{"id":102637,"date":"2016-09-20T08:58:48","date_gmt":"2016-09-20T06:58:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/?p=102637"},"modified":"2016-09-20T08:59:22","modified_gmt":"2016-09-20T06:59:22","slug":"why-we-play-video-games-we-dont-actually-enjoy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/pc\/102637-why-we-play-video-games-we-dont-actually-enjoy","title":{"rendered":"Why we play video games we don’t actually enjoy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Gamers really are spoiled for choice.<\/p>\n

No matter your platform of preference, there are always games releasing or on the horizon that will appeal to you specifically.<\/p>\n

Following the massive amount of time people were putting into No Mans Sky, despite spending the majority of that time complaining, we couldn’t help but wonder – why put yourself through that experience?<\/p>\n

PCGamesN<\/a> <\/strong>covered\u00a0<\/strong>the topic, stating that\u00a0a singular mechanic can pull us through a game (even if the rest isn’t very good) or we will put up with a game’s faults because we are actively using it as a time sink rather than a source of active enjoyment.<\/p>\n

It’s a topic that actually gets raised quite a bit in gaming forums as well with a massive ongoing NeoGaf <\/a><\/strong>thread dedicated to spending time with games we don’t enjoy.<\/p>\n

One of the biggest prevailing ideas\u00a0in that thread is that gamers tend to become more cynical towards a game the more time they put into it.<\/p>\n

\u201cLong-lasting games can have a good start but eventually it becomes sour, making it all feel like a waste of time.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cPut in about 70 hours. I had just spent the past four hours in a cave, picking flowers and whatnot, and I suddenly thought, “What the hell am I doing with my time?” I realized I was doing absolutely nothing of any importance or interest and quit. Don’t think I’ve gone back.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a><\/p>\n

I think a lot of this ties back to games being seen as an investment both monetarily and with our time.<\/p>\n

Those who played games during their childhood know what its like not to have the disposable income to pick up the newest releases or own the latest and greatest tech.<\/p>\n

As such, even if you can easily afford a game, there is still a feeling that we should get a certain amount of enjoyment from it proportional to what we paid.<\/p>\n

This is know as the sunk-cost fallacy<\/a><\/strong> and is defined as the following:<\/p>\n

The Misconception: You make rational decisions based on the future value of objects, investments and experiences.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Truth: Your decisions are tainted by the emotional investments you accumulate, and the more you invest in something the harder it becomes to abandon it.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Whatever the reason, it’s safe to assume that we’ve all found ourselves playing a game we are not actively enjoying.<\/p>\n

\n

Do you ever force yourself to play a game you don’t like? Why? Let us know in the comments below and in our forums.<\/strong><\/p>\n

More gaming news<\/h3>\n

No Man\u2019s Sky review \u2014 an awe-inspiring journey<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

5 awesome PC games you didn\u2019t know were coming in 2016<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Everything you need to know about Xbox Scorpio<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Spend hundreds of hours in a game you don’t really like? This is why.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":234,"featured_media":101440,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20,3,11681,4],"tags":[1975,16529,457,85,7787],"class_list":["post-102637","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-features","category-pc","category-playstation","category-xbox","tag-opinion","tag-psychology","tag-review","tag-steam","tag-time"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102637","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/234"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102637"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102637\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":102769,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102637\/revisions\/102769"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/101440"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}