"WTF Am I Doing with My Life?" moments while gaming?

Please understand I am making this thread lightheartedly, but at the same time...

...let's get super, super cereal about this: do you ever spend some time--usually a lot of time but not always--with a game and have "WTF, why am I still playing this?" moments?

Been experiencing this with Diablo 4 of late. Now, mind you, Diablo 4 is a fun game. I know it got some hate but after some balancing, the expansion, and some polish it's a really fun game. But there comes a point after making a character, leveling it, gearing it, and getting to a certain paragon and Torment difficulty where you sort of feel...I think I'm good. This is a waste of time. It took me 20 hours to get to 90% of where I want to be, it will take me 100 hours to get to 93%.

*Glances at Indiana Jones* I should probably play that...

*Glances at Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2* Or maybe that...

Think of it as reaching the point of diminishing return on enjoyment or progress. It took me 20 hours to get to 90% of where I want to be, it will take me 100 hours to get to 93%.

So, how's abouts yous guys? You ever get 600 hours into Elden Ring and think "OK, enough, WTF am I doing still playing this?" or maybe you like to unwind with a farming game or "cozy" game and you think "I should really go do/play something else"

Perhaps you're playing the new Civ game and you sit down in the evening to play and the next thing you know the birds are chirping because it's the morning.

And if so, what game were you playing? And what did you play next?

Yes, recently with Last of Us and Days Gone, but I'm a sucker for punishment as I have ro finish it no matter how bad it is.

Oh and I played some Remnant 2 or Forza Horizon 5 to cleanse the palate so to speak.

I had to stop playing Street Fighter as it was starting to hit the thousand hour mark.

Still dabble in fighting games now and again, but that amount of time is just too much.

I lean more towards shorter games because I unfortunately have a limited lifespan. Games that consume hundreds of hours are simply out of my lifespan budget.

@last_lap: I felt like Days Gone had a lot of needless filler. Almost would have been better as a linear, sandbox-but-not-open-world game.

Had a lot of good things going for it, was just diluted by the open-world nature of it all.

Look at this Cow. All over those PS games and has to finish them.

I had this moment years ago with Diablo 2. At some point I realized I was grinding for the sake of grinding, and not really having fun. It's the reason I stayed away from WoW and most other MMORPGs. Really, I'm reluctant to get into anything with a big loot grind emphasis.

@BassMan: Low quality bait, is well....low 🤦‍♂️

Trying to play through Devil May Cry 2 and Mega Man X7. Never managed to finish either yet.

Maybe I had those moments more around trying to get a game to run properly.

If it happens during a game it's usually a sign for me to drop it and come back to it later, knock down the difficulty, or just realize the game is not for me. But I still like to give a game a good chance. Sometimes after I got past something that felt like a roadblock, I ended up loving my time with a game.

@mrbojangles25: I so wanted to like Days Gone, but it's one of the most repetitive open world games ever, and the amount of times it takes the controller away from you is double the frame rate lol.

Seriously the frame rate would tank when on the bike half the time, and I suppssedly played the definitive version also.

And other than swarms there was nothing to do in the open world other than to collect scrap, flowers etc to fix breaking melee weapons, such a waste.

@last_lap: If you are playing Days Gone on PS4, then it will be a shit experience. The game runs well on PS5 and PC. I enjoyed the game a lot aside from the pacing issues and the stupid bike running out of gas so easily before upgrades. The game probably has the best horde battles I have played in any game. Especially later in the game.

Really, this is no joke.... I ask myself often at this point in life.... "wtf am I doing playing another game like this?"

It just happened with Ghost of Tsushima... Game was fine. Good I'd even say, but I got that first break in the narrative and rode out across the fields.... Camera following behind... Wind blowing.... Big huge open world in front of me....

I stopped and thought, "wtf am I doing this again for?" and I deleted it. The simple facts are that Its easy to cultivate better activities later in life and games are less and less impressive because they're not original anymore. I can't help but to question myself.

Further... I could not stop playing no man's sky.... Like, holy shit I'm hooked bad and plunging into madness for a good solid month. Around 200 hours in I had to have a self intervention because while I hadn't exhausted everything to do in the game, I had been the space traveler I wanted tk be long enough. I went cold turkey with it....

Oddly enough, I went back to it months later for an update and I was just feeling meh about jumping in again. Still. NMS is one of the best ever to me.

That is some smiting words for this Assassin's Creed clone.

@BassMan: "pacing issues" that's a light way of saying the game takes the controller out of your hand chance it gets, the game just frustrates you, and the hordes are boring after you complete the first one as the rest are the EXACT same. I did about 10 so I had enough xp to buy the upgrades I needed in the stores so i didnt have to find a fuel can every 5mins, pure waste of time they were.

Several years ago when I was playing the mobile game Fire Emblem Heroes, I decided to spend over $1,000 to get unique heroes from its gacha system only to learn that I got very little in return. It was a waste of money and I regretted what I did and eventually stopped playing the game. Not only that, but it became repetitive and I began ot lose interest.

Anytime I reach a difficult part of a game and have to repeat it a bunch.

Roguelike genre as a whole makes me feel this to an extent.

