Fifteen More Minutes has got me into trouble more often than not. Playing Oblivion until 3:30AM when I have to be up at 6:30AM. Playing a FPS with my friends, only to have my friend's girlfriend come around and say "You said you'd be fifteen minutes. That was 1 and a half hours ago". Ah it was fun to annoy her... | |
Ahh, the number of times I've been yelled at for those illusive snatches of play. This isn't inherent just in gaming. Television programmes set for half-hours usually wind up being shorter in order to break up into bite-sized portions for a lower attention span. 8-12 minutes, depending on the channel. These denominations of time are useful in that it allows us to ever-better schedule our leisure time. However, I see down sides. By breaking up our days into 10-15 minute segments we can fritter it away on things which don't require the kind of intense attention span that say, a two-hour block of reading will. Casual games just don't need to be as immersive as something you'll spend hours on does which can in part lie at the feet of the increasing shallowness of many big-name releases. If people play for quarter-hour stints they need not absorb so much as other times. Yes indeed, these stints may be conjoined, which indicates that the game is more immersive than something shallow would be. Not all games manage that, neither do movies, television shows or books. If we could lengthen the Now again, just think how much fun we'd have. | |
I have to admit that I've fallen victim to the extra fifteen minutes a lot of times. It isn't just related to computer games either - the same rule applies to the internet, face-to-face conversations, reading books, exercise... the list goes on. Unfortunately, it tends to ruin my productivity, whether it relates to college work or the assorted pieces of writing that I do in my spare time. I'll probably have to give most of my leisure activities up cold-turkey for a while soon, because frankly, I don't have the discipline to limit myself. Video games, the internet, movies, television - the lot has to go. I won't get anything useful done while I'm trying to justify various distractions. | |
Haha, I've never looked at it like this before but yeah, I've always over glorified the final moments of gaming before having to actually do some work, or whatever. I remember when I was around seven years old, playing The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. I would be doing some dungeon and pressing on without any care in the world. Then my Mum would shout at me "Gav! You need to get ready for school!" and I would literally beg for more time. It's not like she has power over time but I still asked. None the less, I would still pause the game and put my TV on stand-by for hours upon hours until I got back. | |
Jesper Juul, the guy who made Bejeweled, had an interesting observation about this. They inherently design their games so you can get a fair bit done in 15 minutes so that the user does not perceive it as a critical time investment. Yet on average people play the game for slightly less than an hour per session. | |
I was going to read this, but I thought it take more than 15 minutes..... | |
"JUST ONE MORE MATCH AND I'LL GO TO SLEEP!" That's why my parents were so infurated when I played Guild Wars PvP. You don't want to stop the winning streak! Also, Diablo 2. Just one more baalrun... Just one more level... Just one... | |
I implement the "fifteen minutes" rule rigidly, although I guess I never really thought about it until now. I won't play anything multiplayer if there's a chance I'll have to bail - I hate quitters, and one time a submission match of Gears of War 2 took FIFTY MINUTES to resolve. The whole time I was playing, I was half distracted by Angry Girlfriend, who was stomping around the apartment waiting to go to dinner. I have never been so frustrated with Handley the Aggressively Defiant Meatflag. Live Arcade games are usually my pick for short-run gaming. Minimal load time, no hunting for discs, and (generally) simple play means I can drop these games at a moment's notice. I haven't played many RPGs lately, if only because I can't 15-minute game them. You really need to set aside a dedicated hour or two to make story-based games worthwhile, and most of the recently released RPGs I've tried have such ridiculous voice acting that I'd rather play Peggle instead. My choice in game genres is largely affected by my lifestyle, which has changed from "What're you up to? Nothing? Let's kick some ass!" to "She's on Facebook, go go goooooo". | |
I always had the solution to the "15 Minute Law"... it's the Save Game button. D'uh! Okay, that's maybe I was a PC gamer from start, I never understood the "there is no save button" excuse the console players had. When I had something to do, I paused the game, when I had somewhere to go to, I saved the game and went on my way. I didn't have any objection, why should I, if I go now, I get things done sooner so I can get back into game sooner, but there is really no rush, it's saved so it won't go anywhere. But, I admit, I had my fair share of loooong gaming streaks. Staying up late (early) only realizing at 4AM, that I've been playing for almost ten hours straight is something I'll never forget. StarCraft, Diablo II and many-many adventure games come to mind... | |
Yesterday I had a bowl of cereal and some instant ramen. Total. Too busy playing 20-minute matches in S4. >_>;; My mom ends up doing the same thing when it comes to Facebook, so we're late to a lot of stuff. I have my mornings planned out so I get fifteen minutes to spare on the internet. :'D | |
I tend to do that when it comes to talking to people. I know I have to get up at 5am for something and I'm still up talking online at 3:30am. I always tell myself, "I'll be done in a few minutes. I'll get off in 15 so I can get some sleep." Another interesting topic or conversation strikes and I join in, chattering away. Then 4am rolls around and I complain that I didn't know where the time went. Oooh, so much sleep I have lost. | |
