I am 18F and I spent over 55000 hours on my life on Roblox and another 15000 hours on a dead game called Graal, I need something to do with my life. I have no hobbies or interests
Help please 🙏

I love games, but some of them took too much from me. I remember the first time I discovered Plants vs Zombies, I showed it to my mom. Next thing I know - we spent the whole night together in front of a PC, finishing the whole game at once. Have ever games involved you so much, you forgot about sleep?

Just sharing to get off my chest and write it down somewhere so I can come back to it…

I have come to the realisation that my gaming is not a hobby that I take too far sometimes, it’s actually a problem that is disrupting my day to day.

I quit gaming in my teens when I got into the gym and wanted to general improve my life, before quitting I would easily game 14-16 hours a day. I had no real ambition outside of gaming and eventually realised how damaging it was to me.

I picked up gaming last year, I’m 27 (M) and I began to game as a hobby. I told myself it was fine and I’m allowed to enjoy hobbies. Well, it’s come to the point I’ve realised I can’t game without it turning into a serious problem, I lose motivation, stop reaching out to my friends and generally just drop off the grid.

League of legends has been my nasty little vice, that game gets a strong chokehold on me. I’ve deleted my accounts and realised I just need to quit, I don’t even enjoy gaming I just find it so hard to stop.

So, it’s an ongoing challenge but I am quitting gaming, my life is significantly better when I don’t game.

I will come back to this post in my challenging moments and remind myself why I’m quitting.

Hi,

So i've recently made the choice to try to quit competetive gaming after 13 + years. I started of my "gaming career" playing Runescape/cod/minecraft when i was very young.

At the age of 12-13 I found CS, WoW, League etc... these games gave me alot of dopamine and i've racked up over 17000 hours combined on all of these games.

The problem is that the older I got, the more competetive it became. I started reaching Global/Faceit lvl 10 in CS, Gladiator in WoW and diamond in League and even playing tournaments in these games.

I am now closer to 30 and still as competetive but now I have so much more responsabilities of course, and these games are now just making me more irritated and mad because I have less time to play and when loosing I just loose my temper.

At this point I would like some guidance/advice. I recently bought a PS5 to try to quit PC gaming and the competetive scene. I've been enjoying some COD and single player games and it haven't touched my temper at all and its not even close as time consuming. The thing is tho that it doesn't give me the same kick or dopamine as playing competitively, which is understandable but gives me a feeling that i've "wasted" my money buying something that is "kind of" helping instead of just trying to quit on the spot.

What are your advices or what did you do?

Best regards

I started playing League of Legends 5 years ago and have racked up 3000 hours on it, but probably roughly 5000 hours counting all the time I spent learning about the game online and watching streams.

When I play League I just literally cannot think about the game nonstop. Any work I have to do is put on second priority. Gaming is suddenly more important than seeing friends. When I queue up I actively feel bad, but once I enter champ select I am literally hooked. After I finish playing my mind is foggy, and I am basically a zombie for the next couple of hours.

I was first drawn into the game with the visuals and the game mechanics. I have not seen anyone talk about this, but I swear League of Legends puts something into the splash arts that is addicting. It is not like normal art at the museum. They probably engineer it to get people like me addicted. I look at the splasharts and it completely takes me back to the loading screen where I have gotten pentakills or crazy dragon steals. Basically when I look at some of the newest splasharts or some cheap mobile game ad that is similar to league, I am a couple of steps away from relapsing. I just constantly think back to the highest parts of the game and completely lose my mind over it.

When I relapsed last year I was absolutely livid. I locked myself out of my account. I pressed a random string of keys which became my new password and the email that is attached to the account has been deleted. Therefore, I cannot access my account unless I beg customer service, which is really really embarrassing. At the same time, right now I am having thoughts of calling customer service to get my account back. I know that the employees will give it back because Riot games wants you to stay addicited.

The only reason I want my account back is because I have an emotional attachment to it and the addiction to making huge plays. I have some pretty crazy limited edition skins in it that I all somehow got "for free" in the time I spent watching the game and wasting my time on streams for drops. I have this feeling of I spent so much time obtaining these cosmetics and no other account will have these ever again, regardless of money. I have this belief that I need my account and have it stored somewhere in my posession otherwise all my achievement and plays will go away for ever. But if its in my posession obviously I'm going to relapse. I can ONLY go cold turkey. However, I am really struggling to let go of my account.

I am currently almost 1 year clean, which I have been able to achieve 3 times, but every time I relapse at the exact same time (late July). I did mini-relapse a couple days ago and played 3 games of Wild Rift on my phone, but I have since turned on parent controls for myself to stop. I played League of Legends for the very first time in late July 5 years ago. I get extreme cravings for the game EVERY SINGLE YEAR IN JULY where I basically cannot think about anything else. During the rest of the year it is fine though.

