Games fatigue?

[Coagulated]

I've been getting burned out with games as well. FPS genre has gone down the proverbial toilet, even though BF3 was and is a fantastic game, I've got no enthusiasm to even touch it again. Yet, I bet if I watched a video of someone playing it now, I'd get the urge to have a crack, play it for 5 minutes and put it down. DayZ has sparked my interest recently, but even that has been kicked to one side for the time being. I've been going through Mass Effect 1 - 3 recently using the same character... Loved ME1, but I just feel the series has gotten progressively boring. ME2 was "alright", but for all it's improvements it seemed as if it was suffering from the onset of tunnel vision; all action, less substance. ME3 just seems to have gone off the deep end and I'm really struggling to play it because it just isn't gripping me. It also seems lazy from what I've seen so far. I mean, I went on some mission to grab some stuff from a facility that was tiny... I killed the enemies I saw and started looking for a route through to the rest of the facility... there wasn't one, I picked something up and it just spawned enemies in the same area. Maybe, I was too quick to judge, but it just seemed SO lacklustre.

I did pick up Max Payne 3 because I have a huge hard-on for noir, especially the MP series and it was a pleasant game. I think the story could have been a little longer, but overall I was happy with it. The game gave me what I wanted; action, slow-motion, pills, narration and some cracking one-liners.

I am "sort of" looking forward to Far Cry 3... but I think it'll be very hit-or-miss. Borderlands 2 will be a good laugh and I agree with theyarecomingforyou about WatchDogs, it has got great potential. I'm also looking forward to Aliens: Colonial Marines, but I'm still quite skeptical over it. These days companies think it's acceptable to release sub-par and barely polished games because they can "Fix it with patches", well that doesn't cut it for me. It makes me far less likely to purchase a game on release unless I can find a decent price for it.

I pre-ordered Sleeping Dogs recently because I found a decent price and it just looks cheap 'n' cheerful. A nice trashy Tony Scott styled video game where it doesn't pretend to be a deep game, it just is what it is... or at least that's what I hope I'll get!

[giantpotato]

I kind of feel the same way. Over the past 3-4 years I've played 150+ games simply because I purchased them on steam for cheap and it would seem like a waste not to play them. It was starting to feel more like a chore to get through all the games. I'm being more selective of the games I buy now, but I'm still a sucker for cheap games. Hell, just today I bought Aliens VS. Predator because it was 80% off, even knowing it doesn't really have a good rating. I'm going to need to show some restraint during the upcoming steam summer sale :pinch:.

[mattmatik]

I always get excited about games, just like before, but I end up getting and playing them for about 30 minutes before I get bored and forget about it. This has been going on for several years now, and it's really annoying because I do like games.

However, on the good side of things, I have a renewed interest in World of Warcraft of all games. I've been playing it a lot lately, which I haven't since the old days. Surprising, even to myself, because I rarely do enjoy MMO games on my own, but now I can play it fine just on my own.

I was this way for awhile - even moved from 360 to PS3 because I thought playing MP with my friends would help. Really it didn't. However, I am playing a lot on my PC now. So excited for GW2, will be playing that a lot, but I also am now back into WoW since before TBC (so there is a TON of stuff for me to experience). And there's Planetside 2 coming eventually, as well as some others. I just love playing PC games again.

At 32 years old with a wife (where we both work 12 hour night shifts on opposite days) and a kid to raise, my priorities have had to change so I value my gaming time more. I know now the games I choose to play I want to play and will keep playing. No more preorders or any of that crap though. Far too many times I've been looking forward to something and 5 months out I preorder...by the time it comes out I don't want to play it.

When I was growing up I had to beg for my games, then I had to save allowance for games, then I had to mow lawns for games. Now, I work for my higher priorities but we are fortunate enough to where I can buy a game if I feel like it...which is not good :laugh:

[DirtyLarry Veteran]

Interesting timing on this thread, as I was just talking to my wife about something recently, which mattmatik's response above reminded me of.

