Gaming after becoming a parent?

I like playing games, have been an avid gamer since childhood (well over 20 years). However, I have my first child due any day now and am quite excited.

Maybe the demographics on this site are much younger, but anyone who has children, how has it affected your gaming? Have you changed types of games, found it impossible to do any real gaming, or something different altogether?

I'm sure in between feedings and changings for the first few months, there will be intermittent down time that I may want to kill some time, and of course gaming is a great way to do it. That, or just catch up on some sleep and chores. Who knows.

I know this should be the least of my worries, but It's been a significant hobby of mine for so many years, just want to know how it'll be affected.

I look forward to being a parent, and as it will be my number one priority, I think giving up all your hobbies is not a good idea. I already gave up flying mainly for expense, but it was also a big time suck too. I gave up season hockey tickets too. So the last thing I have is my PC gaming.

Anyhow, thanks for any input, comments, thoughts...

 

I will play games until i die,but there are some limitations. we can't play like we do in the past
Eg: We can't play 18+(ESRB) stuff in front of children . I mean stuff Like manhunt

 

<-- Father of 4 kids.

Cant play as often, and you pretty much have to give up games like World of Warcraft

Play when they take a nap, ect ect.

I personally play mostly at work

But hey you only have one and newborns mostly sleep alot. With any luck you will have a kid like my middle son who if I leave unattended for 30 seconds jumps on my computer, and doesnt mind watching me play a game.

 

well being 19 i am probably not one to give advise, but i play CoD with a couple of mates from work who are parents. its generally late(ish) at night, between 10pm to 12pm when the kids are a sleep, and occasionally they will just have to stop if something important comes up. but as long as it doesn't eat up your family time, you should still be able to game a plenty.

 

Well, I know hundreds of people who are parents, and play games. One of my friends is in the Army, and when he's home he plays games on the computer with his son, (America army typically). So if you feel like you're being a child gaming well you got a kid - don't. Most gamers are adults now'n'days.


You won't be playing 12 hours at a time anymore but you'll still be playing. Who knows, you might have someone to frag with ya in a few years..

 

You will probably want to go on a hiatus from any MMORPGs unless you are good with and capable of casual playing.

I find that my focus becomes more pronounced on one or two titles at a time, usually one multiplayer and one single player. When I have large blocks of time (somewhat rare) I load up the single player game and enjoy the game like I would a good novel.

When you only have a small bit of time, you might find that a good multiplayer match is more appropriate (think Counter-Strike or UT).

Any way it turns out, you will eventually find a way to be a great parent and still find time to game.

 

Thanks, that's encouraging.

I never got much into MMORPG, so that shouldn't be an issue. I play a lot of Battlefield 2, enjoy a good single player FPS time to time (just finished HL2 EP2), love RTS games (currently plowing through WIC), and spend time with Falcon 4 Allied Force or IL-2 flight sims.

I've never had a laptop before (wife has had a couple), and am beginning to enjoy the freedom it offers. Sure you make some sacrifices, but now I can wander through the house and check the internet, email, and even spend a few minutes gaming. Of course I still have my monster desktop to keep me up to date if something doesn't work well on the lappie.

All in all, thanks for the feedback. This has been one great group here. Very professional, informative, and reliable. I can trust to get good info every time I have a question.

 

Congratulations on your first child. Like the others have said you will have scale down your time investment and stay away from genres which require hours to make any progress (e.g. MMORPGs).

I'm not married myself and don't intend to, however most of my work colleagues have families and that's the equivalent of doing two full-time jobs for the majority so the next few years will give you an indication of how much time can be spent on gaming in the best case scenario.

 

Anyway, I'm 18 and I have no kids but I just want to say this: congratulations on your near-fathership!! I hope everything will run out fine.

 

LOL htwingnut the fun starts here
yes your gaming habits will change
but it might also happen that your child (children) get into gaming, and home lan parties happen

experienced this myself , problem is..... the kids are better at gaming than you are..... its inevitable prepare for a beating!!!

 

Thanks Thomas1989 --

BOFH1971 -- Coolio. Yeah, I know. My nephew is 17 and kicks my ass all the time. Of course he'll usually play games he knows, and I don't. I've kicked his butt on a few games that were a little bit of a level playing field, and it was fun playing Ghost Recon 2 with him co-op. I've surprised him time and again, but for the most part if I know more about the game, he'll quickly learn and end up beating me every time.

 

First of all, congrats!
As a parent myself I can assure u that your life as a gamer is NOT over
You may have to rearrange your time a bit, specially when u have a newborn, not so much sleep etc.
But I find playing games has a relaxing effect. You know, after the kids have gone to bed, just sit down for an hour or so with your favorit game and a good cup of cappucino.
Just don't forget you also need to spend some time with your wife, or there will be hell to pay

Once again congrats and happy gaming.........


swank

 

Oh yeah, the wife...

I think I'm spending enough time with her now to last a lifetime. So needy. But she is preggers, so I'll give her whatever she needs.

