Video games are a legitimate hobby, DAMN IT!

[FoxLovinPat]

Oh also dunno if this is too off topic or not but dunno where else I can say this but..
Did anyone else here end up doing more than just playing the video games you particularly enjoyed? Because I did.

I bought a few videos game tie in novels for one franchise I enjoy, and I'd go online and look up lore about franchises I enjoyed by going to fan wikis and the like.
Oh and I'd "write" fan fiction, which was either "what if" stories of how things could've gone down if certain events in the games had played out differently.
I'd also write crossover duties, essentially "what if characters from X game found themselves in the universe of Y game?".
Which honestly I might've ended up doing that because of the typical "no video games!" punishment a number of us probably dealt with when we were growing up. Though even when I had access to my video games I still enjoyed doing the above so there was more to it than just "oh well I guess I'll have to find other ways to engage with my favorite games since I can't play them rn".

 

[Misery]

Oh hey Endless Legends!
I actually got that too when they essentially gave it away for free last month and I immediately became obsessed with it, funnily enough.

Yeah I havent actually started it myself. That deal came shortly after I'd picked up Age of Wonders 4 on the Xbox, and I got sucked into that. And then the newest expansion to THAT came out (and I always must have the complete experience), and... yeah I can only learn one 4x game at a time. I'm actually not used to the genre at all (so I'm REALLY bad at it) and there's 5 million moving pieces. I'd previously tried Civ 6 (and 5) and bounced off of those pretty hard.

Really loving that so far. The only 4x game where you can play as an eldritch abomination. Also, you can summon teleporting intangible fish monsters. Cant go wrong with that.

Endless Legends looks great too. One of my favorite games is from that developer, Dungeon of the Endless (not the new one, I mean the old one).

Oh And speaking of PC game storefronts I refuse to use the Epic Game store as I hear from friends that do use it that it sucks, I don't care for their exclusive games (*coughs* Fortnight *coughs*), and I really really hate that crappy thing they do where they'll buy exclusively rights to a game, meaning for a set amount of time if you want to play the game on PC you can only get it from them. Thankfully that's typically not forever so If I am interested in a game Epic nabbed exclusivity to I'll just wait until that expires and it shows up on Steam, which I guess allows plenty of time for others to play and review it so I can gauge if it'd even be worth looking into once the exclusivity on it ends.

This is the way I always look at it with these things:

One way or another, these are all just vendors. Stores. While I like Steam's deals and whatnot, one way or another, that's all they are. Just stores.

For Epic itself, my experience has been totally fine. Steam's deals are nice and all, but... Epic is the one that just outright gives games away for free at random and I sure as bloody heck cant complain about free games. And as prices on all of these stores fluctuate wildly, Steam aint always the one with the lowest price on a given product. I dont really care for Epic's own games like Fortnite, but... yeah I dont really care for anyone's original exclusives, including Valve (never got into their games, really, I dont really do FPS games). Epic is also the one with Unreal Engine, which even I can use completely for free, and for a wannabe developer, that is one heck of a freaking deal. So that's nice. Not that I know what I'm doing, mind you. I've got a long, long way to go yet.

As for the bit about them buying exclusivity, there's a bit more to the story than most people will tell you (because it's easier to hate on things and then get attention for hating on things, than to give the whole story). It's not this evil mustache-twirling scheme that they trick devs into or whatever Twitter wants everyone to think it is. People take that deal because in many cases that boost is what allows the game to get off the ground, and nobody else even OFFERS that boost. Epic then gets the exclusivity in return because one way or another, it's a business, and both sides need to get something out of it. I'll tell you, the devs aint exactly suffering here.

And usually the only other way to get that boost is Kickstarter, which... yeah that has a million problems. Even I wont touch Kickstarter. Not to mention that Valve is... also not exactly perfect. From the side of the developers/publishers selling their games on there, I can say, Valve has just as many issues as Epic does. But Twitter hasnt built a hate train out of that, so consumers aint going to know a bloody thing about it. I'll just say, Valve isnt as benevolent as they can seem. Neither is GoG. Again, on the developer's side, and THAT one, I've run into personally. It's been years now and I'm STILL angry about that one.