She asked if I planned on getting a WiiU when it was released, as I was watching all of the e3 coverage one night about it.

At first I said I was not sure, then I said "yeah, I probably will. This is my golf, or my poker night."

What I meant by that is just as matt, I am fortunate enough to not even think about if I can afford a game or a system, etc. I make a decent living, so things have definitely changed from when I was growing up. I usually had to play games upwards of a year or two after they were released and on sale in the bargain bin. Just how it was financially for a bit growing up.

My wife said she got it, and understood it is what I preferred to do, so she was ultimately fine with me saying I would probably purchase it, but then all she said was "but you barely touch your games nowadays." That really kind of hammered home the point. As much as I love gaming, and it will always be my preferred method of entertaining myself, I just no longer have that strong desire to play whenever I have free time, as quite frankly everything else burns me out so much mentally I just want to take it easy as I said above.

[NoLiMiT06]

I am only 24 for and I just can't seem to get into games anymore. I recently picked up Rage on the 360 and that is the most I have played in months. I got hurt at work back in March and I am still fighting that case and I am just mentally exhausted from the constant stress and harassment from my boss. You would think firing up CoD or something would just take the pain away but it feels more like a chore than anything at this point.

[Detection]

Interesting timing on this thread, as I was just talking to my wife about something recently, which mattmatik's response above reminded me of.

She asked if I planned on getting a WiiU when it was released, as I was watching all of the e3 coverage one night about it.

At first I said I was not sure, then I said "yeah, I probably will. This is my golf, or my poker night."

What I meant by that is just as matt, I am fortunate enough to not even think about if I can afford a game or a system, etc. I make a decent living, so things have definitely changed from when I was growing up. I usually had to play games upwards of a year or two after they were released and on sale in the bargain bin. Just how it was financially for a bit growing up.

My wife said she got it, and understood it is what I preferred to do, so she was ultimately fine with me saying I would probably purchase it, but then all she said was "but you barely touch your games nowadays." That really kind of hammered home the point. As much as I love gaming, and it will always be my preferred method of entertaining myself, I just no longer have that strong desire to play whenever I have free time, as quite frankly everything else burns me out so much mentally I just want to take it easy as I said above.

I had that nice not have to worry about how much something cost a couple of years back, people came to me to borrow, I lived in a nice cheap 1 bed flat with a full time job, then after about a year I moved into a 2 bed house with my fianc?e and lost my job, so not only did I end up losing more than 3/4 of my income, I then had to pay for a big house on top of it.

Luckily the missus is working so all was not lost, but still sucks big time when I have to make sure I have enough money for my bus fare some days

[Debus42]

I get this a couple of times a year. It's different for every person, as it depends upon your favourite genre and whether that's really being catered for by the game devs. I'm a massive fan of classic JRPGs, but it just seems to be that there is no effort being put into the story and they're trying to change everything. I think a major issue here is that the games industry is constantly changing, and some of us just aren't prepared to make the change with them and that's when some people lose their faith in the world of video games. There is the odd game that crops up for me that I find to be truly amazing, but then I finish it because it's too short and then I'm back in the same place again.

It's definitely worse over summer, and I was feeling like this today. I have recently acquired wireless internet in my house so I can access the PSN and XBLA, but there was nothing new that I wanted to download from either of them. The only game I downloaded was Wild Arms from the PSOne Classics for ?3.99. For me too, there is very little to be excited about in the gaming world until September. I think the game devs need to shake up the world of gaming and give us better quality games on a more regular basis to attempt to stop this, as you call it, 'fatigue'.

[Twiddle]

Seen a lot of similar feelings about this lately around the web. I feel the same way. I've contributed it more to a possible overabundance of games. You play so much, that while you still enjoy gaming, you get burnt out quick, because there is another game similar the experience you are having, so you have less desire to continue. Or something... I can't really put my finger on it, but yeah I know what you are saying. It really sucks. :/

I've wondered if it is money. Back when I could only afford a game every couple of weeks, I would play them non-stop when I did not work. Now that I am financially stable, and well off, I don't do half the stuff I said I would do when I was younger. Oh no...I'm getting.. "old."

