'm pretty sure i spent about 55 hours playing KOTOR2 this past week. The only other rpg I realy played through before was fable but it was no where near as long. I mean I'm not sure if I'm even half way through yet. It is addicting, but the first step is admitting the problem.

 

[Social Pariah]

I play that many hours sure... even more when I was younger.

But 24 over 3 months? Pocket money has seemingly skyrocketed in that case or children gotten more spoiled.

 

[Caliostro]

The "time played" doesn't bother me much, I've done nearly the same when I had the time, the 24 games in 3 months though...Doesn't sound like they're enjoying them tbh.

 

[Aiden Rebirth]

these people scare me... i mean i'm though i was a little addicted, 30 hours a week, and 1 new games every 3 months...

 

[SAccharing10]

Buying every game that comes out, even if you can afford it is an addition, a shit addiction at that, atleast get addicted to sex or booze like real men.

 

[TsunamiWombat]

And to think, I felt bad for getting 3 games in a month.

 

[BlueMage]

Hmm, I enjoy sleeping too much to be called an extreme gamer anymore. Oh, and this little thing called work.

 

[Jandau]

Since it's the hollydays, I get to play a lot, perhaps even that much.

Though I do acquire several games a month, 8 a month sounds a bit excessive...

 

[rokudan]

My question is: why is it any of their business. I work my job, pay my morgage, so if I want to play games with "my" free time using "my" hard earned money, who are they to say I am wrong.

 

[Shalakor]

I know of one summer I "technically" filled both of those criteria.

My cousin and I spent pretty much all summer playing the GameCube games "Phantasy Star Online: Ep. 1 & 2"(completely offline and mostly single player) and Sonic Adventure 2: Battle (single player), every day, all day, almost exclusively.
At some points we even slept and ate in shifts and the GameCube would not stay off for more then a few hours a week.
Eventually, the GameCube got burned out and could no longer spin the disk enough to reliably play the games anymore so I bought a GameCube from an acquaintance which came with 22 or so games (2-3 of them being doubles of what I owned already) and I had already bought a few games at the start of the summer.

I am fairly certain we each played over 45 hours of video games a week almost all summer even on most of the weeks that we took time out to play the "Magic the Gathering" card game and near daily D&D sessions at some points.

That was one crazy, stat filled, level up tastic, summer of non-drug induced (on my part anyway, I didn't and do not do drugs, not even caffeine if you can believe it) super insanity.

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Video Games are the path to the enlightenment of Humankind, or at least Reptitekind.