Don't Tell Me I Waste Time Playing Video Games

Don’t Tell Me I Waste Time Playing Video Games

Submitted by Paul Munn on December 29, 2009 – 2:57 pm10 Comments

nielsen_logo_1 It’s hard to wrap my head around the idea of sitting on my couch and doing nothing, mouth open, drooling, watching hours of spoon-fed programming in 5-minute intervals interspersed with blaring commercials and program notes sliding up, down and sideways from various screen animations. But this is exactly what people do everywhere in the USA, it seems. Nielsen released figures earlier this month that noted that for the third quarter of 2009, the average American watched 31 hours of television every week.

This is frankly stunning to me. Sure, they could be surfing the web as well during that time, but all those times someone has told me I waste time playing video games immediately come to mind. I don’t think I have EVER played 31 hours of video games in a single week, let alone every week for a three month stint. Maybe, just maybe I did so when I was single, perhaps during my first experiences with an MMO during the Ultima Online beta eons ago, but really I doubt I could have sustained that level of gaming for more than a week or two.

(Now if you’re playing video games and watching 31 hours of TV a week, I’m telling you that you really do have a problem. Personally, I watch less than 3 hours of anything resembling non-interactive TV each week, that includes rented movies. This is primarily because we turned off subscription TV early this year and haven’t looked back.)

So really, next time someone tells you to stop wasting time with video games, tell them to stop watching TV first and then come and talk to you. Not that you’ll stop playing in kind, or anything. You’ll just have more fun and interactive suggestions for their leisure time, like playing an online game together with you.

Study seen on StopTheCap.com, logo from Nielsen’s US website.

Tags: Nielsen, television, time, USA, video gaming

http://www.fourhman.com Joe Fourhman

Haygood and I hit 31 hours of gaming in a week fairly frequently, I imagine. That's only 4 hours a day.
InfinityDevil

7×4 is 28. How do you play 4 hours of anything with kids around, though?

I saw you playing the M-rated Assassin's Creed II during the day over the holidays and was baffled. Where is your son while this is happening?
Facebook User

Never said I spend any of those 31 hours on math skills.

My son still takes naps! Although, actually, Assassin's Creed II is a pretty tame M in my opinion. All those dopey kill moves amount to pretty much just the hooded guy shoving another guy in the face.
InfinityDevil

Naps oh how I miss those. But you're right about various shades of M. Sometimes some aspects of M are optional, e.g. showing blood.
http://www.fourhman.com Joe Fourhman

Freaking Facebook Connect blanks me out half the time!

A good portion of Assassin's Creed II is not especially violent at all, when you're running races or exploring tombs etc. This is way, as a parent, it's good to know what's in the games, because those rating indicators are terribly vague.
http://www.aeropause.com mclazyj

A lot of my gameplay, and I would assume the same is true for Fourhman comes at the expense of other things, most likely, sleep. I tend to be a very light sleeper, routinely working off of four to five hours of sleep. I stay up til 1 or 2 AM every day playing video games. From 10 til bed is my time, as my wife tends to go to sleep about 10PM.

As for M rated games, it is a weird slope. I mean Medal of Honor shows some graphic kills at times, but is rated T due to their being no red blood. Halo on the other hand is slapped with an M rating, even when the violence is against a ficticious alien race that bleeds blue blood. There are no “hardcore” kill sequences, a la SAW, or other ultra violent titles. I have let my son play some of Call of Duty 4, because it is not that violent. But I would never play Saints Row or GTA IV while he is up.
http://www.fourhman.com Joe Fourhman

Yup, that's pretty much my schedule as well. I bailed out of watching TV many years ago, and I rarely get a good night's sleep. I think we'd ditch cable in our house if we thought we could get past the loss of the few upper-tier channels that we rely on for my son or for the few shows my wife likes.
http://www.aeropause.com mclazyj

I am the same in regards to the TV. Beyond wanting football and soccer, I can get most of my TV fixes via the web (adult swim, hulu) or streaming via Netflix. I know some day, my body will not be able to keep up with this schedule, but until that day, it is the schedule I am willing to keep in order to enjoy my gaming, and still have time with the family.
StephenJMunn

I usually play for most of my lunch hour at work on my DS or PSP. I can game at home on Wii or PS3 or whatever, but I can't really play M-rated games in front of my daughter. I have played the M-rated Castlevania games on PS2 with her present. While there is blood in those games, it seems more like fantasy violence to me. Many of the M-rated games on Wii are HARD M. Like Madworld. No getting that past her.
StephenJMunn

I usually play for most of my lunch hour at work on my DS or PSP. I can game at home on Wii or PS3 or whatever, but I can't really play M-rated games in front of my daughter. I have played the M-rated Castlevania games on PS2 with her present. While there is blood in those games, it seems more like fantasy violence to me. Many of the M-rated games on Wii are HARD M. Like Madworld. No getting that past her.