:/ Throwing on the TV, or Netflix, is just much easier, entertainment wise, for me nowadays. No thinking, just staring.

[LaP]

I've not played a game in a long time. Used to play around 20 hours a week.

Dunno i find games too much complicated these days. Games used to be insert cart, press start, have mindless fun for 2-3 hours. Now it's insert disc, update the game, take one hour to configure all the options, play an overly complicated games required buttons combo for no reason.

The last 2 games i really loved are Halo and WoW (vanilla). Halo had that old simple fun too it. WoW was complicated but like Baldur's Gate there was a reward for mastering it.

[DirtyLarry Veteran]

I had that nice not have to worry about how much something cost a couple of years back, people came to me to borrow, I lived in a nice cheap 1 bed flat with a full time job, then after about a year I moved into a 2 bed house with my fianc?e and lost my job, so not only did I end up losing more than 3/4 of my income, I then had to pay for a big house on top of it.

Luckily the missus is working so all was not lost, but still sucks big time when I have to make sure I have enough money for my bus fare some days

Prior to landing this position I was unemployed for almost 7 months. I had completely depleted my savings. I was literally at the point I was not going to make my next mortgage payment. Like it was a done deal, I did not have the payment for my next month of mortgage. I was really not sure what else I could do except not pay it. Then I got extremely lucky.

So sure, the prudent thing would be to not purchase anything at all and just save, save, save, for if and when it happens again. However I am a pretty big proponent of you only live once. With that said, I make it a priority to save still, but I also do treat myself to such things as well, and just hope I never have to deal with that again. As it was awful. Hope you bounce back sooner rather then later.

[scaramonga]

7 hours straight in Civ V tonight, it does get boring yup.

[mattmatik]

I had that nice not have to worry about how much something cost a couple of years back, people came to me to borrow, I lived in a nice cheap 1 bed flat with a full time job, then after about a year I moved into a 2 bed house with my fianc?e and lost my job, so not only did I end up losing more than 3/4 of my income, I then had to pay for a big house on top of it.

Luckily the missus is working so all was not lost, but still sucks big time when I have to make sure I have enough money for my bus fare some days

Believe when I say, at nights when I get a couple hours to game, I treat it as a reward and do not take it for granted at all. When I got out of high school I moved to Hawaii for college and was scraping by. Lived off Spam and saimin for 2 years. Would torture myself going to CompUSA every week, wishing I could afford to upgrade my badass PC I built in high school. I got my kicks by helping friends/classmates with their computers and whatnot but it wasn't the same. The gaming I did do was on a GBA that belonged to my roommates son. Ugh.

I share the sentiments with Larry, hope things work out for the best man.

7 hours straight in Civ V tonight, it does get boring yup.

Should have stopped at 6 :D I'm purposely staying away from Civ V/expansion. Straight time sink...

[ObiWanToby]

I think the quality of games has declined too. I myself love RTS games. AOE, TA, C&C. Those franchizes are dead. They really were great games then, and are almost unplayable now. It is depressing.

[+virtorio MVC]

I follow games pretty closely, but play hardly any of them. I think I'm more interested in the game industry than actually playing the games.

[mattmatik]

I think the quality of games has declined too. I myself love RTS games. AOE, TA, C&C. Those franchizes are dead. They really were great games then, and are almost unplayable now. It is depressing.

For me, I don't necessarily think the quality has declined so much as the media has taken to promote the obvious high-budget games. There are some very, very good games out/coming out that just don't get the pub. Company of Heroes 2 is coming...first was a classic. But yeah, I miss the AoE, AoM, RoN games for sure.

[remixedcat]

• Lack of good engaging storylines I am huuuuuuge on game stories and when skyrim was bugged real bad*
  
• lack of money to waste 50-60USD on a game that I get a few hours out of
  
• tired of paying to beta test games for these companies... I want a final product that's polished and nearly bug free if i am to pay for it at all. You should pay us to fix your games and not the other way around.
  

