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> Nobody has the energy to learn how to play Axis & Allies after working for 12 hours. I've found that to be a very helpful heuristic in noticing when I'm push

> Nobody has the energy to learn how to play Axis & Allies after working for 12 hours. I've found that to be a very helpful heuristic in noticing when I'm pushing myself too hard. If I'm struggling to remember the last time I did something fun that was new or challenging, I'm probably putting too much energy into work or other serious stuff and not leaving enough left over for any other parts of my life. Sometimes that's a deliberate choice to take care of something important. But often it seems like an easy trap to fall into without meaning to, and watching out for a lack of energy put into fun things is a good way to notice.

dv_dt 4y ago
The time to play also seems like it could also be an indicator of other aspects of life balance and financial health.
- wincy 4y ago
  I was super poor working at Target and managed to play 100+ hours a week of World of Warcraft.
  - josephg 4y ago
    The nice thing about world of warcraft is it gives you the sense of progress without having to actually invent anything yourself. The only creative aspect of WoW is your build, but most players just copy the "best" builds from theorycrafters online. I've been doing improv comedy classes lately. They're hilarious and exhilarating. In improv we talk about playing "at the limit of our intelligence". Walking on stage with no idea what you're going to say or do, and figuring it out in the moment - its the stuff of dreams and nightmares. Not all play is created equally. If my cup was empty after work, there's no way I'd have the capacity for improv.
    - DiggyJohnson 4y ago
      > The nice thing about world of warcraft is it gives you the sense of progress without having to actually invent anything yourself. The only creative aspect of WoW is your build, but most players just copy the "best" builds from theorycrafters online. I’m actually writing a book about this price topic (in the realm of your analysis). It’s specifically about RuneScape, working title: Why We Play. The first three lines are: I’ve played a game called RuneScape for 5,000 hours and I don’t know why. Was all that time wasted. Was any of this experience valuable? My thesis has something to do with realizing that (if the lower aspects of Maslow’s pyramid are sorted out) many individuals are driven to pursue tangible goals they set for themselves regardless of the domain, and regardless of the fact that nobody else will give a shit. What sort of frameworks lend themselves to this impulse. (Hint: what makes games like RuneScape World of Warcraft compelling frameworks for this “drive”?)
      - stanmancan 4y ago
        Is this subtly just chasing dopamine hits by doing things that we are good at? I hadn’t played video games for years when COVID hit. Call of Duty Warzone launched and since my finances were in order, family was stuck at home, I promptly got pretty addicted to the game. I could play for hours on end chasing the wins. When I died I could reflect on what went wrong, make plans on how to avoid it happening again, and try again right away. Games are so quick that you can iterate and see the results within hours. Other things in life usually take weeks or months to see progress. It’s addicting. I still have to keep the PlayStation disconnected because playing one game can easily turn into playing all week. Real life requires a lot more work to get the same reward.
      - lumb63 4y ago
        You may be interested in what Ted Kaczynski says in his Manifesto. He hypothesizes that, with the majority of our biological needs fulfilled by society and technology, we are left with mostly “surrogate activities”: activities which do not need doing, but we have to do something with our time. I work out a lot. That’s my surrogate activity. It’s something where I can push a boulder indefinitely like Sisyphus and there is no limit to how much I can do it. For others it is grinding on video games. For others, it is work (let’s be honest, how many of us can really say we “work to live” when all our money goes to consumer luxuries? Obviously situational). Once you start looking for it, you may notice a lot of people have surrogate activities. I’ll go a step further and say that activities which are more accessible and give someone a better chance to feel part of something larger than themselves lend them best to be surrogate activities. I also think tasks which have no end make particularly good surrogate activities.
    - intelVISA 4y ago
      If only somebody built a game that tricked people into learning... like RuneScape but in order to mine wood you'd need to grind LC/category theory.
      - s5300 4y ago
        RuneScape teaches (or taught?) a lot May sound stupid, but I credit playing it since 2003 while in preschool (stopped around 2007, bounced back/forth a bit from 2007-2010ish) with leading me down the life path that ended up getting me a full ride scholarship in engineering. Also the life path that ended up getting me a completely busted neck & shoulders. It taught many people programming, as they found many things about the game tedious & wanted to automate with bots. If you search “RuneScape” in the HN search bar, you’ll find many anecdotes of HN users getting into programming after writing bots/scripts while they played RuneScape as a young kid/teen. I think that falls into the “tricked into learning” category. Minecraft has done the same for many a bit younger than I am from what I’ve heard. Roblox as well.
        deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
      - wincy 4y ago
        I’m having a lot of fun with Duolingo right now. They definitely gamified the process of learning words (if not conversation, but I have a Spanish speaking friend who is cheering me on), I keep gaining experience and I have no idea what the point of the exp is but it has leaderboards and everything. It’s also smart about putting you in “bronze tier” leaderboards then slowly upgrading you if you’re more into it, so you’re competing with your peers.
    - wincy 4y ago
      In retrospect I think World of Warcraft was the only socializing I could really handle after some really traumatic events in my life. I excelled at the raiding aspects and was in a top guild; I became an officer which was a whole different can of worms. It’s funny because I feel like the soft skills I developed wrangling talented sixteen year old boys to get them raiding, while keeping them from harassing girls in the guild and instead keeping them focused has helped me more than I knew as a SWE team lead, ten years later. In a lot of ways work politics is EASIER. At work nobody gets upset and tells you all about how intimate they’ve been with your mother.