Ah, yes, the old "I'll just try to get a little bit farther" excuse. I've fallen victim to this many times, ending up playing for multiple hours instead of just a few minutes. My favourite case of this was when I finished Golden Sun: The Lost Age. I started to approach the final boss at about 10:00 PM and said to myself "I'm at a high enough level that this should only take a few minutes." After at least 50 restarts, changes of strategy, etc., the credits started rolling. A glance at my clock showed 7:30 AM. I immediately collapsed and slept until about 8:00 PM that day... <( ^ . ^;)> | |
Interesting philosophy about the "15 more minutes", I never thought of it as the smallest possible unit of time we can devote to something else. But I have to disagree about your intro. | |
If you give yourself a set amount of time (say, 1 hour) that you really can't change due to other commitments, even if it's a game you really aren't enjoying, the fun factor increases tenfold the closer you get to the end of your allocated playing time. Then again, perhaps that just means my 'other engagements' are boring. 15 minutes is just enough time to (likely) achieve something, but not long enough that you will begin to tire of the game. | |
I remember accidentally playing the "15 more minutes" game with the MGS 2 ending, that was a big ass mistake. Congrats on the article Mr. Lassik, may there be more in the future. | |
Very true. The moment you become conscious of the amount of time you have left, you keep glancing at the clock, hoping that time would slow down. It's a last grasp before you have to go do something. And see? I told you you'd get it done. | |
Fifteen more minutes also represents another, external factor: it allows us to "come down" and "wrap up" whatever aims we were trying to achieve in the game, so we can leave the game on our terms. It represents an internal shift from fun mode to responsible mode that is more effective for us, as we internally embrace the idea that we are in control and choosing to move onto the other engagement. The flaw with this process comes when we don't want to accept the other engagement at all - in which case procrastination kicks in, and more often than not, we milk those 15 more minutes, and then some, until it hopefully somehow becomes too late to do the other engagement, at which point we might as well continue with the game instead until the next engagement comes along. | |
I once had my mom call me for dinner 4 minutes after starting a 30-min. match in S4....Being the greedy bastard that I am, unwilling to give the money and xp I had so far accumulated, I completely finished the match. My dinner was still lukewarm when I finally got downstairs, so not all was lost. | |
I've been yelled at many times for these chunks of playtime, but that's why I'm starting to go more handheld than usual. See, if I need to head to school, I just need to close my DS for a few minutes, and once I'm safely on the bus and not going to be late at all, the games can continue for-you guessed it-another 15 minutes. | |
Of late, when I have fifteen minutes or so to spare, I find myself firing up Final Fantasy XII. I leave the critical path alone, of course; advancing the plot generally requires an afternoon or more. However, Square Enix did an unusually good job at putting stuff in that title you could do in a short time frame that felt meaningful. Chase down one of Clan Centurio's marks; earn some license points for that new spell or weapon I saw in town; hunt for rare game out in the wilds; help a dude catch some fish. My latest and strangest compulsion is filling out the bestiary, which rewards aggregate creature kills with flavor text on the game world and tips on rare items. Perhaps these aspects of Final Fantasy XII are mere corollaries of its well-documented MMO leaning, as I must confess I have virtually no experience with that genre of gaming. For the first time, though, I can pick up a role-playing game and accomplish something without shirking my other responsibilities. | |
I'm kind of like that when it comes to the internet, actually. | |
I'm 42 years old. I never once had this problem with Lord of the Rings Online or World of Warcraft. But that damn YouTube. Just one more vid, just one more vid...... | |
I'm not alone! | |
I never really do that, I stop when I want, and play when I do. | |
Patapon 2 is doing this to me at the moment. Each mission is somewhere between 2 and 10 minutes long, and when it gets to the point where I've been playing it for too long the whole "just one more mission, they're short" kicks in and I end up playing for another hour or so... | |
Diablo 2/ Fallout 3/ Half-Life 2 is better than any form of dieting because when im playing and i hear supper/dinner i will instinctively reply "15 minutes more!" and of course when i do finally go to eat, the food is stone cold and my mother or girlfriend (depending) is not best pleased. c'est la via. | |
So true. So very true. 15 minutes of gaming is EXACTLY like the snooze button. You allow yourself to press it once more... and once more... and once more... and before you know it an hour has passed and you have no time to get ready for what you have to do or you're late for something. Those 15 minutes are the cocaines and heroins of the gaming universe. | |
Ah, those dreaded 15 minutes. I actually don't see why they can't be used as a legitimate excuse when turning up late to official functions. If your dog has died, you get an approving nod, and things resume as normal- if I were to turn up and say I needed to finish Gears of War 2, i'd be lucky to get away with the smallest shred of dignity. I've had pets die, and i've played Gears of War 2- surely they can relate when I say that the closing levels of GoW had me much more pre-occupied than 'ol Mittens popping her clogs. | |
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Fifteen More Minutes
There may be satisfaction in breaking the shrink wrap of a newly purchased game, but it pales in comparison to the last few moments of play before you have to put down the controller. Taylor Hidalgo ponders what's so special about those last 15 minutes of game time.
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