*to where I had to use setstage a few times to get past some of the main quest becuase NPCs got stuck in a wall or some crap it ruins that for me greatly... I would rather reinstall the game and mess with patches rather then use setstage.... setstage should be use for debugging and mod testing only and NEVER to complete a quest with standard gameplay.

[+Eternal Tempest MVC]

Same boat, however really forward to the Shadownrun, and Wasteland 2 kick starter projects I help contribute too (hopefully) next year.

Also waiting on Guild Wars 2,

I could fire up Civ 2 Mutiplayer Gold, Call to power 2, Alpha Centuari, and Galatic Civ II to kill... many hours if I wanted.

[remixedcat]

I think age has been the winning factor in killing my passion for a lot of things, I used to be excited for everything computer related, even a flash player update would be like "Wooo"

Now I couldn't care less about new windows being released, new games coming out, new hardware... I find myself becoming the boring adult I used to laugh at when I was younger and find myself just wanting "Something that works"

I used to run the cutting edge everything with all its faults and bugs and love spending hours finding workarounds to problems, now I cba !

kinda the same here as well I am prolly headed to the "post PC" era.... my next purchases for new systems are gonna be some kinda decent server and UPS for it and a windows 8 tablet of some sort. This system can stay as a workstation for certain things. I also don't even game on anything smaller then a 10 inch screen. it kinda makes me sick.... I played on PSPs, DSs, stuff like that and I would get a killer migraine after half an hour on that.

[TheLegendOfMart]

Wow didn't think this thread would have so many responses.

It's wierd because most games I can't stand and will only play for 5 minutes but there are other games that I get ridiculously addicted to which I will be able to play for hours at a time.

I just wish I could strike a better balance.

[Orange]

I don't know what the problem is but over the past 18 months or so I haven't been bothered with games. E3 comes around and I am really excited for games that are coming and when they eventually come out I rent them and end up returning them the same day the disc arrives in the post.

I'm not sure whether its the quality of games that has declined as of late, or whether I'm just burned out on certain types or settings of games, maybe I'm just growing out of playing games which is sad as I've seen it happen to a number of friends and thought that it would never happen to me.

I got really excited about the Vita, had it for 2 months then got bored and sold it.

Is it just me or does anyone else have the same problem?

I want to like games but they never hold my interest for more than 5-10 minutes.

Same here. well im 28 so not sure if age and life getting in the way of my gaming but i haven't been playing my xbox for months now. I get excited for new games etc but as you said, you either buy or rent and the excitement is gone.

[+jamesyfx Subscriber²]

I just go through phases of being into games and to being bored by them. I usually alternate between games and movies, actually.

[neo1911]

I am passing through that phase and I am just 26. Expansion of business and investments are the two things which bug me all the time. :(

I did buy a decent new PC but I don't get to spend proper time in front of it.

[McKay]

Same here, I used to buy every OXM, got excited about games, now I just don't care... I've got so many games that I still havent completed. I'm 21.

[spaceelf]

Personally, I buy a game, play it for a while, and if it's too long I just stop for months. And feel like I wasted my money even if it was $1/hour, it just stopped being fun overall.

Like Amalur. I'm still playing it so obviously I enjoyed it at first, just can't get myself to actually care about it. As soon as I'm done I'm deleting it permanently.

I like RPGs in general but sometimes they add way too much filler.

Since I tend to go for action games anyway I guess it's not a shock.

I think the quality of games has declined too. I myself love RTS games. AOE, TA, C&C. Those franchizes are dead. They really were great games then, and are almost unplayable now. It is depressing.

Generals 2 disagrees with you! (Yeah, C&C4 was crap, but I still have hope. Also praying it's one of the 64 bit games they mentioned coming.)

[McKay]

I think a part of it may be down to be starting to get whooped by 12 year old kids on Xbox Live, seriously I thought this wouldn't happen till I was at least 30. I'm 21, I'm still young this should not be happening to me.