I was reading through the forums earilier today, and I came across this post.
"There is no "first time". There's just "the only time". You only have a few decades on this planet and there's too much content out there to waste your time seeing, reading, or playing the same experience two or ten times."
What do you think about this, are playing games more than once a waste of time? I personally think that if you enjoy somthing you should just do it, so if I enjoy a game why not play it again if I'm enjoying it again, is this person coming from an Achivement/Trophy standpoint in which this would be to a point true, or just from a game persepective.
Isn't everything in life a waste of time? Can you really even waste time if you're enjoying yourself? Pretty sure being happy and having fun is the point of life.
We really decide what our lives mean to us, so giving one empirical definition of what a "waste of time" is to anyone but your own child is fucking stupid.
You can look at it that way, sure but just playing the game in the first place is a waste of time, as is watching TV or a movie, so truthfully if it makes you happy, do it ;) <3
" Isn't everything in life a waste of time? Can you really even waste time if you're enjoying yourself? Pretty sure being happy and having fun is the point of life. "
Well said.
I'll never understand those that play nothing but World of Warcraft or Call of Duty, but if they're having fun then all the power to em.
" Isn't everything in life a waste of time? Can you really even waste time if you're enjoying yourself? Pretty sure being happy and having fun is the point of life. "
Well said. I'll never understand those that play nothing but World of Warcraft or Call of Duty, but if they're having fun then all the power to em. "
I generally agree with these statements. But those people that play WoW all day really are wasting their time.
I believe that most games are designed for you to come back to...right? lol
I find myself watching the same movies from time to time. Hell I think I have watched the first Clerks film at least 30-40 times with different commentary from time to time.
The last game that I liked to beat all the way through for the entire experience was Resident Evil 2. Never got old for a solid year and since I did not bother recording cutscenes or anything at the time - it was the only way to see some of the best scenes time and time again.
" I think I have watched the first Clerks film at least 30-40 times with different commentary from time to time. "
Many films and perhaps even more so music, reveal themselves only after repeated viewings. I constantly find new jokes in The Simpsons, in episodes I've seen dozens of times.
" I was reading through the forums earilier today, and I came across this post.
"There is no "first time". There's just "the only time". You only have a few decades on this planet and there's too much content out there to waste your time seeing, reading, or playing the same experience two or ten times." ....
Either this was a troll or the guy is just as stupid and shallow as he sounds. But it sounds like a troll. Or a child.
" Let´s just have sex one time.. why bother, ther´s a zillion things to do and we all DYING SOON! "
Pithy. Relevant.
Why the hell should doing something enjoyable more than once be considered a waste of time. There are plenty of things I've done repetitively, namely because I really enjoyed them, receive a sense of nostalgia or uncovering things you didn't notice earlier, ad infinitum.
Another good example is an album. The difference in time factors is relatively important, but, again, enjoyment is the main thing, not time spent.
A waste of time is doing something that (eventually) gives you a significantly lower level of happiness compared to something else you could have done instead. So, if in general you enjoy re-playing games at least as much as playing new games, and at a given moment you have nothing "better" to do than playing games (which I highly doubt), then it's not a waste of time at that given moment.
@Hizang: I think that's the difficult thing about life, there is no right or wrong. There's certainly good cases for 'playing games is a waste of time' and vice versa - but it's all about priorities. It would be a dumb move to focus on one game, play it over and over again and lock out all other games. But as long as the balance is right, then you can play a game as many times that should be needed to gain the amount of enjoyment out of it you've aimed for.
I just finished replaying through Resident Evil 4 this morning. I guess that was a waste of time, though. I mean, I have done it once before, so there is no way I could possibly have had fun doing it again. I should have played something I have never played before. I should have played something like Superman 64. You know, that way it wouldn't be a waste of time.
that's a ridiculous point of view! that's like saying kissing the same woman, hearing the same song, eating the same kind of food multiple times is a waste of time because there are so many alternatives
Most games, I only play once through (mainly for the story). It's not to say that I sell the game afterwards, but that experience is the most enjoyable (to me).
About time spent playing games, if you enjoy it, who cares?
I generally play through games once, though I've gone back to old favorites when I've lacked the funds for new games or there simply wasn't anything I thought interesting coming out. Oblivion I've managed to play through twice, for instance. And Ocarina of time at least three times. If it's still fun after repeated playthroughs then it's not a waste of time in my book.
I totally see where he's coming from, and I definitely have that kind the mindset of "new trumps all". But that being said I totally do it all the time, but only with games that really struck me.
If you've the attitude that life is too short to be playing video games more than once, you should probably be thinking it's too short to be playing them at all. There's so few video games with such an amazing story that you need to hop from one to the next, so most video games are all about the game mechanics and how fun they are to play. At that point, playing through a game more than once is called getting your money's worth. I don't think many people out there old enough to be purchasing games themselves would argue with that (but this being the internet, I could be wrong).
That's a stupid perspective which would only be true if the value of life could be quantitatively counted by the amount of unique experiences one accumulates. The relative futility/utility of our lives changes drastically based on the criteria we use and the time scales we consider - for example, ultimately everything's meaningless, since the heat death of the universe is only billions and billions of years away.
I find it hard to classify anything that makes you happy, even briefly, as a waste of time.
Playing games is considered by most people a "waste of time" In my opinion as long as you're having fun and enjoying something it is not a waste of time
If you want to listen to, watch, read and play as many as possible of all the movies, books, albums and games that are out there, sure, doing one of them repeatedly is "wasting" the time you could have spent on discovering something else. There are so many things to discover that you can never experience it all in a lifetime even if you only do everything once, so I can kind of understand his point of view, but as many have noticed before, if you listen to an album, watch a movie or read a book again you might discover stuff you didn't notice before - and if that's possible with 'static' or non-interactive media, I'd think video games, since they often include multiple options, branching paths and such would probably give more reason than most other media to be re-experienced.
I can subscribe to the notion that you can only truly experience something once, but you can still have fun within the confines of the original experience. I've re-read books, re-watched tv shows/movies and re-played games tons of times and I'll admit that it never elicits the same emotions or feelings that I had with the first experience, but it doesn't diminish or take away from how I'm spending my time.
It's completely subjective of course. The idea that our time on this Earth is limited and we should experience as many new and unique things as possible isn't inherently a bad idea but there's something to be said for experiencing for the sake of experiencing. If a game, or any other type of media, is able to leave enough of an impression on you that it makes you want to experience it a second or third time, by all means do it.
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