The How many Candles are you Burning poll. (How old are you)

[Con9mm]

If I'm still gaming at 70....damn, I would have lived an awesome life.

62 , my candles are beginning to bother the local fire brigade , just love playing GTA.

You know something....nursing homes are going to start needing gaming rooms!!!

(Not implying you belong in one of course)

Plus nursing homes are for those left behind by family and those too sick to care for themselves.

I know an 80year old that still lives on his own.

The secret is health. He is healthy and it shows.

[REVENGE777]

If I'm still gaming at 70....damn, I would have lived an awesome life.

 

62 , my candles are beginning to bother the local fire brigade , just love playing GTA.

You know something....nursing homes are going to start needing gaming rooms!!!

(Not implying you belong in one of course)

Plus nursing homes are for those left behind by family and those too sick to care for themselves.

I know an 80year old that still lives on his own.

The secret is health. He is healthy and it shows.

Yeah, but how old are you?

[DozenCylinderV12]

Turning 20 in 2016.

 

Been playing GTA since 2004 when I was 8 (San Andreas). Back then I didn't understand much of the story/dialogue, only the violence haha.

[Phthalate]

I love knowing I wont be alone when I grow old with the Grand Theft Auto series.

 

Thank you OP for this.

[mmm chocolate]

38. played vids all my life, my more spoiled friends has computer games, commodore 64, intellivision etc,..

 

got an Atari 2600 when I was five or so and played the sh*t out of it. california games, pitfall, pac-man.

a bit of OG Nintendo at 13, but also years after everyone else.

 

GTA 3 got me back into gaming. a friend had it and i made it a mission of mine to get a ps2 and Vice City by the time it came out.

now I basically only play GTA and zombies in black ops games. destiny and star wars battlefront are my only other xbox one games.

Edited January 5, 2016 by mmm chocolate

[fw3]

I started gaming on an old Texas instruments computer, the days when loading a game meant you actually had to know a bit about typing.

Made me smile, @poppafewpills, as I had the TI-99/4A computer by Texas Instruments and along with it, a subscription to 99'er Home Computing magazine, which had articles, tons of ads, and games you had to hand-code by typing them in, one line at a time... up to 6000 lines of code! holy omg!

 

I absolutely LOVED that machine and spent hours and hours learning how to code in BASIC and Extended BASIC, which of course, led me into other languages. Great, great experience.

 

My friends would come over to use it, play Munch-Man, before we'd ride our bikes to their houses to play Atari or on a Commodore or Apple 5200 (which one friend was lucky enough to have).

 

If you happen to recall that magazine, here's a link to one issue, where you can see the coding for a game called BeeLine... it's worth checking out just for the ads!!!

 

ftp://whtech.com/magazines/99er/99er8305.pdf

 

Thanks for yanking that bit of nostalgia out of the ol' noggin! Cheers!

 

Screenshot of the TI-99/4A game Parsec... you didn't have to pay $16,000 for a paint job, but you could play this game for hours and hours!

 

 

 

 

[gizz01]

 

 

 

 

I started gaming on an old Texas instruments computer, the days when loading a game meant you actually had to know a bit about typing.

Made me smile, @poppafewpills, as I had the TI-99/4A computer by Texas Instruments and along with it, a subscription to 99'er Home Computing magazine, which had articles, tons of ads, and games you had to hand-code by typing them in, one line at a time... up to 6000 lines of code! holy omg!

 

I absolutely LOVED that machine and spent hours and hours learning how to code in BASIC and Extended BASIC, which of course, led me into other languages. Great, great experience.

 

My friends would come over to use it, play Munch-Man, before we'd ride our bikes to their houses to play Atari or on a Commodore or Apple 5200 (which one friend was lucky enough to have).

 

If you happen to recall that magazine, here's a link to one issue, where you can see the coding for a game called BeeLine... it's worth checking out just for the ads!!!

 

ftp://whtech.com/magazines/99er/99er8305.pdf

 

Thanks for yanking that bit of nostalgia out of the ol' noggin! Cheers!

 

Screenshot of the TI-99/4A game Parsec... you didn't have to pay $16,000 for a paint job, but you could play this game for hours and hours!

 

 

 

I remember getting this baby for xmas, thinking I had won the lottery lol

 

do you oldies think todays gamers lack a imagination? (not having a dig at todays gamers, it what they have grew up with and come to expect) but its like the game must now provide everything to become immersed into the game...

