Are You Taking Videogames Very Seriously? Are You Spending Too Much Time And Money On Them?

According to a 2019 study by Statista, a prominent statistics website, the average American spends between 1.51 to 2.88 hours each day on a regular weekday playing videogames. This is understandable considering that traveling by public transport takes about 2.5 hours both ways.

I think there are a lot of people who play videogames while taking public transport. The issue that is not understandable however, are the people who drive to work of which many people do. Do they really spend more than two hours each day playing videogames?

Also, according to the website TechRepublic, on a worldwide basis as of 2021, the average video gamer spends about 72 minutes each day playing video games. This is about a 14% increase since 2020.

As you can see, according to the statistic people are spending more and more time playing videogames. But this is no big secret, the large videogame companies have been making more and more money from the ever growing popularity of playing videogames.

Videogames are exponentially growing in popularity because they can be very addictive for many people especially the young and idle minded. In fact, there are even rehabilitation centers in such countries like China, UK, USA and so on who are dedicated to videogame addiction.

But why are there people who get addicted to videogames? There are plenty of reasons but here are a few: They are not boring as compared to the lives of ordinary people. The graphics of videogames are also so high quality that they’re very visually appealing and hard to resist.

Many videogames also now come with the ability to connect players together. Videogames are in a sense virtual parties where gamers can virtually party and have virtual fun with each other unlike actual parties which can be boring because you often don’t select the attendees.

The avatars in videogames can also be very attractive to both sexes unlike the appearance of gamers in real life which can be less than appealing. This is the reason why many gamers hide their identity by using attractive avatars.

An unknown, poor, thin/fat, short, ugly man or woman can be famous, rich (with virtual money) and attractive in their videogame world. There are even people who fall in love and virtually marry videogame characters.

Contrary to what the title might suggest, this article doesn’t have any intention to stop people from playing videogames. Like it or not, humans cannot work non-stop all the time. Humans need their downtime too to refresh their brains and body.

And this is the function of entertainment: To temporarily relax the human brain such that they temporarily forget their problems with their jobs and life in general. In short, earning money is a necessity while entertainments are non-essential.

But there are people who lose themselves playing videogames for hours on end and even days on end to forget about their real life. In the same TechRepublic study, it was found that 13% of the respondents admitted to playing videogames more than five hours in a row.

Imagine if someone worked for five more hours or studied for five more hours. Imagine the benefits of changing one’s mindset from playing videogames into doing more work or more study. But let’s consider work:

If a person earns minimum wage (the lowest minimum wage in the US is US$ 7.25) and works 5 or more hours then they would have earned about US$ 40 hours just from working more and not playing videogames. What’s more if the person earns the salary of a manager?

According to an article by the website named The Gamer, the economists of the US company All Home Connections an authorized reseller of AT&T products, the average gamer spends US$ 58,000 during their entire life playing videogames.

Further to the All Home Connections study, Gen Z gamers could expect to earn US$ 285,000 by the age of 65 assuming a 6% annual return if they’d just invest the money they spent on videogames.

They also stated that Gen X could have US$ 221,000, Boomers could have US$ 185,000, and Millennials could have over US$ 307,000 if they also invested their money instead of spending it on videogames.

As you can see from the above, these amounts are almost retirement funds especially for Millennials. There are even people who spend millions on videogames. For example, according to Mashable, a Chinese gamer by the name of Lu Mou spent an eye watering US$ 1.3 million on his Justice Online character.

But he’s not the only one, a man by the name of Stephen Barnes spent US$ 2 million in the mobile game Modern War. As you can see, there are people who spend money more than worth a nice house when they became very serious with videogames.

Firstly, videogame companies are not charities and unless they’re doing something illegal like literally robbing the people who play their games, they can do everything within their power to make money off the people who buy and play their videogames.

The same analogy can be said about alcoholic products which are also categorized as very addictive. Videogame and Alcohol companies can do everything within their legal limit to entice people to buy their products but in the end its the consumer who decides if they want buy.

As has been said, videogames are not a necessity to live just like alcohols are. These products are entertainment products and people can survive without them. But people get addicted to them if they decide to be addicted to them.

As the saying goes: “Everything In Moderation”. Everything can be addictive if you consume too much of it. Even something as basic as drinking water can become an addictive substance to anyone if they let water become addictive to them.

In case you are curios, addiction to water is very real. It goes by a lot of names: Polydipsia, Hyponatraemia and Aquaholism. If even water can be addictive then almost everything is.

Unlike traditional media like television and radio where we use two of our senses namely seeing and hearing, videogames involves a third sense: our tactile senses. This is the reason why many people forget how long they’ve been playing videogames:

It’s because people’s brain get too busy playing videogames by using three senses all at the same time that their brain cannot process anything else. It’s no wonder videogames are so addictive if you want them to be.

If you’re consuming videogames only as a form of entertainment and not a way to shut off the reality around you, then maybe you could consider other entertainment such as listening to music or audiobooks.

You could listen to music and audiobooks with your eyesights fixed somewhere else and while you’re doing something with your hands. You can still do your work while still being entertained by music and audiobooks unlike playing videogames.

If you’re bored with music and audiobooks you can watch videos or read. These entertainment does not block you off from the real world (at least theoretically and if you don’t allow them). Also, if you exercise you make yourself healthy at less the time it took you to play videogames.

I must admit that I was a gamer back in my younger years. I would spend hours on end playing videogames. But as I grew old I started to get disillusioned with gaming in general. This is because I learned to value my time more.

But don’t get me wrong, I still like videogames but not the playing part. I started programming my own videogames and felt more happy because I was really in control of my videogame. It used to be that I was playing videogames that were the creation of others.

But now, I was playing videogames that I really liked because they were my own creation. I can adjust the settings of my game the way I wanted them. I can change the graphics, audio and so on if I wanted to.

By learning videogame programming skills, I now also have the opportunity to actually work with big videogame production studios to really not only play but participate in the making of AAA videogames.

Videogames can be addicting to you if you let yourself be seriously addicted to it. Many videogames are now free to play but there are gamers who still get so engrossed with a videogame that they can really spend millions playing them.

You can still be productive while being entertained by listening to music and other audio materials unlike videogames. You can even learn to create videogames instead of playing them which is actually a more immersive experience.

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