If you’re a gamer, you know it’s the kind of hobby that has its ups and downs. You can cycle your way from loving to play to being completely burnt out and hating the idea of touching any game at all.
This can happen in the space of a week, a few months, or even across the span of the year – there’s no rules around when and where your passion for gaming can dip. But no matter how quickly it happens or when, it’s a disheartening thing that can put you on edge.
After all, gaming is a pretty intensive hobby. It’s the kind that takes up all your attention, and you may find that you don’t have many other hobbies to fill the gap when you switch off. If that’s the case for you, it may be worth stepping away from your PC or console and trying out a few new things. Your brain may literally be asking you to do so!
But if you’ve got plenty of fun activities to keep up with, and you’re still really missing the way gaming filled your free time, finding your passion for it again is key. And we aim to help you do that with the ideas below.
Work Out What You’re Feeling
When you know where your feelings toward gaming lie, it’s going to be easier to work out why you’ve lost your passion for it.
Maybe the current video game scene has changed so much, and become so stale to you, that you just don’t want to be involved anymore? If that’s the case, ignore what’s going on in the modern gaming world and open up your retro closet. You could be in need of a little nostalgia hit right now, which can show you exactly why you fell in love with playing video games in the first place.
Maybe gaming has turned into something that’s more boring than it is pleasurable? If that’s happening to you, it could be a sign you need to play different things. If you’ve got the same five games on rotation and not a single one of them can hold your attention for more than a few minutes, you need to go left field here! Pick out a game in your back catalogue that you bought on a whim and give that a go instead.
Start Small
One of the best ways to start small with gaming is to play something classic, traditional, and very easy to pick up. A game like chess, for example, or even checkers, backgammon, rummy – anything that’s been played for a long time already and isn’t hard to get into.
Don’t force yourself to play something that’s a bit too slow paced or boring, and find something you’re interested in.
If you start with solitaire and hate it, head onto something a little more involved, like sudoku. If you decide checkers is too boring, step up to chess and play a few rounds of that. All of these games can be played either by yourself or against the computer, and you don’t have to become incredible at them immediately to try and win against another player.
That’s good for anyone who struggles with the pressure of being a ‘good gamer’, which we hear about a lot in gaming circles. Telling someone they have a ‘skill issue’ is a stock phrase that’s very boring at this point, and we highly recommend avoiding anyone who resorts to that while you’re trying to find your passion again.
Don’t Force Yourself to Complete Anything
The ‘completionist mindset’, as it’s often termed, stems from a sense of perfectionism. You want to get every single achievement in a game because you won’t feel truly satisfied otherwise. But the playing of the game is supposed to be the fun – not the tiny string of text that lets you know the result you see on the screen at the end!
So you grind and grind, and waste your own time trying to capture even the smallest and most obscure of objectives, and don’t even have all that much fun along the way.
If you can’t touch a video game without feeling like it needs to be 100%-ed, we challenge you to play in a more casual manner. If you miss a side quest, don’t go back for it. Just keep playing and see what else you might discover! Or if you miss dialogue options for a secret ending, don’t restart the game – just look up said ending on Youtube instead!
Get Stuck into as Many Games as You Like at a Time
A bit like the point above, this is a reminder that it’s OK to play what you want, when you want. You don’t have to finish one game before you load up another, and you can have as many games on the go at once as you feel like.
This helps with staving off the boredom of game cycles. If one game has mechanics that feel stifling after a while, or make your brain feel like it’s turning to mush, turn it off and play something else.
Of course, have a break in between, but make sure you play something different that has a better chance of holding your interest.
Lost Your Passion For Gaming?
It happens to everyone who loves video gaming at some point or another. There are reams of content online about this very phenomenon, and you’re not alone in trying to pick things up again.
Start with why you lost your passion, if you’re able to. The more of an insight you have into this problem’s source, the more fun you’re going to be able to let yourself have in your free time!
Then take the small steps approach to fixing the problem. Try out a small and simple game, maybe from a genre you don’t play very often, and let yourself try out more and more complex games as you find your feet again.
Last Updated on by Icy Tales Team