Best Of

This was a good older discussion which touches on this subject:

https://newbuddhist.com/discussion/23801/video-game-violence-and-buddhism/p1

As you can see I have been struggling with this topic for a while. Its been good for me to read some of the things I wrote back then, I was pretty forthright. I wouldn’t go so far as to say games are bad for everyone, for some people it might be a better choice than others, or a necessary escape. But for those on a spiritual path who are serious about it its not a good habit.

@person said:
what got me back into the game was seeing the streaming games and the way they presented their characters, it looked really fun to me.

Yes that co-creative aspect of the game, the idea of just having fun with the theatre of it. In some ways a certain amount of optimisation is unavoidable, it is part of operating within the rules. You take the Quarterstaff +2 over a non-magic quarterstaff because it is better.

But I feel that you can take that creative role-play into the character creation process as well, which means not feeling forced into making optimal choices such as selecting Fireball as your first level 3 spell if you play a Wizard. It may not be necessary to pick a support-only character.

The way we used to play back when I was last playing D&D and not DM’ing, the Wizard was a bit of a glass cannon. Nobody else could do as much damage to a pack of enemies as the group’s Wizard, which was often me, at the cost of not being able to stand up to much punching.

We can become attached to almost anything just as our relationship with anything can become the means of discovering equanimity.

The degree to which we are attached to anything is the degree to which we will suffer the uncomfortable consequences of that attachment.
The degree to which we are not attached to anything is the degree to which we do not suffer the consequences of that attachment.

The ego's storyline, which is simply a collective construct of our attachments, is not softened by another storytelling of an attachment. The storyline of the ego is only dissipated by the establishment of a greater life effort in the transcendence of our attachments than in our continued indulging of them.

Even education itself becomes a limitation when a professional student's underlying motivations become an avoidance of facing life's responsibilities.
How much more so can an imaginary game be?

I can relate to others here. I was a teen when home video games first came to market and would often sit playing them all day long. Since I've had times where I had zero involvement with games and others where I've been consumed by them.

Currently a good part of me would like to devote myself to the Buddhist path, but since I do have to work and would like to maintain close contact with family and friends I inevitable soak up the energies of the world. My practice isn't able to go deep, it largely consists of clearing away the accumulated mental and emotional energies, its like constantly swimming upstream. I don't feel its possible for me to really be able to achieve meaningful peaceful states of mind like those achieved in retreat.

So, that's to say I kind of feel like I need some measure of worldly pleasures and human connection to live a happy life. But video games are isolating and addicting, at least to me. I no longer play anything more involved than solitaire or Candy Crush and I limit my time on each. I have however been playing Table Top Role Playing Games (TTRPGs) online with others for a couple years now.

At one level they do feed into the desire for advancement and mastery, which I don't think are necessarily bad in themselves. Only some spiritual paths eschew that form of practice, the Gelug path of TB speaks a lot about enlightenment as a goal to be attained and spiritual qualities as skills to be mastered. It teaches active application of antidotes to harmful mental states.

More to the point though, what I really enjoy about it as opposed to video games is that it is way more social, creative and collaborative. Every group plays it differently of course, but in general the goal isn't to win, but to create a fun and interesting story together. And for myself I've been able to develop more spontaneous creativity, as opposed to the more deliberative written style.

Anyway, not all games are created equal. If TTRPGs aren't your thing, board game nights are pretty common these days at local gaming stores and other venues. They allow for human interaction and aren't "always on" to help avoid addictive tendancies one may have.