Yes. Games achieve nothing. Though it hasn't been the handicap to my success.

I'm only interested in playing video games when I've been procrastinating too much. Hmm, post my new designs, do my essay due Monday, or play Morrowind using my Pilgrim - which beats the crap out of anything with her fists.

The only game (in the sense you describe: to entertain young people) truly worth playing is LEGO. So if you weren't playing LEGO, it's good that you've stopped.

I've felt that games are useless for a long time now. I continued to map because I like designing things, but I didn't play SC.

Wait. Wait. LEGO is okay but Nerf is not? I mean, I hate my boyfriends' collection. But I can get behind pegging him with foam darts.

It's natural. Remember when you were 5 or 6 and monopoly was the funnest thing ever? Try get a group of friends around for a 6 hour session of rolling dice and moving pieces... Not quite the same as it was back then.

Computer games are by nature, repetitive. Many view them as a means of escape (boredom, loneliness, avoiding responsibility) or just purely for fun. Take it as a good sign that you are getting bored of computer games, and that you aren't like the vast majority of people who get hopelessly addicted to computers/games.

Go get another hobby to fill your time with - learn to play an instrument (guitar, drums whatever), take up writing, get a job etc... Do something productive!

I think Monopoly is one of those things which sounds like a good idea at any age, but once you've been playing five minutes you realise how boring it is.

NB: Though most computer games are repetitive, that is one of the features of the modern games industry. In the old days games had a bit more depth and charm to them.

So is LIFE. I never realized how stupid that game was until we pulled it out when it was snowing a couple months ago.

I've been trying to get my boyfriend to buy Stratego - ffs its like eight bucks at Target right now. But maybe that is just as boring. :\ I used to love that game.

Funny when an industry turns into a monopoly, that its' products inherit certain characteristics of the original monopoly .

I still like monopoly.

Also what old days, Will? When you said that I thought of like space invaders, snake, asteroids, or even pac-man. Trying to move forward, I still can't think of much that are that different. There may be variants in worlds in more recent than that, but the goals are always the same.

What I mean is that it is kind of rare to find games today which have as much attention to detail in the gameplay or the story (and not just background fluff like in Mass Effect or Dragon Age - which are both good but the stuff in the codex doesn't affect the game at all) as they did in certain "golden ages" of particular genres.

Take, for example, the point and click adventure genre. The Sierra and Lucasarts games were incredibly detailed and well-designed. Then of course you had Broken Sword, which I only discovered three years ago. The Last Express represents the pinnacle of innovation in the point and click, or indeed any, genre. It also signalled its demise.

These days people get excited about Call of Duty or Dead Space - games which have an initial dazzle due to the amount of polish, but are fairly hollow, easy affairs where the only real draw or challenge is in the multiplayer. People got excited about different kinds of games in the past - better kinds imo. The best kind of FPSs, which I suppose is the genre of the age, are in the vein of GoldenEye... so the Timesplitters series, Perfect Dark etc. The company which made them has since folded.

That's not to say that there aren't some excellent mainstream and indie games still being released, but there are certain genres that will never again be popular, and it's a shame. Another major example I can think of is Star Control II (re-released fairly recently optimised and as freeware) - a game which could never ever be released in today's market. Too difficult, too unforgiving - actually required some long-range strategic thought, reading of the manual etc. However, it was an excellent game. The trend has been for games to go from an emphasis on thinking and brainpower, to an emphasis on cheap thrills.

Sorry, but there can be only one king on the throne, irrefutably owning everyone else.

BLASPHEMY!

Wait, Dead Space had multi-player? And it's an FPS?

I didn't say it was an FPS. I mentioned it because it's a recent franchise, and I was very tired when I wrote that sentence - I realise I've made it look like I think it has multiplayer. I know it doesn't.

In any case, it's another franchise that relies on polish rather than long-lasting substance. It draws you in for 8 hours or so with its gimmicks, graphics and cool but shallow features, then you've finished it and you play a new game, because there is no replay value in most of these big name modern games, apart from getting "achievements", which for me is not replay value - it's just a tacked-on feature that tries to pass itself off as replay value.

I dunno, BioShock had me hooked. So customizable.

Bioshock is the spiritual successor to System Shock 2 though, which was a classic of its time.

Dead Space 2 has multiplayer