Something I don’t talk about much here, but play regularly, are video games on our XBox. Just as always having a book (or two) on the go, I always have a game that I am in the midst of playing.
Aside from being really fun, I’ve read that they are very good exercise for your brain, and have been used to help in the recovery process of stroke victims. I don’t doubt it, as they require lots of quick thinking, puzzle solving, strategic planning, and dexterity.
(All that said however, even though I don’t choose to play war or sniper games, most do involve shooting and life/death situations of some sort. They are very much adult entertainment.)
In the case of my most recently completed game, BioShock 2, the targets of my character’s wrath, were strange inhuman clowns called Splicers. This first-person shooter is in the science fiction genre, and is set in an underwater city called Rapture.
Having loved the first game in this series, the second installment was also a ridiculously good time. There are some games that I’ll come back to for an hour here and there throughout the week, but I whipped right through this one, and was sad when I finished it. It left me wanting more.
And the cherry on top is that the many hours of fun I had were bought for a mere $14.99, as we got the game used, as we do with most of the ones we play. In fact, after we play them we can sell some of them back at a discount, for credit, at our game store. So this ends up being a very inexpensive leisure activity.
Further on this subject, for Christmas we got ourselves the XBox Kinect, which adds the element of motion detection to the unit. You stand in front of your tv and it reads your every move. It’s quite amazing how well it works and our intention is to use it for exercise. So far we’ve only played a few games with it and the aerobic work-out you get is impressive. And all while having quite a laugh too. So now we can get work-outs for our brains, as well as for our bodies. Gotta love it!
Do you play any video games? Any that you’d recommend?