Casual Gaming in Alaska

Anyone that knows me is well aware of my online gaming. Being a family man, I am forced to be a casual gamer at best. By no means is this a complaint about my status as a father. I love my family and would not trade them for the world. However, there is no doubt that there are things you just cannot do online when you have these responsibilities.

In the FPS games I play, it's not as critical. It means that I can't be an active member of a clan that does ladder tournaments. While I believe that would be fun, it's not really my play style anyway. Where I'm affected most in shooters is in skill. I get a few hours a night (shared between games) to play. There's no way I'm going to get as skilled (or learn all the exploits) that some punk kid that games 24/7 in his mom's basement obscured by the empty pizza boxes and energy drink cans. (In my day, it was Mountain Dew...)


Now when it comes to my other online vice, it gets more complicated. I love MMORPGs. I grew up playing AD&D, GURPS, and Earthdawn, and when my gaming group got too busy for the weekly game, they pitched in and got me EverQuest for my birthday. When EverQuest II came out, it was a natural move for me. I just got my Dwarf Templar to 80/80 before Fan Faire in June.

Challenge number one in my MMO adventures is time zone. The boys go to bed at 8pm my time, which is midnight EST. When I am logging on, many players are logging off. Raids are either over or full, and most groups already have a plate healer.

Challenge two is the amount of time I play. As a working man, I don't stay up till the wee hours like I did as a kid. This means that if I'm going to get in a raid (hard to do because of number one above) then it needs to be forming right when I'm getting on. Otherwise I either go past my allotted time, or log out and risk getting blacklisted.



All of this is very detrimental to getting my mythical epic. My options are to risk my marriage and kids' welfare, or make time to make raids during earlier hours. Not really an option. It would almost be like choosing to jump off a cliff rather than stand there and enjoy the view.