Extended gaming sessions: How do people do this regularly?

I wish I could focus on playing a game for hours upon hours. But honestly, as much as I love games, I just can't sit down and play them for huge amounts of time without taking breaks. It makes me sad, because time continues to be limited in my life for things like games. With some holidays coming up, and no hopes for a girlfriend in sight, gaming time should be in big supply. But how am I supposed to get myself to finish all these games? It's frustrating how many games I love and how complete I want to be with games in a series, but I just can't sit down for more than an hour or two (at most) and play the same game. It's tough! 
 
Am I getting old or something? I just don't see how people can devote consecutive hours to sitting down without getting worn out. My friends laugh at me because I talk games all the time, but I'm so behind in what I'm playing because I can't seem to finish anything quickly. This goes for board games too: I love any type of game...but I can't seem to focus for 4+ hour play sessions of Through the Ages or some other time-intensive game. It sucks! 
  
Do you game in large quantities? Are you some crazy Diamond-Tier SC2 player who is laughing at his huge flat-screen monitor right now? Am I in the majority or the minority? 

I wish I could focus on playing a game for hours upon hours. But honestly, as much as I love games, I just can't sit down and play them for huge amounts of time without taking breaks. It makes me sad, because time continues to be limited in my life for things like games. With some holidays coming up, and no hopes for a girlfriend in sight, gaming time should be in big supply. But how am I supposed to get myself to finish all these games? It's frustrating how many games I love and how complete I want to be with games in a series, but I just can't sit down for more than an hour or two (at most) and play the same game. It's tough! 
 
Am I getting old or something? I just don't see how people can devote consecutive hours to sitting down without getting worn out. My friends laugh at me because I talk games all the time, but I'm so behind in what I'm playing because I can't seem to finish anything quickly. This goes for board games too: I love any type of game...but I can't seem to focus for 4+ hour play sessions of Through the Ages or some other time-intensive game. It sucks! 
  
Do you game in large quantities? Are you some crazy Diamond-Tier SC2 player who is laughing at his huge flat-screen monitor right now? Am I in the majority or the minority? 

I've had pretty much no time to game since summer. I'm in med school and there's just a ridiculous amount of work to be done during the semester, don't really have time for much else....
 
I am going to try and find at least some time for gaming though. It's such a good stress reliever for me.

But yeah, apart from Christmas I'm not sure when I can really find some good time without falling behind in school. I really do envy the people that have time to play games everyday.

I used to play games for at least three hours a day and devote entire weekends to playing games. But now that I'm in collage, I can't do that without falling behind in a class or two. Now I almost never play on a weekdays, and I only play for about six hours on weekends. (Except for last week where I pretty much blew my weekend playing Fable II.)
 
Responsibilities be damned.

I know how you feel. It's probably because you feel like you're "wasting time" and should do something important, even if you have nothing important to do. I used to be able to play marathon sessions too, but now I tend to do shorter sessions and mix up my games more frequently. It works out alright for me.

i can't do it anymore either because of school.
 
The most I can go on a good day is around 4 hours, depending on the game.

@TheSilentTruth: Responsibilities be damned indeed. I would rather play games all week than go to the grocery. Play a grocery game, even.   

I just stay up super late playing games, I figured since there are no real obligations at night for me that its the perfect time. I normally don't have to be up very early though (normally around 11 or 12) so I guess if thats not the case then you can't really stay up all night.

Personally I tend to play through campaign modes bit-by-bit, it's very rare I'll sit down and just speed through it all at once, I like to give that kind of stuff time to sink in. There are also a lot of games that I think are best taken in moderation, that being said I've tore my way through a lot of Reach and WoW in the past couple of weeks.

• Cigarettes
• Alcohol
• Coffee / Caffeine
• Any combination of the above

I'm unemployed and only have class three days a week. I generally spend Friday nights doing stuff with friends (movies, hang outs, etc) so it frees up many hours for gaming. 
 
Do I feel bad about it? Yeah, if I think about it after the fact. 
 
But since I'm participating in NaNoWriMo, my gaming time is going to take a dive.

" @VelvetLore04: I just looked up what nanowrimo is...  Holy shit that sounds fun, it's also ingenious. Once you have the first shitty novel in the bag and done, you actually know the scope of having to write something so large so you can then write a serious 50,000 word work. "

" I wish I could focus on playing a game for hours upon hours. But honestly, as much as I love games, I just can't sit down and play them for huge amounts of time without taking breaks. It makes me sad, because time continues to be limited in my life for things like games. With some holidays coming up, and no hopes for a girlfriend in sight, gaming time should be in big supply. But how am I supposed to get myself to finish all these games? It's frustrating how many games I love and how complete I want to be with games in a series, but I just can't sit down for more than an hour or two (at most) and play the same game. It's tough!  Am I getting old or something? I just don't see how people can devote consecutive hours to sitting down without getting worn out. My friends laugh at me because I talk games all the time, but I'm so behind in what I'm playing because I can't seem to finish anything quickly. This goes for board games too: I love any type of game...but I can't seem to focus for 4+ hour play sessions of Through the Ages or some other time-intensive game. It sucks!   Do you game in large quantities? Are you some crazy Diamond-Tier SC2 player who is laughing at his huge flat-screen monitor right now? Am I in the majority or the minority?  "

Start playing an MMO that isn't World of Warcraft. Get yourself hooked. Problem solved.
 