 

when I used to play the game above, there was no question I was a pilot lol.. I was there man!! lol maybe It was my love of all things that fly im a huge flight sim nut and I just think that was the closest I could get at the time lol....

 

great days

[CaptSpalding]

 

 

You know something....nursing homes are going to start needing gaming rooms.

 

In the home we have a gaming room and we all sit on commodes so we don't even have to visit the toilet , more gaming time ,also our meals and medication are brought to us by nubile nurses , mine likes to charge my controller for me . The biggest problem we have here at the Sunny Meadows home is forgetting our log in details ,thankfully Trixi ( my carer) helps me log in for about 20 bucks , the dirty trollope .

[degas93]

 

 

 

 

 

Me in the world of gaming i'm probably ancient at 43 compared to most others ( I feel like it anyways, lol )

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Well, please enlighten us, how '' a brisk walk outside'' is going to help the kids get into UCLA? There are many things in life that we cannot change, and videogames deal with a lot of those issues, mainly- escapism. I spent a fair bit of time living in England, and a cloudy cold summer would have been much worse if not for GTA San Andreas back in the day. See, if a person is looking for somewhere to escape, he will find other ways- alcohol, drugs. And I think that videogames are a lot better at that, since while the latter two could help you integrate socially, they lack valuable life lessons that books, movies and games can provide. Growing up an orphan in a post soviet country that helped me develop my personality a lot, Red Dead Redemption and some other games are great in that matter. Some of the games like RDR and the early installments in the Assassin's creed series, as well as Call of Duty black ops made me interested in certain periods of history, what helped me be more attentive during those classes or read on my own. In the end, I don't want to trash you but you sound like an overprotective parent who feels like he or she does not have authority over his/her kids or lives in the nostalgic fantasy of the ''good old days'' and is trying to find excuses for not being a good enough role model.

TLDR version- if you feel like your kids are doing something wrong, talk to them, help them get interested in the things you think are important to them. Trust me, intelligence and social skills are mostly built in, they rarely come from outside. One of my former best friends in life was very introvert and spent most of his teenage years playing videogames and reading books. He found his friends there, and now he is more or less a successful person, and so am I, despite being 22. Good luck.

 

You asked that I enlighten you (actually, you asked me to enlighten "us," but really, it's more appropriate to speak on behalf of yourself, not an entire forum), but alas, I cannot.

 

You asked how "a brisk walk outside would help kids get into UCLA?" My answer is, I do not know – because that is not what I said.

 

You conveniently took two separate statements, worked them out of context, and reapplied them to suit your comment.

 

What I said was:

 

"An entire generation of children, spending their best years of creative, productive energies, mindlessly deteriorating on a couch, while their dreams evaporate, one level at a time.

What skills are they learning? Who are their role models? What are their aspirations? Can you get into Syracuse or UCLA with background in Call of Duty? Will a level 300 get you hired?

 

These modern games. They scare me, mostly because while I can control my time with them, my four kids cannot.

Sure, I set limitations, guidelines, etc. But they're already hooked. Between social media, video games, cell phones, and computers, there's little time left for a brisk walk outside."

 

The first statement regards young people's valuable time spent on video games instead and questioned their abilities in learning life skills, prepping for college, getting a job, and dreaming about their lives.

The second statement reflects upon my own time experience with video games and how my own children are affected by them and social media, leaving little time for the simple things in life (hence the "brisk walk").

I known some women who like to twist statements out of context to support their argument, and recognizing that comes only with experience in age.

 

Something I would not expect a 22 year old to likely understand.

 

Cheers and congratulations on being a successful person, for whatever that may mean.

 

Ok, firstly, thanks for you reply. Secondly, I did not twist your arguments or pull them out of context. Basically what you are saying is- in my time, we had a lot less inside entertainment at home, and I cannot get used to the modern age, thus I will try to make the arguments to support myself. Trust me, the same thing happens in my country. A lot of people your age are bragging about how many books they read back in the Soviet Union times. And one famous writer of that age recently said ''We like to brag about it because we envy them. Be honest with yourselves- if you would have had facebook, iPhone, digital music, videogames and such at 15, would you have read that million of books.''

Secondly, the world is a lot faster nowadays, you have to understand that. Nobody, even a teenager has enough time to go around the city to a shop to buy a vinyl or a cd of some new artist.

 

Lastly, since you tried to reply to my comment by going personal, in a true discussion you have already lost, but nevertheless, you kind sir- are probably a member of some political group, since it took you two paragraphs and two more citations of yourself to not answer a simple question, and then one more paragraph adressing my age and questioning my abilities to debate.