dv_dt 4y ago

The time to play also seems like it could also be an indicator of other aspects of life balance and financial health.

wincy 4y ago
I was super poor working at Target and managed to play 100+ hours a week of World of Warcraft.
- josephg 4y ago
  The nice thing about world of warcraft is it gives you the sense of progress without having to actually invent anything yourself. The only creative aspect of WoW is your build, but most players just copy the "best" builds from theorycrafters online. I've been doing improv comedy classes lately. They're hilarious and exhilarating. In improv we talk about playing "at the limit of our intelligence". Walking on stage with no idea what you're going to say or do, and figuring it out in the moment - its the stuff of dreams and nightmares. Not all play is created equally. If my cup was empty after work, there's no way I'd have the capacity for improv.
  - DiggyJohnson 4y ago
    > The nice thing about world of warcraft is it gives you the sense of progress without having to actually invent anything yourself. The only creative aspect of WoW is your build, but most players just copy the "best" builds from theorycrafters online. I’m actually writing a book about this price topic (in the realm of your analysis). It’s specifically about RuneScape, working title: Why We Play. The first three lines are: I’ve played a game called RuneScape for 5,000 hours and I don’t know why. Was all that time wasted. Was any of this experience valuable? My thesis has something to do with realizing that (if the lower aspects of Maslow’s pyramid are sorted out) many individuals are driven to pursue tangible goals they set for themselves regardless of the domain, and regardless of the fact that nobody else will give a shit. What sort of frameworks lend themselves to this impulse. (Hint: what makes games like RuneScape World of Warcraft compelling frameworks for this “drive”?)
    - stanmancan 4y ago
      Is this subtly just chasing dopamine hits by doing things that we are good at? I hadn’t played video games for years when COVID hit. Call of Duty Warzone launched and since my finances were in order, family was stuck at home, I promptly got pretty addicted to the game. I could play for hours on end chasing the wins. When I died I could reflect on what went wrong, make plans on how to avoid it happening again, and try again right away. Games are so quick that you can iterate and see the results within hours. Other things in life usually take weeks or months to see progress. It’s addicting. I still have to keep the PlayStation disconnected because playing one game can easily turn into playing all week. Real life requires a lot more work to get the same reward.
    - lumb63 4y ago
      You may be interested in what Ted Kaczynski says in his Manifesto. He hypothesizes that, with the majority of our biological needs fulfilled by society and technology, we are left with mostly “surrogate activities”: activities which do not need doing, but we have to do something with our time. I work out a lot. That’s my surrogate activity. It’s something where I can push a boulder indefinitely like Sisyphus and there is no limit to how much I can do it. For others it is grinding on video games. For others, it is work (let’s be honest, how many of us can really say we “work to live” when all our money goes to consumer luxuries? Obviously situational). Once you start looking for it, you may notice a lot of people have surrogate activities. I’ll go a step further and say that activities which are more accessible and give someone a better chance to feel part of something larger than themselves lend them best to be surrogate activities. I also think tasks which have no end make particularly good surrogate activities.
  - intelVISA 4y ago
    If only somebody built a game that tricked people into learning... like RuneScape but in order to mine wood you'd need to grind LC/category theory.
    - s5300 4y ago
      RuneScape teaches (or taught?) a lot May sound stupid, but I credit playing it since 2003 while in preschool (stopped around 2007, bounced back/forth a bit from 2007-2010ish) with leading me down the life path that ended up getting me a full ride scholarship in engineering. Also the life path that ended up getting me a completely busted neck & shoulders. It taught many people programming, as they found many things about the game tedious & wanted to automate with bots. If you search “RuneScape” in the HN search bar, you’ll find many anecdotes of HN users getting into programming after writing bots/scripts while they played RuneScape as a young kid/teen. I think that falls into the “tricked into learning” category. Minecraft has done the same for many a bit younger than I am from what I’ve heard. Roblox as well.
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
    - wincy 4y ago
      I’m having a lot of fun with Duolingo right now. They definitely gamified the process of learning words (if not conversation, but I have a Spanish speaking friend who is cheering me on), I keep gaining experience and I have no idea what the point of the exp is but it has leaderboards and everything. It’s also smart about putting you in “bronze tier” leaderboards then slowly upgrading you if you’re more into it, so you’re competing with your peers.
  - wincy 4y ago
    In retrospect I think World of Warcraft was the only socializing I could really handle after some really traumatic events in my life. I excelled at the raiding aspects and was in a top guild; I became an officer which was a whole different can of worms. It’s funny because I feel like the soft skills I developed wrangling talented sixteen year old boys to get them raiding, while keeping them from harassing girls in the guild and instead keeping them focused has helped me more than I knew as a SWE team lead, ten years later. In a lot of ways work politics is EASIER. At work nobody gets upset and tells you all about how intimate they’ve been with your mother.