You Know You're a Gamer When...

[Nixxter]

I'll start -

You have a bunch of games on a new Iphone but only play Angry Birds and must get three stars a screen because you're not like all those casual gamers who play it too and you're a completionist.

[Robert Sharp]

My wife took my angry birds and played the hell out of it. Apparently, there is no way to reset the game or to have another profile for it. So I don't get to play :).

Anyway, here's mine:

Every day (EVERY) for the last 2 months or so, I have a date with my wife from 5-about 7pm (dinner time) to have hot chocolate (with Baileys!) and play Assassin's Creed (Brotherhood, at least since we finished 2). If I'm late, she comes looking for me.

[Nixxter]

That is so sweet, in so many ways Robert! My wife is a casual gamer, but at least I turned her, like an ocean liner (I don't mean she's big, but she isn't inclined to change her (lovely) ways easily)!

[JeffL]

Well, this is from a different angle, but my current addiction is Bad Company 2, mainly as recon. And now when I see someone up on a roof working, I think "Oh man, he is SO exposed up there, if he'd just stand still for ONE second...."

BTW, looking for a game for my wife and I to play together on the XBox or PS3. Something adventure-like would be best, where the main input is the result of collaboration of thought - a crime or mystery type game.

[Pogue Mahone]

JeffL, the games don't get good reviews but I find the CSI games are kind of fun. I usually play them on pc but they're available on 360 (I'm sure on ps3 as well). Plus Sherlock Holmes vs. Jack the Ripper was an interesting adventure game mystery.

Similar to Robert's story, my wife loves to play the various board games available on Xbox Live and have me watch. So when you see me online playing Carcassonne or Ticket to Ride or Lost Cities, that's my wife. I'm just sitting quietly nearby offering no assistance or criticism, just the occasional 'good move babe!'

[Omniscia]

Crime, schmime. Get those nifty Monkey Island remastered versions and laugh together as you piece together the clues to, say, get by Governor Marley's vicious Piranha Poodles, or find the treasure of Big Whoop.

[ceolstan]

you plan to use your excess vacation time to work through your Steam sales backlog.

[GloriousMess]

..you look at the overcrowding in the train on the way to work and think "this would make a great basis for a mobile resource management game". While a fat businessman's armpit engulfs your head.

[Calistas]

Everywhere you go you see hull-down opportunities for your pzIV - too much Combat Mission!

You had a dream which was basically an MMO idea two years before Ultima Online came out

[Nixxter]

Ceolstan - good luck with the Steam backlog, I can't get past Din's Curse addiction!

GlouriousMess - I hope the big guy at least powdered himself up and used deodrant...

Calistas - thank you for triggering some UO memories, it's a nice way to start the day thinking about my retired dudes (I'll have to do some math, that was long ago, surely).

[Brian Rubin]

Ceolstan - good luck with the Steam backlog, I can't get past Din's Curse addiction!
And you won't for a while, either. ;-)

[Ben Sones]

You pull off twenty-five head shots in a row, but the achievement doesn't trigger, and you are pissed. Then you realize that you are at the Post Office.

[ChrisPal]

You know particularly when your three year old son is becoming one also. He's got his own games (iXL), plus he's totally into Angry Birds, and now he wants to play Everquest 2 with me every time he sees it.

As I type, he's running around pretending he's a Shadowknight in armor and with a sword, yelling "I'm a bad, bad dude, I'm gonna beat you up! I'm a knight in armor! I want to beat up some skeletons!"

He always wants to see all of my guys (as he calls them) and make them run around on their horses. He's piss poor at mouse control, so the guys end up running everywhere randomly. When he wants to beat something up, it's funny, but frustrating. I'm trying to get him to understand the number keybindings so he can make some attacks. Otherwise, the poor boy is toast on the battlefield. At least we're learning more about numbers and keyboards!

Almost a year ago, his big thing with games was wanting to see every map in any game I was playing. Not sure why.

Oh, and you also know you're a gamer when you really just want to lose the kid so you can play yourself and accomplish something.

[MikeP]

the ASD labels on your keyboard are worn off.

[Delta]

Nooo, that's how you know when you're a coward.

[Robert Sharp]

As I type, he's running around pretending he's a Shadowknight in armor and with a sword, yelling "I'm a bad, bad dude, I'm gonna beat you up! I'm a knight in armor! I want to beat up some skeletons!"


That's pretty adorable.

[Brian Rubin]

...you covet the H.O.T.A.S.S. you got over ten years ago that they don't make anymore.

http://www.brubin.net/Img/fs-2tower.jpeg

Edit: Sorry, fixed the image.

[XPav]

...you covet the H.O.T.A.S.S. you got over ten years ago that they don't make anymore.

http://www.combatsim.com/htm/nov99/jpg/fs-2tower.jpg

I'm kind of scared about the HOTASS you broken-linked too. A HOTAS I could get, otherwise...

