Top Ten Ways To Tell You’re an Older Gamer
August 31, 2009 66 Comments
Getting older is one of those unfortunate facts of life. Many times we don’t even know it’s happening until we take a look in the mirror and make the stark realization that we still have the same exact haircut we so precariously styled way back in our high school days, the bad news being it’s two plus decades later. We also tend to not age very gracefully, and one of the ways that is apparent is through our gaming habits. Are you approaching the crest of the hill but haven’t quite realized it yet? Here are the top ten ways to tell you’re an older gamer. By the way, the 80s called. They want their fingerless “gaming” gloves back.
- Not only do you insist on watching every single cutscene instead of fervently mashing all the buttons in a hurried attempt to skip them, you instantly yell at and silence anybody who has the audacity to speak during one.
- Fully completing a game requires several playing sessions since you can only log an hour or two at a time due to having to wake up early the next morning for work. Or kids. Or meetings. Or other stuff you don’t want to do.
- Your video game time is almost always scheduled days in advance with reminders penciled in on your calendar. But that’s only if you are lucky enough to acquire your significant other’s permission. And they don’t give you a guilt trip the day of.
- You purchase your favorite video game’s soundtrack and listen to it during your commute, playing through your favorite levels in your head, in order to make up for your lack of actual playing time.
- You no longer pick up video games at midnight launches because you know you will be too tired to actually play it that night. Instead you opt to get it the following morning so you can keep your eyes open long enough to get it in the disc tray.
- You belong to an adult-only gaming community because you’re sick and tired of getting repeatedly humiliated by teenagers less than half your age who only beat you because they still have their lightning fast reflexes intact.
- Half of your vacations involve going to major gaming conventions. The other half are whatever your significant other selected because that’s what you had to agree to in order to go on the other ones.
- You always read the instructions before starting a game, often times spending several minutes studying the control scheme while simultaneously muttering under your breath about how much easier it was back in the days of joysticks and solitary fire buttons. Then you carefully tuck them back in the case because you know you will need a refresher the next time you play.
- You stick to puzzle and sim games when playing in the evening because you find shooters to be too stimulating in the pm hours.
- After immediately turning off any and all music in the options menu, you create your own custom tracklist for titles like Madden that feature modern tunes. Thankfully you realize the music coming out these days is nothing short of a travesty. You hold onto hope that the video game industry will pick up on that eventually too.
Ah, this is somethin my dad should read. He’s the one who got me into gaming.
Love #6. So true.
1, 8 and 10 apply to me. Although I’m not an older gamer =P
Minus the muttering ;)
wow…. I’m only 20 and i fit almost every one of these… i don’t want to accept that i’m old. I’m already having a crisis that a fifth of my life is gone.
Mustang set the bank back a bit. (stupid age crisis purchase)
Actually a quarter of your life is gone according to the average life expectancy rate these days.
:cough:
Have a great day!! ;)
to Hawty below… (just realized how bad that sounds…) stupid reply doesn’t exist
good god! you’re right.
and i live in the one place in the world where life expectancy exceeds 84!
not cool. Thanks for nothing Angel….
All jokes :P
Dude, I’m *14* (*gasp*) and I match all but about three of these. I’m SO freaking out right now. (Whoa, Red vs. Blue flashbacks!)
Yeah, a couple of those apply to me, too. Hate to think what I’ll be like as an older gamer.
*mutters about crappy popular music and new-fangled contraption-devices*
*mutters about Twilight and Transformers 2*
*mutters about Anus fruitshakes*
I don’t even want to know.
1, 2, 4, 8, and 10 all apply to me, but I’m only 17 ._.
That means your gamer age is 25!
And mine is 19 =D
(Not accurate numbers)
yeah, 1,2,4,8,10 apply to me as well… dang im getting old
Gotta love your cutscenes! :D
Ah, it’s good to be young.
Although the cutscene thing is true for me. Nobody talks during my cutscene times.
true… and 10 also…and 7 for some reason…
Wow, that first one, if any of my friends read it, would instantly think it was describing me lol. Thank god all the others don’t fit though ^_^, except the vaction one, its kind of close lol.
GET OUT OF MY HEAD
Indeed.
Sad, but true. (except #9)
1,2,4,5,10. And i’m 16. Also 1 was a huge, huge problem in MGS3 (not 4, 4 is for scrubs) that i eventually only played when i was holed up in my room with plenty of free time.
Devil May Cry 4 Is Like A Movie… (it’s even got a movie director)
Hmmm First game was pong then an Atari 2600 I just dont see it (LOL in my Head )…..Im sooo busted!
Hahahaha… Ah, that was ( literally no sarcasm intended) very funny. Keep up the good work, I always love articles of this natures! You wouldn’t be an anonymous member of TTL, would you angel? :D
gee…I am old already…1,3,4,5 apply to me perfectly…
A couple of these apply to me, but luckily I have a almost full time job, but it starts in the evenings and weekends, and I dont have kids. So I dont have to suffer with those. Still, a great list.
1. ….check
2. ….check
3. ….check
…
hey! wait a minute! Does this mean I’m old?!?!?!?
