To be pissed off that DD has spent a good 15 hours playing video games today?

[VerityMichaels]

She’s still up now. Is 17 (18 in December).

It’s just annoying. She won’t roll out of bed until 11/12 tomorrow. She won’t go out with her friends (she is constantly getting messages off them and although texts them a lot, she says she “can’t be arsed to see them as she sees them every day at college” even though they have invited her to some really great places). She’s just so lazy.

Surely 15 hours (and counting) just isn’t healthy? She is working tomorrow evening, but from when she gets up at midday until 1 hour before she is due to start work, she will be playing it again.

Nightmare.

AIBU?

I feel your pain. But here's a chink of light... DS was exactly the same. He is now studying at English at Oxbridge (won't say which in case it identifies!), and writing a dissertation on a video game and its literary allusions. Or something. TBH I don't understand.
He may even get a job out of it one day - big business. You never know.

But yes... teeth gnashingly annoying when they do it hours on end to the exclusion of anything else. Drove me mad.

If it was every single day, would be a bit worried, but unless you are watching her constantly, she could be doing other stuff too surely?? My eldest for example likes his one day off from work and college to ignore his girlfriends ramblings, buy a load of crap food, and sit on front of his telly, watch a film, play some fifa, watch another film, play more fifa, come downstairs, kicks his younger sisters backsides at Mariokart, then goes back upstairs to play more fifa, and I encourage him. This is his bit of time, he goes out for a jog every morning before college and works 2 jobs at 18 and babysits for me, so if my lad wants to have his day off and spend 15 hours in front of the telly once a week then its not going to do him any harm. All I would say is every so often tell them to have a screen break! Thats when I tend to make my lad a cuppa!

15 hours? That's a day of her life she's never getting back. She sounds depressed.

Gaming is looked down upon on this corner of MN, plenty of examples are on this thread alone. If she were gaming for 15 hours every day, missing college and not holding down a job I would be concerned. But I can’t get worked up what is as far as we know one occasion.
Yep, and if you're an Adult and a gamer be prepared
she sounds depressed
Oh yes, because she just couldn't possibly like gaming...
So would it be better if she was out shopping or At the pub everyday?
She's holding down a job and college.

She sounds depressed

I once watched all LOTR movies back to back without a break. I re-read all the Harry Potter books in one day in prep for Book 7's release. I watched 5 rugby matches in one day a few months ago.

I'm not in the slightest bit depressed 😃

Every day would be an issue. One lazy day of computer games isn't. It might be that she just wants to recharge this half term. I think my dd has only left the house once so far! She's done some room tidying but otherwise she's just been relaxing.

I used to get worked up about this. DS is also 17, has had a girlfriend for 18 months who also plays, is currently alternating gaming with seeing her, composing and producing electronic dance music (since being 13) and doing ‘A’ level work in preparation for doing computer science at a Russell Group University. It’ll be fine.

What’s she playing? This is massively important if it’s mario kart she is possibly unhinged if it’s something like Fallout or Skyrim then 15hrs barely scratches the surface.

Of course there are a million more productive things she could be doing but there is an equal amount of worse things she could be up to.

If she is going to college & doing well, holding down a job, still eating and bathing and still at least texting friends she is actually being quite productive.

If you are worried about exercise levels why don’t you both do something active together a couple of times a week. Something fun and different like roller derby might be of interest to her.

if you want to have a shit relationship with your daughter then by all means, take it off her, turn the Internet off. The amount of people on here telling you to do that is ridiculous, I bet you all have a fantastic relationship with your kids...
She's in college and has a job, give her a break? If you had a kid on drugs going out sleeping with people you'd wish she was at college with a job and playing games in her spare time. She's nearly 18 so maybe have a chat with her (you know because you can talk to your kids) and if it's on a weekday maybe just say turn it off at a certain time. I'm an artist, trust me staying up drawing or painting makes you feel exactly the same as staying up gaming. People make careers out of gaming. Get with the times people..

My DS11 has been on computer pretty much all day. It’s half term and his holidays. I do what I want on my holidays and he’s doing the same. YABU

"This is massively important; if it’s mario kart she is possibly unhinged, if it’s something like Fallout or Skyrim then 15hrs barely scratches the surface."

Totally with Mustang on this! Currently on my 4th playthrough of Fallout 4, and am well on my way to beating my last one which took me just over 450 hours. (I build a lot.)

