video games Would you rather Play Video Games or Watch Movies

[DylanB47]

[Steven P. Administrators]

Bit of an odd question, depends on the mood so watching movies takes less effort than playing video games so that's what I voted  

[indospot Veteran]

Definitely videogames. I find them much more engaging and engrossing.

 

EDIT: Steven makes a good point, though, it's a lot easier to watch movies, you can even have them in the background while you do something else. In that sense, I'd say it's easier to consume movies/shows, so I may spend more time on those, but video games are more memorable experiences.

[Nick H. Supervisor]

I really enjoy video games, as they can have a story that I'm involved in rather than just being a member of the audience. And recently I bought Civ 6 so I've been cursing things like work getting in the way. At the same time, there are times where a game can seem like a lot of effort. Booting up, loading, remembering where I was, what has happened so far, what I planned on doing, how I'm going to do that...sometimes I just want to open Netflix, click play and switched my brain off.

[Louisifer]

Games all the way, some games have a great gameplay to story ratio. If you can find a nice trilogy out there then that could occupy hundreds of hours, dwarfing even the longest movies/tv shows.

[Mindovermaster Global Moderator]

There are games like LateShift, where it's a movie, but you choose the outcome. So in a sense, it is both a movie and video game.

[ThaCrip]

Movies ; hands down as they are the safer all-around choice in the long term. I say this simply because there is a higher volume of quality movies than there are video games and to me the true worth of a movie/video game etc is whether it's worth re-watching/playing from time-to-time or not.

 

I have seen 2,350+ total movies and out of those currently there are only 150 that stand out (or 208 movies if I count movies a bit shy of my favorites). so about 6-9% of everything I have seen is good enough for me to call a favorite (or about 1 out of every 15 movies I have seen over the long run are good enough to be among my favorite movies) or thereabouts.

 

but in a very basic sense... I ultimately judge movies by whether I want to re-watch them or not (which is clearly the best way to judge them in basic terms) as this determines my basic Thumbs Up or Thumbs Down status. so in this regard only about 20% of everything I have seen (in regards to movies and the like) is worth re-watching, which means about 80% of everything I have seen gets a Thumbs Down. but with that said... I would say most of what I have seen was at least okay enough not to have wasted my time.

 

I typically re-watch all of my favorite movies and ones a bit shy of that status 'at least' once every few years and even ones outside of this standard I still try to re-watch roughly at least once every 5 years or so.

 

hell, if I could not re-watch movies I would largely lose my interest in them at this point simply because I feel I have largely exhausted seeing all of the movies worth seeing from the past (there might be some undiscovered gems out there but it would likely take me watching a bunch of mostly forgettable movies to 'maybe' find something worthwhile once in a while) as while I would still see some quality movies being released in the present and into the future, they tend to be more limited.

 

also, in terms of time spent... that's another bonus for movies since they only take about 2 hours of ones time where as a average game (putting aside those really simple ones that are quick pick-up-and-play types since these don't require a bigger time investment as I am primarily talking about games with story etc which are more comparable to movies in general) would be well beyond that. so just given the time investment, one has to be much pickier on what games they play as it would be much easier to get through a average movie than it would be a average game as the average game etc.

 

video games on the other hand... very few are worth re-playing. without checking I can't imagine it's more than around 5-10 or so (I am assuming we are talking games with more movie like characters/story etc) and I say this as someone who was basically into video games quite a bit from since I can remember until probably around the age of 30 (I am in my early 40's now) before they mostly fizzled out. I might still play a more modern game once in a while but generally speaking a very high percentage of what I do play is replaying games I liked from years ago. hell, I imagine back in my younger days I might have chose video games over movies, or at least it would have been more competitive between the two, where as time passed, in the long term, I can tell movies are clearly superior overall, especially like I was saying, given the volume of them and time spent to enjoyment levels etc.

 

hell, in regards to video games... in terms of consoles the last console I bought was the XBox360 generation which is basically inline with what I said with games as a whole losing most of their appeal by the time I was around the age of 30 as after that I simply did not like enough games to justify spending more $ on consoles etc. but generally speaking... since most games I play with good characters/story tend to be shooter variations I have pretty much always preferred the PC over consoles simply because of the superiority of mouse+keyboard over a console controllers analog stick as I simply can't aim quickly enough with a analog stick to enjoy a shooter on a console as it clearly handicaps me. but on a mouse on the other hand I am not handicapped at all as I can play to my full potential as I am easily more than good enough on that to enjoy a shooter etc.

 

also, in regards to TV shows... assuming we keep this as a separated a bit from movies, very few of these stand out but the ones that do are great as while a person spends many hours with these, if done right, they can really develop characters etc etc, which is a potential bonus over a movie. but the amount of TV shows worth mentioning that can compete with higher quality movies is very limited from what I have seen to around 5 shows. but then again, higher quality drama variation of TV shows has not been around nearly as long as higher quality movies have been.

 

for me... I would say higher quality movies pretty much started in the 1960's (although a high percentage of my favorite movies (16.7%, or if you count movies a bit shy of my favorites the percentage shift a bit to 12.8%) are from the 1990's to date) where as with TV shows you might as well call it the 2000's on forward (pretty much The Sopranos (1999-2007)). so while I have not seen nearly as many TV shows as I have movies, I tend to be more selective given the time investment. but I do think there could be some undiscovered gems I have missed on the TV show side of things, but probably not many, especially stuff that can compete with the higher quality movies.

 

hell, here is a quick break down of percentages of my favorite movies (ill just exclude movies a bit shy of that status for now) by decade's...

 

2020's (so far) = 1 movie (1%) (but I think technically they consider it a 'TV mini series', but ill just count it as a really long movie as it's a bit under 7hrs total)

2010's = 48 movies (32%)

2000's = 44 movies (29.3%)

1990's =  32 movies (21.3%)

1980's = 9 movies (6%)

1970's = 6 movies (4%)

1960's = 9 movies (6%)

1940's = 1 movie (1%)

 

p.s. a very limited amount of video games can hold their own against higher quality movies. Mafia (2002) is my #1 video game experience to date as I first played it back when it was new nearly 20 years ago now. it's one of a very limited amount of games I would consider worthy to challenge some of the very best movies I have seen.

 

On 10/02/2021 at 08:10, indospot said:

it's a lot easier to watch movies, you can even have them in the background while you do something else. In that sense, I'd say it's easier to consume movies/shows, so I may spend more time on those, but video games are more memorable experiences.

It's kind of pointless to watch a movie if it's playing in the background. I either actually watch the entire movie or I don't bother in the first place, unless of course the movie is boring in which case ill usually turn it off around the 40min mark etc of which only about 7% of everything I have seen managed to be THAT bad as, short of rare exceptions, boring is pretty much the worst crime a movie can commit since it's the opposite of what they should be which is interesting/entertaining.

 

even in terms of more memorable experiences... I definitely side with movies over video games as very few video games can match the overall experience of higher quality movies in my mind. like I mentioned in my novel above, there is 150 movies (or 208 if you count movies a bit shy of favorite movie status for me) that leave a lasting impression on me currently where as with comparable video games that figure is probably in the ball park of 5-10 or so tops.

[JustGeorge]

I suck at videogames now, but enjoy watching a good FPS or fighting game matchup. I also like movies and cheese