 

again depending on the game the wife can get into it too
my other half loves Mahjongg , theme hospital (its really hard to keep that thing working), and various puzzly games
she is also hooked on the wii she bought me for christmas last year.

basically what we do is replace whatever time we would have spent watching tv with some gaming.

everything else still gets done that way

enjoy parenthood its all over far too soon!
(ours are 18 and almost 21!!!)

 

Father of 2 and I can definitely say that the wife will dictate your gaming time much more than the child will. Make sure she has the time she needs. Gaming will take a lesser role in your life for a while but no worries, it's not over.

Btw, Congrat's! You're about embarq on bold new adventure!

 

My baby is now 8 months old tomorrow, so I can giv you some goods from the field.

A lot of advice about babies, but take this one truth -- you will survive! The first 2-3 weeks are _rough_, but of course wondrous. In truth, after those weeks I actualyl did get game time, because over the first 2 months there was very little sleep possible. (Depends how collicy the baby is, but we ended up in shifts since the baby needed to be fed every 2 hours, taking about 30 mins to do, and was cranky half the time anyway. So I was up till 3-4 am, then my wife would take over and I'd get a couple hours sleep before work.) So in that parcel of time, I gamed from midnight to 3am (or coded, as I'm wont to do.)

After that, the baby matured and let us have relatively normal sleep habits (by which I mean not nearly enough, but at least at night time .. so the baby stays awake till 7-9pm or so .. so I find after chores (dishes etc) I get free time around 9-10, for an hour.. gotta pass out by 11 since the baby will likely be awake randomly in the night, and up for the day at 5-7am.

WoW and such are 100% out nowadays, which is a blessing in disguise!

Games like Team Fortress 2, Portal and the HL2 Episodes (ie: The OPrange Box) are both very good, and very short -- Ep1 is 5 hours of gameplay or somethign, so took me 4 or 5 nights to do (would've been 1-2 before), which is fine. TF2 and Quake Wars are multiplay3r and fast paced.. can do a TF2 match in 10 mins or more .. QW tends to take longr for campaigns, but still.. you get 30-60 mins to yourself, and decide to game.. you can do okay.

Or get a PSP

You'll do okay; congrats on the baby; they're challenging and amazing, and hard on your free time. But you'll sort it out.

The first 2 weeks had me questioning everything, like my whole past life was changed and gone. But thats an illusion.. you can stil lbe you, just after a couple months

jeff

 

Oh, and Oblivion .. can be a long game, but is another good example -- a great game that can be taken in small bites; most dungeons are small so can be done in an hour. Overland travel can waste a lot of time, as does alchemy and such. So I've decided to play it like this... (especially after playing WoW in the past, I will no longer tolerate my tikme being wasted

- mods to avoid grinding -- rather than have to work really hard ensuring you level up the right skills so your stats get +3 or +5 to go up, I have a mod that ensures your most used skills get the +5 stat option on level; so no more grinding. Its cheating but only in the save-time method.. you coudl fully do that through normal play, by investing hours of time. Likewise .. a mod to make a larger backpack for storing gear -- no time for running in and out of dungeons to sell everythign off, so toss it all in the bag of holding. Again, it sonly cheating in the same way as 'fast travel' which is built into the game .. things ot save time. And hell, a single player game.. cheating is irrelevent iof it doesn't ruin the game.

- play either the sidequests , or the main quests .. I'm doing the guild quests and such, which are bite sized; after a bit I'll dot he main quest. Just focusing one or the other. No mixing it up, since progress would be slow. I chose a full otu warrior class since its more effieicnt in a lot of ways .. an all mage class would be harder and take longer to level up, so screw it

Just takes prioritization and time management.

jeff

And like the other guys said -- you'll both be hard pressed for time; take some few moments to talk to your wife. You'll be in survival mode, so dont' get your head down into gaming at the exclusion of everything else in your free moments

 

Reminds me of my old guild on World of Warcraft, there were about 25 core members, and at least 20 of them were parents with kids, with one's son in the guild as well. Had tons of parenting conversations where I was completely lost, but I guess I learned stuff. Like when to buy diapers, and where, as well as the best ways to get them to eat their veggies

 

I have hardly played anything for two years since my son arrived. That is mainly because he doesn't sleep like normal kids. But I still have hopes he will start sleeping one day (night). Looking for a new gaming laptop to be ready when that happens.

 

Sorry to hear that. Hope you get things sorted out.

That is kind of why I bought a laptop. Our "family room" is in our finished basement with TV and PC's. Our bedrooms, kitchen, living room, etc are on our main floor. I figure I'll be spending a lot more time on the main floor since that's where the kid will be sleeping usually, so will need some form of portable computing. At least I'll be able to game occasionally even if he's right next to me.

 

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEK!

 

LOL @ link1313 !!

Not that big of a deal. Can barely make most games anyways. They were shared games anyways. I think compared with nosebleed seats, TV is the better alternative anyways.