losing interest in games as you get older?

Hello, just wanted to get your take on this question. I, personally have experienced a drop off in interest in gaming the past 5-6 years. I'm 34 and I've been playing PC games since high school. How's your interest holding up over the years?rlc-madcat

I'm definitely not as fierce or passionate a game enthusiast as I once was ( I'm 28 ), but it's difficult for me to understand if my lessening interest has to do with changing tastes in me, or if I simply have more responsibilities diverting my energy away.

Hello, just wanted to get your take on this question. I, personally have experienced a drop off in interest in gaming the past 5-6 years. I'm 34 and I've been playing PC games since high school. How's your interest holding up over the years?rlc-madcat

It depends. I'm somewhat more picky about what games i want to play than i did when i was younger. I've always enjoyed strategy games (since i was 10 i believe) and coincidently i still enjoy them quite a bit (i'm playing europa universalis 3 non-stop at the moment).

However, I rarely touch FPS's unless they have an interesting RPG element (deus ex) or have interesting multiplayer (eg. battlefield series). It really depends on the genre.

Overall, though, i dislike simplistic games like C&C3 or oblivion, for example, which i haven't touched in ages (when i was younger i'd probably be playing them right now). I like games that tend to be more complicated, original, and interesting, hence why i've become more picky about the games that i play.

I'm definitely 1000 times more choosy than I was as a kid, only playing through the best games out there. As a result, I definitely play fewer games, but that also is largely due to the fact that I put in a ton of hours at work every week. When I get home, though, there's nothing I love more than settling down with a good game on monitor one, and a good movie on monitor two, backing in their radiant glow :DMikaivo

same here, except for the job part :P

For me its not age, its whats going on in my life and other events. I'm 40 and I played regularly until summer hit and I started getting involved in a relationship, now they have not been my primary focus....but that doesnt mean I wont return to them more often somewhere down the road.

I don't necessarily think that age has anything to do with it, but rather the quality of games these days. There's a lack of innovation, gameplay mechanics and good storylines in a lot of games released these days, all because they tend to focus more on making it pretty looking rather than fun to play. Granted, there are a few games which stands out from the crowd and they manage to bring all elements into play which essentially makes them fun & interesting even for old time gamers such as myself.BounceDK

You might be right--don't get me wrong--but don't you worry that what seems from your perspective like a shift in game quality might, in fact, be due in part to a shift in your perspective? How can you tell? How do we gamers make objective statements about how games were made when we were 10, versus how they're made now that we're 30?

Again, I don't deny that game standards change. You're probably right, at least in PART. But I suspect it's more complicated overall.

I started playng when I was 9 years old, now I'm 21 and the interest is raising and raising ^^

The games have more and more possibilties and options, also the graphics get better, what makes them more fun. Been playng 12 years now actively and still kickin with full throttle.

Some mentioned in previous posts that games get more boring and not so much new going on. Well imo there are enough really good games coming out all the time, you just have to look and search for them more than you had in 5 years ago. I spend at least an hour almost everyday by browsing game sites and reading about games then download demos. At times I get lucky and find a interesting game again to play with.

I really liked games when i was 15~16, but in the last 2 years (im 18) my interest has been dropping real fast even though i spent alot of money on a High-end PC, now all i can think about it's gym, running, the beach and the ladies, but i'm not very good at the last part xD

Im 24 and started losing interest when they started releasing ported games from consoles to the PC with little to no effort. After Rainbow six Vegas i figured "screw it", and started reading books and finding hobbies away from the computer, i would still play oblivion or have a quick match of RO but really knocked my video game time down. Just recently ive gotten back into "hardcore" gaming with bioshock in the sense that i sat and played it for multiple hours a day, averaging around 5 hours a sitting (great game btw). I guess because im a PC gamer im usually at the obtuse angle of the market and it easy to get discouraged when you have a $2000 machine and all the games wind up on xbox. Theres only a few games on the horizen that im interested in, Crysis, UT3, GeOW, Assassins creed so im not throwing in the towel yet. If your losing interest in games you can always try switching the genres up.

If you have a decent computer, this year wont disappoint. Just wait until Nov

if anyting i have more interest now then when i was a kid,

but then again i do have the internet and money now so probably means i could just afford more now

For me its not age, its whats going on in my life and other events.

quadraleap

Same, while i'm young, i'm about to enlist into the USMC next year and games is slowly not becoming my number 1 priority.

I wouldn't say my interest has decreased but I don't spend nearly as much playing games as I have in the past. It's mostly due to the fact that I can't find many games that holds my interest for more than a week. The games I do like I definately don't have the time anymore due to work and making time for my wife ;).

I remember in high school when warcraft 2 was pretty new I spent an entire summer like 8-12 hours a day playing that. No time for such endeavors anymore...