Since trying to quit I have gone cold turkey on everything. All social media is blocked and scrolling methods have been blocked completely. I have no games or anything on my phone, the most interesting app literally is gmail. 😭😭I also have been running, swimming, hiking, gym, etc. I have strong habits but league always seems like a bigger priority during this mid summer time from nostalgia and probably because when I played league the first time ever it was a different feeling and my brain is chasing that.

tldr

*I am just seeking advice on how to get over my attachment to my "limited edition cosmetics"/my lol account and not calling Riot customer service to give me back my account and relapse again. I also would like some advice to get over this relapse withdrawl craving situation in July that happens every year. I am a little worried that this will continue to cycle and it is one of my last steps to be free from this game.*

A while ago, I would spend at least 10+ hours a day gaming, and it felt good.

But the problem was, I would feel the need for more once I stopped.

I thought it was just a problem with all games, but then I just realised it was just the competitive ones for me, and Sims 4.

I decided to give all my competitive multiplayer games to charity, delete Sims 4, and only play relaxing, mindful games instead, like outer wilds and similar ones.

Through this, I managed to cut my time spent on games to an average of 20 minutes a day, with my maximum being 1 hour occasionally.

Im 21yo male so it’s not like she’s neglecting me.

My mom (42yo) has been panting a video game called “Last Z: survival shooter” since last year, at the beginning she was playing occasionally but now she is on it almost every day, she’s has no job and she abandoned every responsibility, including sleeping, eating and cleaning herself, me and my dad work but he’s impossible to convince to do any chores, and I’m totally overwhelmed with this amount of stuff, we now live in a big disgusting house.

This dumb game has been charging like 4 dollars a week for no reason and she spend willingly like 5k this last 6 months in only one of her accounts (she have two). Also she is flirting with guys in the game (she’s still married to my dad), is a gooner game, the characters only have physics on the boobs so you know what kind of players it has, I’m even starting to think she only plays to keep receiving that kind of attention.

She invite me to play it a couple times but I ended up disgusted by the mediocrity of its mechanics and the gooner things. I’m a gamer too and we used to play a lot together, we played like good fun campaign games. I even have a tough time with gta online and cod addiction which its finally over, she didn’t even consider it a problem. So now I’m trying to confront her and give her advice in own experience about how is to struggle with multiplayer games addiction but she’s just not even taking it seriously, she’s not even mad, she does jokes and ignores me to keep playing.

Please give me some advice, I love her but I hate everything related to that game now. And please don’t be misogynistic

I live with my girlfriend of 3 years. I currently work to support us both as she has been severely depressed and dealing with a physical disability as well. She really enjoys gaming and has turned to it in the last year since she hasn’t been able to play sports due to illness, which is what used to take up most of her free time. I am very sympathetic about this and have encouraged her to pursue gaming as a passion since I can see how excited and happy it makes her and how much it hurts to not have her sport.

I do feel though that the amount of time she spends gaming is excessive. I’m talking 6 hours nearly every day. When I get home from work and we tell eachother about our days that’s usually the only thing she has done. I worry that this isn’t healthy, but when I‘ve gently tried to bring it up in the past she has reacted strongly and become very depressed for the rest of the day.

She is convinced that video game addiction isn’t real, so I’m not sure where to go from here. I’m not going to lie, I feel a bit resentful that I’m working hard to barely scrape by paycheck to paycheck and she gets to relax all day. I get that this is not the ideal scenario for her either, and I just want to let go of those negative feelings and improve the situation.

Any advice about how I can encourage more variety for her without coming off as overly controlling would be appreciated. Yes she’s in therapy.

(sorry for my bad english)

I like playing video game and i only have 1 video game on phone so i can focus on it

Every game i played i have a goal "i want to be skilled player" no matter shooting game, MOBA or more. And im understand to obtain that goal i have to get a lot of hour play time and experience. I practice a lot and played a game more than 6 - 8 hour a day to gain experience.

But sadly just after 1 month i start lost motivation to play that game for no reason, even i push my self to play it i always start thinking "im lazy" something like that. And then i delete that game and i never obtain that goal in my whole life in gaming.

What should i do to avoid lost motivation? How do you guys that have competitive mindset can play 1 game for a years consistently?

Hi

I have been off gaming about 3.5 years. I usually slip up every summer and have to realize fast that I cant game anymore.. This summer is no difference. I start to think gaming is a good idea again.. I just have to remind my self what I am capable of without gaming. Since I stopped gaming I started lawschool with great grades. I just need some motivation to stay of gaming this summer :)

So basically I've lost all passions and the ability to play ps games anymore, its too boring and the only thing I've been waiting for is gta 6 for the last 5 years, but I really dont want to touch my ps5 ever again, how do I fight this urge?

I applied to volunteering in the Civil Defense of the Ministry of Interior, hopefully I will be trained to be a volunteer firefighter.

Being out on the field is so much better compared to gaming!

I’m new here, and I’ve been gaming since the NES days—it’s still my main hobby.

I’ve been noticing something lately: trophies have really changed how I play. I feel like I can’t enjoy a game unless I’m determined to get the 100% platinum.

Then, when I think about quitting, I get anxious. Which, honestly, is probably a sign that I should quit.