I've been gaming since the mid-'70s. I worked as a games journalist, then a tester, then a producer, then a designer, and then the owner of two companies; one a PR agency, exclusively serving the games industry, and other a development studio.

My partner started as a games writer, then a highly sought-after incubator, then a publishing director, then a CEO.

We both became very successful consultants, and built teams for quite a few massive world-famous games, and plenty of less well-known ones. Our decades of expertise with videogames has allowed us to live and work all over the world, with some of the most awesomely talented people around. Not just in the games industry but in TV, movies, and music too.

I'm now in my mid-50s and I still adore playing videogames. My partner still loves playing too. Our son (in his 30s) is also a gamer. We are highly responsible adults who work hard, and believe we deserve to spend our leisure time exactly as we please.

To the OP; your daughter is adult enough to work, to pay taxes, to get married, to bear children, to drive, to fight for her country... and yet she's not adult enough to choose how she spends her free time? Really?

It's her life, not yours, and while I suspect that your concern may come from a place of love, it's really not for you to decide how she spends her time. So yes, I believe you are being completely unreasonable by not only declaring your daughter to be lazy - simply because her idea of downtime is different to yours - but also, by asking a group of strangers to judge her too. In some cases, pretty harshly. In what world is that kind of behaviour OK?

Ooo @ZarduHasselfrau I’d love to know the games?

Iv been a gamer since well forever, I can still remember sitting for hours playing Alex the kidd when I was in early primary lol.

I’m a relatively functional adult I think. Just gutted I don’t get as much time with really young kids.

Wish I had 15 hours free time to play video games. Not that I play them anyway. Getting a couple of hours to myself if bliss!

Ahhhh, the luxury of a whole day gaming. It's been a long time since I did that! Fine to do if it's not everyday. No worse than box set bingeing or anything similar.

It is not good for her, there should be no question about that. But being angry with her doesn’t solve anything. All you can really do is try to encourage her to do something that is good for her and will help her energy and concentration levels. There are many young people around who spend all their spare time smoking weed and playing video games who wants to see their kid wasting their life like that? I wish I had a bit more guidance when I was that age don’t know if I would have listened but it doesn’t hurt to try.

Who mentioned weed??

There is some evidence that gaming does improve concentration, reaction time and potentially helps prevent dementia.

She's got a b and going to college...nah,you've nothing to worry about

Job

Just read some of this thread....I've had 3 teens now adults ,on my 4 th nearly teen...if they are going to college and working that's fine,and not depressed..she's just choosing to relax differently from you...mine all said the same about friends,they've been with them all week,they don't need to see them at weekends / holidays.
..drugs / no college/in trouble with police / yeah worry...gaming no...she's just relaxing

It is holiday time!

Yes of course it’s not good, but how do you stop them? One of mine clocked up hundreds of hours. Got a guy to get internet switched off for hours of sleep. Youth immediately switched it back. I guess I could have turned off electricity, but other than that...
He’s now fine and at uni. Son, not techie guy!
Offspring know more about technology than me unfortunately.

I think it’s ridiculous the amount of people saying turn it off or force her to stop playing haha!!!

Maybe instead of worrying about her from downstairs and writing a thread you should talk to her about the game she’s clearly really into... it might give you an insight into what she likes and what she’s gaining from the game... she’s nearly 18 she will be very aware if she’s wasting her time or if she’s genuinely enjoying something.

My brother went through a similar stage, he’s now 21 with two beautiful children and qualifications and it hasn’t had a brain numbing effect in him. My ex boyfriend would do all nighters playing WOW - he literally wouldn’t sleep until the following night and now he’s qualified in computer software and design and has a gorgeous girlfriend he met in turkey... gaming isn’t going to ruin her life.

And I completely ageee with a lot of other posters - my mum would have been so bloody happy if at 17-18 I was at home playing games instead of out at house parties drinking and smoking.

Just let her be but remember she’s doing something she’s enjoys so in her mind she’s not isolating herself, you being sat in the living room moaning about her enjoying a game is infact isolating yourself from her - just talk to her about it, ask her to show you the game, ask about the storylines. My dad and brother still to this day make sure they spend time playing fifa and COD and Grand turismo together.

@Mustang27 - I'd love to be able to tell you but Ubisoft has always been really strict with their NDAs. Though in saying that, they did agree that we could feature Driver: San Francisco in our portfolio.