Really, all of the stores have big freaking flaws of some sort. It's one of the reasons I'm willing to just use any and all of them. The only store that I've never personally had any problems with is actually Itch. Also Humble Bundle, sometimes. I mean Steam's deals are nice and all, but not "here's 1400 games for the price of one and this supports a charity" level of nice.

 

[Misery]

Oh also dunno if this is too off topic or not but dunno where else I can say this but..
Did anyone else here end up doing more than just playing the video games you particularly enjoyed? Because I did.

I bought a few videos game tie in novels for one franchise I enjoy, and I'd go online and look up lore about franchises I enjoyed by going to fan wikis and the like.
Oh and I'd "write" fan fiction, which was either "what if" stories of how things could've gone down if certain events in the games had played out differently.
I'd also write crossover duties, essentially "what if characters from X game found themselves in the universe of Y game?".
Which honestly I might've ended up doing that because of the typical "no video games!" punishment a number of us probably dealt with when we were growing up. Though even when I had access to my video games I still enjoyed doing the above so there was more to it than just "oh well I guess I'll have to find other ways to engage with my favorite games since I can't play them rn".

Also yes I've done the "connected way more than just playing them" thing a lot. I really am very obsessive.

Cosplay, in my case. Among other things. I have so many figures and such.

 

[FilterFreq]

Which honestly I might've ended up doing that because of the typical "no video games!" punishment a number of us probably dealt with when we were growing up. Though even when I had access to my video games I still enjoyed doing the above so there was more to it than just "oh well I guess I'll have to find other ways to engage with my favorite games since I can't play them rn".

That's really clever! Once upon a time, fanfiction and things like that didn't seem to exist (or at least weren't talked about if they did) and I would have never even known about such cool things when I was growing up.

Honestly I'm glad different avenues like that exist, too. Because while I believe gaming to be more beneficial to most people than not, exploring creative writing and other hobbies that are interconnected with gaming seems like a great way to see what other things you enjoy doing. I bet a lot of great careers started out this way!

 

[FoxLovinPat]

That's really clever! Once upon a time, fanfiction and things like that didn't seem to exist (or at least weren't talked about if they did) and I would have never even known about such cool things when I was growing up.

Honestly I'm glad different avenues like that exist, too. Because while I believe gaming to be more beneficial to most people than not, exploring creative writing and other hobbies that are interconnected with gaming seems like a great way to see what other things you enjoy doing. I bet a lot of great careers started out this way!

Well I actually never wrote any of it down as I was rather self conscious of my writing skills, as essay writing was never a strong suit of mine.. and not for lack of trying either. I guess there's a difference though between essay writing and creative writing though but younger me didn't know that, I just thought "Well I suck at essays so I shouldn't actually write this down because it'd be terrible."

Instead I just told them to myself in my head, and if I do so anything physical with my fanfic stuff it was either poorly drawn comics or I'd just draw battle scenes, and
my parents and teachers dubbed this "video games on paper".

 

[DrBadStrings]

Lucky you, I am surrounded by nongamers who tell me that all of the time. Most of them are recovering alcoholics, though.

Recovering alcoholic here. Video games help keep me sober and give me something to do to focus on when the cravings really hit. Always was a gamer but now more than ever I really cherish my time I can relax and just game. Preferably alone and not a 1st person shooter. Give me 3rd person survival craft all day long.

 

[Metalhead]

Gaming is keeping me sober. I can actually hit my targets in gaming now that I am not stumbling over myself while drunk off beer or whiskey.

 

[FilterFreq]

Gaming is keeping me sober. I can actually hit my targets in gaming now that I am not stumbling over myself while drunk off beer or whiskey.

Weirdly I kind of game less in my sobriety, but it is kind of awesome to have your mental faculties available at all times.

I've noticed my taste in games has changed, from really mindless types when I was drinking to more interesting and difficult ones. Sometimes I stare at the screen for hours and basically just give up, but it feels meaningful

 

[Lemon Zing]

I am tired of nongamers telling me otherwise.

Then they turn around and watch the Kardashians like that is better, which it is not, because it is much worse.

Video gaming is a legitimate hobby, and I am proud to be a gamer with the skills to stay afloat in most game situations.

Remember, centuries ago people were thinking that reading books was not a legitimate pasttime and that it would destroy the youth of the nation.

I love that photo of her butt where she is pouring alcohol into a glass. That's brilliant.

But I know what you mean. Chav culture is sad.