The reason is of course because the target audience for most of these games simply isn’t a parent/spouse/partner.

The way around that, actually, is to make content that can be worked toward in pieces, that add up to a certain amount of ‘time played’ without requiring you put in that time all in one 5+ hour sitting. That kind of system would work just fine for parent/spouse/partners, because even though the reward will take the same amount of time, it’s manageable in smaller chunks of ‘real life’ time each day.

I think that as gamers we all know exactly what Mark means, at least those of us how are parents. To the rest of you … why the hell would you read a topic titled “You can be a great parent or a great gamer but you cant be both” for anyway? Just kidding expand your mind.

Its the beginning about the lawn obsessed father that makes the point more than everything else that follows in my opinion, (my neighbor is one of those guys).

Gaming like its another career simply isn’t an option for a parent, spouse, partner, not if you want to keep that “tag” anyway.

It is all about balance, but it begs the question. Why are games designed in such a way that by default those that spend the most time in-game end up having the bestest, mostest, and sexiest stuff?

The reason is of course because the target audience for most of these games simply isn’t a parent/spouse/partner.

What Marks article is pointing out in a lateral sort of way to any developer that would listen is that there IS, in fact, a market for a well made game that doesn’t require catassing/poopsocking/givinguplifeforthegaming.

-Gooney

I don’t think it’s fair to say that you can apply the article to any topic in order to prove that it’s irrelevant. I spent a good deal of verbiage carefully qualifying the title of the post to point squarely towards those who will settle for nothing less than elite in-game status. Those are the specific people I’m talking about, not people who work long, crazy hours. You can always argue that by working hard they’re trying to provide financial stability for their family which is also important. I think coming down on people who are putting more than 40 hours a week into a career would certainly be heavy handed and holier than thou. Gaming is optional though. It’s a choice and a trivial one at that. And no, I certainly don’t think raiders or hardcore PVP honor grinders are great. I just meant to say that by the in-game definition of success they are the ‘great’ ones. If only people were impressed by my hordes of discarded low level alts…

Your getting people talking though about an issue that is effecting what I call the “powerpad generation” more and more everyday. So if that was the point of your writeup, it worked.

This sort of “You are the devil if you do X” kind of article doesn’t settle well with me (and no I’ve not been on raids in years so I’m not being defensive.) This kind of holier than thou rant could be applied to so many things. Take game developers for example, they work insane hours, often 6 or 7 days a week. Should we write an article saying:

“You can be a great game developer or you can be a great parent…”
“You can be a great lawyer or you …”
“You can be a great social worker or …”
“You can be a great President of the USA or …”

I also find your definition of great somewhat odd. Raiders are great? Ok. Then does that mean everyone else sucks? I know it is semantics to a point, but still. It seems the wrong way to state this.