I do not think is lost of interest as it is a lost of time to play games. I work all day on computers and when I come home I just want to watch alittle TV or I have to talk to my wife about her day. happy2012

This is pretty close to my situation. Most of my gaming is done on the weekends and that's only if I don't have plans (an dmy wife didn't make any for us) for the weekend. Because of this, I don't purchase games as many games as I used to. This kind of works out to my advantage though, because I remember when I was younger constantly looking at the titles on the shelf looking for something new to play.

I probably get in more gaming on my DS than any other platform because it's so easy to pick up and play for a short period of time. Plus, my job often takes me TDY so it's useful for passing time at the airport, hotel, etc.

Well, as i grow older i tend to play less shooters and such. Also most of the games now are just dumbed down console ports (they don't make games like Fallout anymore), that's probably the biggest reason in my playing time drop.

I'm almost 20. Throughout high school, I lost most of my interest. Ever since WoW took over my life, I haven't played much.andrewt1187

Pretty much the same. Although CS and Diablo II took over for me. I'm excited about games coming out and stuff but I never have FUN playing games. When I was younger I was totally immersed in games. Playing Deus Ex was one of the greatest experiences of my life. Now... meh :/

The games industry is took much like the movie one now. The same stuff all over again

I don't necessarily think that age has anything to do with it, but rather the quality of games these days. There's a lack of innovation, gameplay mechanics and good storylines in a lot of games released these days, all because they tend to focus more on making it pretty looking rather than fun to play. Granted, there are a few games which stands out from the crowd and they manage to bring all elements into play which essentially makes them fun & interesting even for old time gamers such as myself.BounceDK

I'm 100% with you. I mostly play RPGs, and when I compare recent offerings to the story-driven RPGs of yesteryear (Baldur's Gate series, Planescape:Torment, Wizardry 8 ), I find most of the recent titles to be lackluster at best. There have been a few recent standouts (Morrowind comes to mind, or the two Neverwinter Nights expansions SoU and HotU), but really, most of what's available these days have simplistic or unintelligible plots draped over graphics-intensive combat engines. Whee.

I used to describe it as "being chased around." When I'd play a game that was so good I'd find myself thinking about it even when I wasn't playing--at work, at the dinner table, in church--that was a great game. What was it about the Baldur's Gate series that made it so cool, so epic, so fun? I wish I could put my finger on it, but a game hasn't "chased me around" in a long time.

But I keep looking!

When i was younger i played every game that i could get.

Crazy games, very stupid one 2, but i liked it...

@ this time i expect more from games... so i buy only good ones i liked the demos from etc..

So i think its cuz of 'expecting'.

But i still like many many games & if i once play a game and looking so hot, i play it very very much.

I Still like games but yeah I know what you're talking about. The same games I 'used to' like are not as appealing anymore. I don't think its a matter of getting older its a matter of expectations. You play 16 bit games, you see 32 bit games and you say 'wow I want to play those'. It is exponential our appetite for better games. There will be a point when they can't make improvements fast enough. I find it hard to believe that we can keep up this doubling graphics performance thing up forever:

8

16

32(snes)

64(n64, ps)

128(ps2, gcn, xbox)

256(ps3, xbox360)

512(expected about 3 years from now)

1024...(10 years from now?)

2048 (15-18 years think 'the matrix')

I'm almost turning 17, my interest in games is about the same as always, but lately i got a little bit bored, and im waiting till a game comes out that is running in my head, something very complex and very real, if that game every comes out, we are about 10 years further from now, and im lately a bit dissapointed how games are becouse of that idea in my head :roll:

I Still like games but yeah I know what you're talking about. The same games I 'used to' like are not as appealing anymore. I don't think its a matter of getting older its a matter of expectations. You play 16 bit games, you see 32 bit games and you say 'wow I want to play those'. It is exponential our appetite for better games. There will be a point when they can't make improvements fast enough. I find it hard to believe that we can keep up this doubling graphics performance thing up forever:

8

16

32(snes)

64(n64, ps)

128(ps2, gcn, xbox)

256(ps3, xbox360)

512(expected about 3 years from now)

1024...(10 years from now?)

2048 (15-18 years think 'the matrix')

gam3r3OOO

damm thats all wrong dude, snes is 16, ps is 32, xbox is also 32, dunno about this gen

and bits has stopped beeing an important factor on graphics and processing power some time ago, now you must analyze everything like Cache, Mhz, Nr of cores, etc.

It seems alot of people are consistent to their stories. As we are older and have a job, we are able to buy our own games actually increasing our interest. I have to say Im the same way.

Another thing is seems consistent with everyone eise is people who grew up on SNES, genesis and other older consoles when they are younger.Then the kid grows up to a young adult, he still have interest in gaming. Its like new past time for our generation. Look at how many mature rated games out there.Developers are all targetingpeople who grew up on NES and SNES.