So, I’m asking for your thoughts. Do you think it’s okay to switch to a Switch 2 and still enjoy the hobby? It offers games at a more relaxed pace and doesn’t have that trophy pressure.

Or is it better to completely cut ties?

I currently own two PS5s, a Series X, Nintendo Switch 2, PC, SteamDeck, and Apple Arcade. Of course, I cannot possibly play all of these…but I have them.

Hi everyone! If you're the parent of a child ages 11–14 and your child doomscrolls, this short survey explores how families manage children's screen time and social media use, what tools they currently use to mitigate it, and what they wish existed. This survey takes no more than 5 minutes. Thank you for sharing your feedback!

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfhr8et-go6y9uJls7NEH68lJa7vn59YYQk8yJ38dCnQiZuTQ/viewform?usp=dialog

Driving school exams this week. I haven't studied much, and I'm not sure I'll pass. I've got enough experience behind the wheel, but I have to take the exams a second time because I want a local license in the country I've migrated to.

Not really sure what's going on at work. Everything seems stable, yet I've never been more lost trying to describe what it is I actually do at the company. No clear sense of my future career path, or of what I'd do if things go south and I need to look for a new job.

General complexity of life. Nothing is linear. Nothing is transparent enough to show me a 0/300 progress bar whenever I do something. Social connections that drain the social battery constantly. And no clear understanding of how to recharge it and stop feeling so tired of life.

All of this brings me to a point where I just wish I could log in again. And the moment I think that, I feel the aftermath of FOMO: why did I decide to quit in the first place? I've missed so many cool opportunities to be part of the community! And now, if I come back, I'll just want to double down on my gaming time to get back to where I left off.

The urges are real. I try to smother them by watching and reading an absurd amount of news and street interviews. It's as if I need a virtual place where I can stop feeling and thinking whatever it is I'm feeling and thinking in response to my life and what I have to go through.

I just wish gaming had never been an option to begin with. But for that, I guess I should never have started. Gaming has served an important role my whole life — it's always been the place where I self-medicated the anxiety and the depressive thoughts, and the anger and fear behind them. But now that I've banned it (once again), I feel so deprived, and everything else is more vivid and visceral.

Sharing here helps, in a way. Thanks for tuning in. I'm off to do my adult obligations now, as a way to get my mind off all of this.

TL;DR: Exams I haven't studied for, career uncertainty, and life with no exp bar. The urge to log in is strong, I'm drowning it in news instead, and quitting has (as always) made everything feel more intense.

I've been addicted to video games since I was a kid. It started with mobile games, then multiplayer mobile games, then multiplayer PC games, and then eventually single-player games.I've spent countless hours gaming over the years.

Then I stopped and asked myself, what did I actually gain? A few rare skins to flex? Higher ranks that don't matter outside the game? Endless trash talk and toxicity? I quit multiplayer games first.Thinking single-player games were different ,indeed they are i still remember all of my experiences unlike multiplayer. But eventually I realized that I don't even enjoy them anymore. Played so many games across so many genres that I can predict what's coming most of the time.

So I've decided to quit gaming. Not taking a long break not just one last game.

I've never been an addict but there's always better ways I could spend my time. Also lately gaming has been boring me anyhow and the console ended up being an expensive streaming device. Now with gaming gone next step is ditch streaming, the hardest of the two to dump.

Played CS2 all week especially today. I literally did nothing but game all day and although I top fragged what did I prove? Nothing. Just wasted a whole bunch of time.

As the title mentioned i have decided to fully quit gaming after 2 decades i deleted all my discord accounts and monday will recieve a new phone number to leave all the old people behind. My reason for quiting is just it being a waste of time/ it not being enjoyable anymore/ it messing with your dopamine receptors. The friends u usually make trough gaming are people that accept their life as it is and often choose gaming over self development. Personally i like personal development alot and found out none of my friends that game share the same interest (even some people i know irl that game) it feels like it drags me down in life and being a barricade of me getting the full potential out of myself. This is my first attempt of actually wanting to quit gaming and im new to this community im curious to know what lead you to quit gaming and how it improved your life. 🙏

I was a curious, hardworking student until 5th grade, when COVID hit and school moved online. I ended up living with cousins, grandparents, aunt, and uncle since my village had no good schools, while my parents stayed behind. With no one watching, my cousins and I secretly started playing Free Fire, and I got hooked — rank-pushing daily and cheating on online exams via Google. When school reopened, I actually hoped the pandemic would return. Tuition kept me passing 6th out of fear, but I failed three subjects in 7th, barely passed 8th, and failed Maths, Science, and SST badly in 9th — moving to 10th only because the principal let me pass. I also switched schools in 8th and hate the new one due to bullying and poor teaching. My attendance dropped so low that my class teacher barred me from my half-yearly exam and threatened to block my promotion — I've attended school only twice this session. Now I sleep at 3 AM after gaming all night, wake at 3 PM, skip breakfast, and often clash with my parents, sometimes physically, with no quiet place to study at home. I need guidance as a friend 😭