[Brian Rubin]

I'm kind of scared about the HOTASS you broken-linked too. A HOTAS I could get, otherwise...
Huh, image works on my end, even on my phone. It's from here: http://www.combatsim.com/htm/nov99/hotass2.htm

And here http://www.combatsim.com/memb123/htm/nov99/hotass.htm

[Ezdaar]

...you covet the H.O.T.A.S.S. you got over ten years ago that they don't make anymore.

http://www.combatsim.com/htm/nov99/jpg/fs-2tower.jpg

I thought I was the only one who had one of these. I can't imagine I'll ever give it up. I recall that they also sold templates to make your own but I have no idea where you would find one now.

[Brian Rubin]

I thought I was the only one who had one of these. I can't imagine I'll ever give it up. I recall that they also sold templates to make your own but I have no idea where you would find one now.
Sadly the company that made them folded looooooooooooooooooong ago. :(

[Nixxter]

From WoW days, long ago, as a rogue.

When you find yourself walking on a nice summer day in downtown Chicago with all those fools who can't walk properly, or quickly (dawdling fools!) and take up way too much sidewalk and you snap into a fantasy of assuming the lurking position of invisibility and coming up behind them and ganking them with long knives and throwing down some caltrops and becoming smoke and dancing your way on to the next group of violators.

[Ben Sones]

...you covet the H.O.T.A.S.S. you got over ten years ago that they don't make anymore.

I still have mine!

[Brian Rubin]

I still have mine!
Yay! Do you still use yours?

[Ben Sones]

Nope. It's in the basement. I don't currently have a functioning HOTAS to use with it. My Saitek X36 gave up the ghost a while back, and since I wasn't really simming at the time, I never replaced it. So currently I'm using an MS Sidewinder for all joystick duties. If I end up getting hooked on DCS A-10C, though, I may have to do something about that.

[Paper]

You pull off twenty-five head shots in a row, but the achievement doesn't trigger, and you are pissed. Then you realize that you are at the Post Office.

I don't quite get this. Why would you be shooting heads at the Post Office?

[Calistas]

It's a joke

[Nixxter]

You know, one of those moments you are out in the real world and then you find yourself thinking about blowing some guy out of his socks and shoes except you don't because you can do it in games but probably shouldn't in real life. Like that.

[Brian Rubin]

Nope. It's in the basement. I don't currently have a functioning HOTAS to use with it. My Saitek X36 gave up the ghost a while back, and since I wasn't really simming at the time, I never replaced it. So currently I'm using an MS Sidewinder for all joystick duties. If I end up getting hooked on DCS A-10C, though, I may have to do something about that.
Yeah, I hear ya. Mine is off to the side here and there, but I love space sims, so I use mine often. Used it today, as a matter of fact. :)

[Meghan Bowyer]

When confronted with old buildings, either in reality or photographs, you look for hand and footholds you'd use to climb to the top a la Assassin's Creed.

[Nixxter]

Nice! Please, don't jump from rooftop to rooftop irl Meghan, keep your wits about you! (leave parkour to the experts)

[Pogue Mahone]

When confronted with old buildings, either in reality or photographs, you look for hand and footholds you'd use to climb to the top a la Assassin's Creed.

I have a photo my wife took of me putting a hand and foothold on the wall of one of the churches in San Gimigniano. She didn't know what the hell I was doing.

[The Bitter Cynic]

You see a traffic circle sign and are reminded of a Hunter's Mark graphic.

(could mean I'm a WoW addict also)

When you do employee placement for the day, you think of it more like a game than your job.

(Bob is kind of a level 3 baggage handler, I'll put him on the ramp. Jerry is more level 6-ish, so he'll be in the baggage room setting up carts.)

[Delta]

I have a photo my wife took of me putting a hand and foothold on the wall of one of the churches in San Gimigniano. She didn't know what the hell I was doing.

Even just trying to get a foot and a half up one of those buildings in real life makes you suddenly realise just how strong/unrealistic the assassins are. Your whole center of gravity suddenly starts mucking around.

[SlyFrog]

With respect to Advanced Squad Leader, it was when I was driving with my family five hours in the country and kept involuntarily thinking that certain terrain would make good firelanes, or constitute gully terrain visible only from a short distance (next hex) away, etc.

Then I feel incredibly guilty, as I realize I've become the stereotypical armchair warrior who knows nothing about real military tactics, etc., but still insists on thinking, "I could put a squad in that church and command that neighboring field with a good fire position."

This is akin to the geek who really gets into football and starts talking about how they really should have used a cover two and rolled the safety on that last play. :)

[JeffL]

Again, too much BC2 lately - I was in my office yesterday, on the second floor, and I was standing in front of my window and involuntarily took a couple of steps back so I wouldn't be so visible in the window.

[Enidigm]

You know you're a gamer when...

you spend over 200$ in preorders for games in March to support your dying hobby?

[Alan Au]

Yeah, I involuntarily start calculating terrain bonuses and fields of fire when I walk around anywhere.

I also check behind myself a lot, but that's more of a situational awareness thing.

- Alan

[Omniscia]

It's not exactly game-related, rather more to do with computer use in general, but this morning I was trying to draw a straight line, and it went a bit askew, and for a brief moment my fingers were poised to hit Control Z.

And I wasn't anywhere near a keyboard.