When I was teenager, I would get excited about so many different new releases, and would pretty much just play anything. There were also some times where I would spend all day playing a game just to finish it. I remember when i first got FFVIII, I played that game for like 3 days straight.

Today I am a lot more choosy. I don't even get that "I can't wait for release" feeling anymore. Hype has absolutely zero effect on me, and if the concept behind the game doesn't interest me, chances are I am not even going to think about it again. Hell, I didn't even know what the much hyped Bioshock was about until a few days after it's release and I decided to download a demo. But then again I couldn't care less about new fps games because I played so many of them since 1998, they are all starting to look the same.

Only games that have interested me in the past year were Spore and Mass Effect. Really, I don't think my interest in gaming has gone away, just that I have become jaded. I still enjoy playing games as much as I used to but I have played so many games that only something with a completely new concept, like Spore, will get my interest. There is also the fact that these days I would rather not spend all day playing video games.

I'm not losing interest in wanting to play games. I'm just losing patience, faith, and respect for the industry. As for pc gaming, over the many years I have tolerated the constant upgrading, tweaking, and fussing to keep playing the games. I've always been led to believe that the industry is improving and is getting more standardized. With each new generation of hardware, we are told that compatibility issues are improving. When in fact, I have seen no real evidence of this, in fact, it's getting worse than it ever has been.

Nowadays, you are fortunate if you can even get pass the overly zealous security software to play your purchased games. In the meantime, while we struggle to play our purchased games, pirates effortlessly bypass these security measures. These things were designed to prevent a novice from stealing software, the same people who don't even know what a torrent is to begin with.

Drivers are a mess (still, as they have always been). Most new games require an update, yet, I have often found that updating to a new driver causes problems with other games. There's really no such thing as backward compatibility in this industry.

And then there is the lack of support. The $50 you pay for a new game gets you virtually no support when you have problems. Game developers don't understand the concept of logging. Instead, you just get freezes or generic messages not giving you any clue as to what may be wrong. If you are lucky to find support of any kind, usually your intelligent gets insulted (example, they ask if you updated your drivers after you already told them you did.) DVD player won't play a particular game? Good luck trying to return it to the store for a refund. Exchange for the same game usually gives the same problem.

My rant is getting long enough, and I could easily go on. But I think I've made my point. And as for the console game industry, my gripes are just as extensive. But that's for a different thread in a different forum.

I can't say that I've lost interest, but I've certainly been playing less games/having less fun on the whole. I think it's actually me becoming pickier.

I've found that the games I enjoy now are also the ones that I'm actually excited to play. Also, the games need to have real value- living in China, well, there's no option to buy legitimate copies of games (short of me flying to another city). When I buy a game at $1, well, that's all the value I'll ever really take from it....which is almost nothing. I'm happy to see things like Steam really gaining...steam (wow that turned out to be lame) so I can buy legit from anywhere. I wish Ubi would jump on board instead of limiting their games to North America.

Unfortunately for myself, there's only two games on the horizon that I'm really excited to play- Spore and LittleBigPlanet. Including released games, it adds Wind Waker and Shadow of the Colossus. I bought WW three days ago, and despite disliking (and sucking) at all previous Zeldas, I'm having an absolute blast because I really wanted to play it. Had it been Zelda:TP, I would've played for an hour and just stopped. Also, had I been able to buy a pirated of copy of the game, I probably wouldn't playing so much in such a short time- I'm actually happy I shelled out $20 for it.

So for me, it's a matter of finding games that actually get me excited to play them and paying legitimate prices for them.

With each passing year I'm less interested. It is not that I don't like gaming, I enjoy good games, but those games get more rare each year and I no longer expect anything good. In the past I enjoyed strategy, adventure and rpgs above all and would play those games over and over and feel great, I read about them and thought "hey, this sounds good, it's new and might work", but now I read something about a game and think "hell, haven't I done this crap a thousand times already? Wasn't that old game better made?"

Even if we leave originality aside... is it so hard to test games to remove enough bugs to at least make them playable? is it so hard to port a game so it doesn't run better in an emulator? (yep, that's exaggerating, but...) is it SO hard to write a decent story?

I haven't updated my computer in a loong time, but seeing what is going to be released soon, even if my computer can't take it, I won't miss anything.

I definetly agree about losing interest, to an extent. When I was in my teen years I play games all the time, and followed them much more than I do now. I still enjoy gaming, but now that I have grown up and have responsibilties, gaming takes somewhat of a backburner in my life, as far the amount of time I spend on it anyways.

I go through phases though, a game will always come along that really grabs me and I end up going crazy on it and playing it non-stop for awhile like the old days. But for the most part, my interest has waned over the years, mainly due to the fact that I don't have the time to devote to it like I used too.