 

Since you adressed all those ''issues'' such as ''will a level 300 grant them useful skills to become successful'', you should have not been a ''lady I know'' yourself, and provide a reasonable alternative. If you think somebody is wrong, put yourself in their shoes, and remember youself at that age too. Teenagers and kids never change, Aristotle said the same thing in his time- ''at first I thought that the young have turned to be sinners, until I realised I was of the same character back then'' (or something like that in English).

 

P.S. I guess I owe you an explanation- by ''being successful'' I did not mean owning a Ferrari. I meant all the things you wish your kids would have but are worried are missing out due to playing video games.

[mytikibardot]

Turned 50 in September.

I feel like I can hold my own in a fire fight still! LOL

I've actually written a few games in my time and had an online adventure game with Zelda like graphics, full map and quests.

Unfortunately, I cannot draw a straight line with a ruler and gave up programming it as I could not find an artist that could do the graphics the way I needed.

 

Currently I am in IT and run my own social web site.

[elfoam]

I spent my day today riding my 1970s cromoly framed bike (made in Australia). To the local rubbish tip, nice warm day, dry and dusty. I found a bike on the scrap metal pile that had hardly been used, I couldnt take the entire bike as it was jammed in the pile but I managed to remove the wheels, brakes, seat/seat post. I paid my 2 dollars scrap price and rode home. Days like this show you a few things like, old things were made better (games included), people are terribly wasteful these days and you can have a great days shopping for 2 dollars !. Ill be well on the way to completing the 1980s Mixte Im rebuilding with the parts. I live in a town that has a ton of young kids in it yet you NEVER see them, even on days like this the are all inside mostly playing rubbish ipad games, although one girl I know has a mame cabinet.

[Jehannum]

I'm 14. Oh, sorry, wrong forum. 44.

[Con9mm]

 

If I'm still gaming at 70....damn, I would have lived an awesome life.

 

62 , my candles are beginning to bother the local fire brigade , just love playing GTA.

You know something....nursing homes are going to start needing gaming rooms!!!

(Not implying you belong in one of course)

Plus nursing homes are for those left behind by family and those too sick to care for themselves.

I know an 80year old that still lives on his own.

The secret is health. He is healthy and it shows.

Yeah, but how old are you?42

I used to dream of these graphics as a boy.

Cannot wait for the virtual reality stuff...imma be in my Walker fuggin sh!t up, my dentures flying out during the deathmatch rage.

Can't wait.

Or I could turn into a "normal" old person and follow societal norms...ZZZzzzzz.

Edited January 5, 2016 by Day Reaper

[Con9mm]

You know something....nursing homes are going to start needing gaming rooms.

 

In the home we have a gaming room and we all sit on commodes so we don't even have to visit the toilet , more gaming time ,also our meals and medication are brought to us by nubile nurses , mine likes to charge my controller for me . The biggest problem we have here at the Sunny Meadows home is forgetting our log in details ,thankfully Trixi ( my carer) helps me log in for about 20 bucks , the dirty trollope .

You should get a Twitter account. lol.

[CyborgZombieJesus]

Dear god, I'm like 15, I'm a baby compared to you guys

What are you doing illegally playing this game? Tut tut.

[KurtBong]

Hmm, I see some people checked in the 70+ category which is probably a joke. I remember playing Pong on a black and white set, but dad thought it was ruining the tube so he wouldn't let us hook it up after a while, lol. I just turned 56 and I love GTA but I have scores of games to play mostly Combat, Racing and Flight sims.

[Arachne]

I'm currently 14 (Don't worry,i'm not an squeaker,just some guy who likes making friends and having an good sense of humor).To me,videogames are some of the best things humanity has ever created,they are one of the only things (besides my family and friends) that I actually love (I spend half of my time playing videogames on my 7 consoles).My life will be fully complete once I become an indie game developer and start making my own games (something I wanted since 2008 but couldn't do because I didn't know how to make one until 2013)

 

 

Not your typical 14 year old.

Edited January 5, 2016 by Arachne

[Hunter]

Let me see. The ba***rds hung me in the spring of '25, back when I used to ride along the coach roads, with sword and pistol by my side. No that can't be right, I'd be about 200 years old.

[deadx23]

I'm 34 I didn't play much games as a kid I tried to play at my cousin's house (snes) they nevered wanted to play,I got a computer about the time of San Andreas wich I had, I was/am single parent of one,at the time I stood home so I played the hell out of it I progressed to gta4 (offline) gtao is my first online game and here I am