[shadowwolf007]

I don't think [many/most] gamers consider gaming to be "a real addiction" - especially FPS games. I definitely have friends that I don't want to play games, I don't talk to them about games, and when the subject of games comes up I actively try to move it elsewhere because when they gamed that's literally all they did. As someone who enjoys going out, it's so weird to ask someone "Hey, wanna go do XYZ" and have them be like "nah dude, let's just hit up ABC game like usual - I played all weekend to get us set up for tonight".

People don't realize that it's like you wouldn't invite your now-sober alcoholic friend to the bar unless you knew they were absolutely comfortable with it.

I'm glad you got outside of it. Games are awesome and a lot of fun, but there's a lot of other really awesome stuff out there too.

[kylebrown]

Will augmented reality games (eg. Ingress) be more healthy activities than flat screen stay inside games?

[shadowwolf007]

Honestly, I'm not sure. I mean, I play games too - don't get me wrong. I am not sure how much of gaming comes down to being healthy or not and how much is just the culture. The very limited exposure I had to ingress involved a lot of drinking and eating out. It definitely was not even close to neutral calorie wise.

But I didn't get in to Augmented Reality games and it's not my shtick. At the end of the day, I definitely use games as a way to decompress.

For me, personally, when I go out I have a hard time wanting to have anything to do with the computer, be it software dev or games.