Or start doing drugs.

I have my fair share of times where I'll spend a straight 12+ hours on a game.  But then the next day I may not spend any time on it at all.  It's all about balancing that responsibility crap people have been talking about, and doing what I want to do for a while.

I'm in the same boat. In the last year, I've purchased something in the neighborhood of 25 games and have finished maybe two of them (Starcraft 2 and God of War 3). It's just all these cool, kick-ass games come out that people are talking about and, between grad school, a full-time job, and maintaining myself, I can't find the time to play anything except during my train commute or on weekends when I'm not hanging out with people.
 
And switching to XBLA/Wiiware/PSN games after a long day of work doesn't seem to be helping either. I still haven't finished Super Meat Boy. Or Shadow Complex. Or Puzzle Quest 2. Or Cave Story. Or...you get the idea.

In the weekends and holidays I play games all day long. I rejoice the moments I have to spend on gaming now that school is taking so much time away from it.

" @Seppli: Unfortunately, that isn't how I roll. I have gotten to the point where I have to play multiple games to keep things fresh. I get burnt out on games pretty easily (PQ2 would kill me if I wasn't mixing it up right now, for example.) Plus, my list of games to play is quite large, and I need to keep pushing through. The list of games I haven't played it kind of ludicrous at this point... "

"I just stay up super late playing games, I figured since there are no real obligations at night for me that its the perfect time. I normally don't have to be up very early though (normally around 11 or 12) so I guess if thats not the case then you can't really stay up all night. "

" But now that I'm in collage, "

In order to play hours upon hours, you must tap into your gamer vision.

When I was younger and didnt have to work to help feed the kids, I could spend 10-12 hrs a day easy on one game. Not now though...probably the longest run I've had recently is around 4hrs cuz I had the flu and couldn't go to work.  Now it is just a bunch of little 1-2hr bursts in between the kids, wife and work... 
 
This is why I need to be self employed and work from home...lol

It only happens rarely, and only when it's a game I get really hooked on. Most of the time I just play in chunks of an hour maybe two.

Guess this means we should all work in game journalism or something. I'm glad I'm not in the minority. I wish we could all band together to ask our lives for more free time though. Make the majority the minority.

" Responsibilities be damned. "

 I can't not play games in long seasons. Unless I know I can spend at least 2-3+ hours with a game I just can't start because I feel like I will just get going and need to stop. Which ruins my enjoyment with a game as I like to get lost in it, so breaking from it ruins the experience for me.

" @Truitt said:
  My advice... do more expensive hookers. You got expensive legal brothels around your parts I hope? "

Most I've ever played consecutively was about 6 hours a day.
 
 
Which I did for every day for two months last summer :P

My suggestion would be to sometimes plan your days around playing a game and just trudge through it. I know that's what I do when I have a mission to play a game, I get it and play as much THEN so I play in long sessions as opposed to bite sized chunks, because I feel like that's how the game was meant to be seen. Of course that's why I get my school studying and whatnot done before hand so it's just me and my games....like love was meant...i mean..what?

I've been playing alot of videogames today. I used to get bored after an hour and now it's the opposite for me. I can't do anything else for hours though that's like boring work. However videogames aren't boring. I only play the game I feel like playing though, not anything else or i'll get really bored.

i think it's because of games aren't that great compared to back in the day. the longest i played a video game was 17 hours from wow. i think it was because there were so many things that i could do in that game. games aren't that great with things to do. it is kind of like do this through out the game.

" I've had pretty much no time to game since summer. I'm in med school and there's just a ridiculous amount of work to be done during the semester, don't really have time for much else....  I am going to try and find at least some time for gaming though. It's such a good stress reliever for me. But yeah, apart from Christmas I'm not sure when I can really find some good time without falling behind in school. I really do envy the people that have time to play games everyday. "

Honestly this thread has put me at ease a lot. Like it makes me mad that I had no time to play anything but a few games of Go on my phone yesterday, but otherwise I just have to come to the understanding that I have other things to do with my time. I would kill for some gaming holidays to be written into the calendar, though.

"

• Cigarettes
• Alcohol
• Coffee / Caffeine
• Any combination of the above

 
It helps if the game is actually good though.

"

" Honestly this thread has put me at ease a lot. Like it makes me mad that I had no time to play anything but a few games of Go on my phone yesterday, but otherwise I just have to come to the understanding that I have other things to do with my time. I would kill for some gaming holidays to be written into the calendar, though. "

" @JoyfullOFrockets: It does sound a little confusing. My problem is that I frequently don't have time to play games, and when I do have extended periods to do so, I can't get myself to sit down for long periods of time. There are very few games that I seem to lose track of time on, and there are cases in which I wish I would. That way, I could get through games more efficiently. "