Everything but the custom soundtrack bit; if the music sucks, I just turn it off.
(Now, where did I park my walker?…)
— Steve
After reading this I am forced to reconcile with my mortality, I guess it can’t be helped. Fair well to the springtime of youth!
*laments
yikes! i may be getting old…
I am thankful that only the first one applies to me… Though that is a reason that my friends no longer play games with me anymore…
Too many apply to me, I would tell you which ones if I could remember =P
Thanks, Angel. I just turned 26. Now I come on here and see this? Grumble…grumble…
Seriously, though, number one just happened the other day. Do these people not realize that a game is not a movie!?! If I miss this cutscene I may have to play for fifteen hours just to watch it again!!
I totally feel you on that. I think my blood pressure actually rises when people talk during cutscenes. There’s no rewind people, seriously!!
that’d be a good option tho… a rewind on a cutscene….. i’d use it
To be completely fair, though, a lot of games have a view cutscene feature now, or the ability to pick and play specific missions (Halo 3 and Halo Wars, for example). I was mainly referring to RPG’s.
I like how in the last year, all have applied to me in one way or the other! Damn, I’m getting old.
Most of those are true for even me… *sigh*
Am I getting old already?
1, 2, 4 and 5
Nuts.
#1 (I shush, not yell), #2, sometimes #4 (the playing through levels in my head part), #5 (although somehow I’m going to get ODST at midnight, dammit!) and #10 (I find hip hop pretty annoying). GOD, SOMEBODY TAKE ME OUT TO THE PASTURE AND SHOOT ME.
Sure, my lightining fast teenage reflexes will kick ur adult community butt anyday :-)
:p
I’m not part of an adult community, actually. I play against a lot of randoms in Halo 3 and more or less hold my own pretty well. It’s my (younger!) friends who don’t do as well for some reason against the teens.
Maybe I’ve got a longer lifespan than average in Halo because of my superb data entry skills. Yeah, that’s the ticket.
Great, now I feel older.
I already have gray hairs and almost 20.
Now I feel like I am 40. :_:
1, 4, 8 and a BIG yes on 10. Soulja Boy? Jonas Bros? No thank you.
I do some of these and im not old at all D:
I think that if any of us fit into these above categories, regardless of age, it merely means that we are the few that still actually appreciate games in modern society as opposed to the majority of people who do for instance, skip the cutscenes. There is nothing wrong with bearing the stigma of an older gamer, in fact, it should be worn with pride as we are are the elite, the patriarchs of our gaming culture and all those little whipper snappers who play games because they can are merely soul-less, empty shells with no appreciation of what has been done for them (they’re more concerned with “global warming” and beer bombs) Ha! I’m proud to be considered an older gamer, even though technically I’m not one and I’ll always cherish my days of playing on my old C-64 and Atari 2600…good times…
I believe the term is “beer-bong” =P (unless you are talking about something I have never heard of before…)
i appreciate the old consoles (of course i grew up on a snes)… so i’m not OLD.. i actually have a box of old consoles (a big box) and another one with NES and SNES cartriges(spellcheck?) and a case of dreamcast disks…
*single MANLY nostalgia tear slides down cheek*
So many of those are spot on.
I am 14 and all my classmates make me feel old cause I keep talking about movies from the 90s that no one has ever herd of. This blog post made me feel even worse.
My fingerless gaming gloves rule. That is all.
who knew 15 was when you got old. Most of these are true. In my day all i had was a GB colour and pokemon Gold and that was enough
i Miss GB… I Think i’m Gonna Get A…SP?
I am what you would consider a youngin, and yet I partake in almost all of these activities…
Damn it. I’m old.
What age is considered old? Are we all into our fears of being classified into the ‘old’ group that we fail to recognize our lives slipping through our fingers? Is being old realy all that bad?
*dramatic pause*
W/e. Imma go play some Halo 3.
Up with LW!
I belong to #1 and #4.
I like storylines and music. :)
Oh gawd… 8 out of 10 apply… But, I don’t wanna be old!!!
Hawty McBloggy Invites You To Get Off Her Lawn
This is a really great top ten list, I stil read the directions, I don’t care how simple games are, even the Wii games. Anyone can post their own list to our site http://www.toptentopten.com/. The coolest feature is you can let other people vote on the rankings of your list.
Good grief, I never realized many of you are kids. Hawty, you practically run a day care here. Yeah, I love my cutscenes, and I hate it when people talk to me while I’m in the middle of watching one.
Now get off my lawn, you whippersnappers.
The first two apply to me.
Yay! I am not an old gamer…yet. :-)
I’m an older gamer, and I agree with this wholeheartedly. My only addition would be–
* You read the instructions which advise you to take a fifteen minute break in gaming every hour to avoid hurting your eyes, and you actually do it.
you need to add the fact that when you hit 20+ you’re too old to be playing xbox and have no life. My personal reply to that is “i was playing video games when you were still shitting in nappies!” or ” and how old are you? 16, oh right so did you have to get mummy to buy the game for you?”