I mean, the comparisons are there for a reason... I don't even mean that in a desparaging way. I rather enjoyed AC Odyssey and did a completionist run on it. Perhaps Tsushima has more refined systems or a better story or whatever, but I was doing the same stuff I always do.... Meh.

There was no denying though that as I was galloping across the same old same old I just couldn't ride another foot. Tank is empty.... Haven't touched any open world game since then.

The good thing about your decision is that you will have more opportunities to experience different games. 👍🏽

Dude, same.

I had the "this is about as good as this game gets" moment, you know...riding through a field, first big fight, an hour or two of the story, then the game opened up and I was like "You know what? No. Nothing against you, Tsushima, but I've done this before".

Uninstalled it.

And yeah, it's pretty much an AC game. Don't mean that as a negative because I love the series.

Every time I go back to Final Fantasy XI haha...

I just went back to it 😣

@uninspiredcup: I think that makes sense. Games are great, but unfortunately after so many hours of good gaming, it comes to an end. Hey, don’t be pessimistic. At least you learned a lot, accomplished “finished said game”, and stuff. All good things come to an end.

What The **** Am I Doing with My Life?

Outside finally playing and enjoying Mass Effect 1 & 2 that's how I felt playing Inquisition, Andromeda, and Anthem.. Not only are 'Modern' Bioware games generally awful (sadly played a few awful games); they're massively time consuming too, Bioware add techniques that really waste your time with some baffling poor game design. They generally pain me to play.

Going further back it's also how I felt playing D00M 3.. I really dislike D00M 3.. so very much. The level design felt insulting, repeating the same scenario with a scripted imp teleporting in that one random empty block in the corner was used over 100 times in the campaign. It's so bad. Guns sound and feel like pea-shooters.

Basically my point is why did I seem to give in and try ass games because was curious how ass they are (not for D00M 3 I was generally excited and sadly disappointed)? I don't know why people recommend shit games to other people, they must want to watch the world burn or something..

I would never recommend a bad game I forced myself to experience, that's just batshit crazy bro!

Upgrading CPU and GPU in 2025 and asking myself: what is even the point.

The price/performance is totally gone after multiple price hikes, inflation and of course Nvidia greed.

I've put together numerous builds for people now but I've just completely lost motivation to do any upgrades myself.

I usually don't go back to play games I don't like. If I do go back to one, it's because it had potential but was released in a bad state. One of those games was Battlefield 2042. Sometimes that game is really cool but most of the time it's garbage. I go back every once in a while for those little cool parts.

Felt that way when trying to force myself to play through Baldur's Gate 3.

By the time I got to act 2 I was being more bored than entertained. And once Act 3 hit I started genuinely cursing about how much I hated the game.

That's a great way to think about it. Too often people ask if it's worth the money but unless you're dirt poor this is the real thing you should be asking.

I think Cyberpunk was the last time I had that thought. I had basically cleared the map as much as possible and was looking for more quests. Night City may be a large puddle...but it's one hell of a nice looking puddle. Anyway, then a patch came out that added a monorail and...er.....dates. So I tried those. The latter was just a little sad if anything. And so I was sitting on the monorail in the game thinking "well this is it...peak gaming right here. Pinnacle of human achievement.". Yeah time to complete it and move on. Good game though overall....don't get me wrong.

I keep meaning to revisit Cyberpunk to check out the update, but there's just so many games to play right now.

I didn't know they added dating. That's...something, I guess. More interested in car customization though.

We lost linear games. They are the well paced games that are ultra satisfying to play in short bursts or to complete.

It's like every game wants to be a time sink now, every game wants to be an RPG.

Sometimes I play one of these new games for 5 hours, and feel like I've gotten nowhere, feels like I've pushed a dial a tiny bit to the right because woopee, I got stronger and I deal more damage now.

But then other times I play linear games of the past (X360 gen had loads of those) and you feel like you've done so much in half an hour or an hour and they are just well paced and respect the players' time.

@R4gn4r0k: my whole attitude towards games of that nature is "if you've played 5 hours, you've played 50 hours". Unless the basic gameplay loop has me hooked and is entertaining all the time, I just don't see any reason to continue something that has no real end in sight.

It's ultimately why I gave up on Ghost of Tsushima; I know it's a good game, and I know I am probably missing out on some things; but am I missing out on enough to justify spending dozens of hours with it, when there are other, equally good (and arguably better) games to play?

I think no.

Time is a limited resource, but I still try to complete all the games I buy and play. And yeah I've been having a way easier time completing PS2 era games (linear FPS games) than I have modern games.

But it's also the reason why I still have Arkham City and Ghost of Tsushima on the back burner while I keep starting so many RPGs: The Veilguard, FF VII Rebirth and soon Avowed and AC Shadows.

I think you need a hook to become invested into a game. The reason I completed Outlaws is because I loved spending time in the Star Wars universe. The reason why I finished Sniper Elite Resistance so quickly is because I love WWII. And for Ghost of Tsushima the hook for many was ancient Japan and having this Samurai hero going up against an entire mongolian army kind of power fantasy.

Relatable. I have almost 700hrs on Tekken 8. I only play for fun and CBA with ranked matches.