PC Gaming and YOUR Health, tell us your symptoms.

All i've noticed is incredibly increased reaction speed and the ability to see details in real life. Well sometimes when I wake up i can see flickering but i think i have a twitch in my left eye so it doesnt really bother me.

I play guitar better.

i admit that may have put on a few pounds, but for the time being i am pretty much even to what i was back before feb when i got my comcast.

actualy i think i have stayed quite limber still, and my hands have improved in manual dexterity, and that makes for me being much better at work. unless i am doped up on allergy medicine.

and i go outside all the time. but with it raining all the time here. its kinda discouraging.

but i definatly need to get back to regulary excersizing, i ran a bit today, and i thought i was going to die

madcow235 said:

All i've noticed is incredibly increased reaction speed and the ability to see details in real life.

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I have to say I notice the same thing, especially the detail thing. People are always giving out to be because I find flaws in anything and everything I see, lol. It only really started a few years back when I started gaming heavily. I'll notice if a light switch isn't straight, if a clock is off by a minute, if 2 buildings aren't symmetrical.

But the latest thing is this, if i'm out and about, anywhere at all away from the PC, i might hear a sound from a game. It's the weirdest thing, like a door closing and someone moving a chair at the same time might produce the sound of a grenade dropping in CS, or the sound of putting on armour in Far Cry might be produced by someone going through a rucksack, etc. I'm finding that it happens more and more these day, maybe i'm just weird...

Oh and the reaction speed thing too, i've been a barman for years and i've come incredibly quick at handling glasses, ice, drinks and money, etc. There's other people that work with me for the same amount of time and they're no where near as quick.

if i play games steadily for too long, i feel a bit nauseous.. i just usually have to walk around and get a drink, then im fine

My friend knows someone that gets motion sickness when playing FPS games

Well, I actually did get a mildly serious condition from gaming. It is called Guyions canal syndrome and basically it is related to carpal tunnel except it is on the outside of the hand. What makes me think that the gaming did it was that I only got in in my mouse hand (had it been typing, I would think that I would get in in both hands).

I was able to make it go mostly away by changing to a different mouse (thanks to the magic of usb, I can switch a couple of times per day w/o having to change anything around and I even have a preference for the track ball in some games).

I have a rather mild case of RSI because of gaming/keyboard use :S

The nerves tense up in my hand right by my thumb

After long sessions of Rome TW (just general micromanagement stuff) my mouse hand goes numb and pretty much unuseable for about a hour.

When I first started playing RoN for extreme periods of time, my shoulder would tense up and basically became useless for a good hour or two.

Yeah my eyes feel very tired because of playing games to much and i wear glasses now and i do put it down to playing games from a very early age.

Playing Halo, i have to wear bicycle gloves because i have a death grip on the controller.

Computer, i tend to drink roughly twice the amount of coffee i normally do, and the same with smoking.

My legs fall asleep regularly and are generally numb for around 15 minutes.

~ Gos

I can understand the want for more coffee, but why does computer use make you want to smoke more

lately i just get motion sickness whenever playing any FPS. SOmetimes i have to stop playing. Ive been playing games for years and never had this problem. Whenever i play a game that plays real good and gets high frames i get sicker. The most sick i ever got was from HL2. I sit in front of a 21 sony and i am literally less then a foot away from the screen. Today im actually going to try and re-arrange my room so that i can sit further away from the monitor. Mybe this will help.

ANd i also hear video game sounds everywhere i go. WE went to a fishing pier the other day and i was looking at the water like crazy and was comparing it to the water on a game and how it looked so much like the the water in Hl2 or COD. I told my friend about it while we were there and he thought i was totally crazy and told me to sell my computer and that its rotting my mind. lol

i get muscle spazms once in a while and my hand twitches sometimes. I havent worked out for months but i trained hardcore during the wrestling season... but ever so slowly my 6 pack is turning into a 40oz...... One time my peck muscles were spazming when i was walking down the street and people thought i was trying to show off.


And.... You know you've got a problem when a girl your interested in calls and it is a hard and painfull decision weather or not to get up from the PC.

I showed up 2 hours late to a party because the battlefield 2 demo came out the same day and i lost track of time...

And i act like a hawk sometimes just randomely looking left right up and down scanning the area.... Too much america's army....

Yeah, that's another thing I find, just being generally more aware of my surroundings, constantly looking around as if someone is gonna jump out with a knife or something.
Not that I expect it to happen, but i'm always looking in all directions, waiting for something, anything, to happen.

chris64, the same thing happened to me with HL2
i had to take a few breaks if i played for too long
but not CSS ... i dont get sick with it for some reason

I've just recently started getting some seriously painful headaches. It might be due to smoking excessively in a room without very good ventilation.

easy, all my side effects are good.

i'm not over-weight. i'm not un-healty. I play games alot.

my reading speed is above average. I type really fast ( thats due more to chatting than games )

And my hand eye reaction speed is 30% faster than average ( thats at 8am, without any stimulants...aka, Caffene, chocolote...ect..and 8am for me is EARLY! )

when i was tested for medical stuff a while back, my hand eye reaction time was tested, so thats how i know how fast i am.

Due to the fact that i play alot of RPG's, my vocabulary is a bit more extensive ( except i don't really show it on the boards for some reason, maybe i'm just to lazy to type out the big words, and i use small ones instead ), again my reading speed is quite fast. I understand things very easily, and don't have to be told things over and over to get it.

And the fact that i have met some good friends online while playing games, it helps me to have fun. and when i have fun, i am happy. And being happy does wonders for your health and mind.

so basicly, i have no ill-effects from gaming.

Also, i wrote a paper on the effects of gaming a few years back for school. It mainly had to do video games and violence. but i had to put in other benifits of video games. I used myself as an example in that paper.

Edit: Also, after reading about everyone noticing their surrounds better, I realized i do that too. I just get a better picture of whats around me than most. I notice tiny little things. Like said before, when something isn't straight. Or someone sits something small in a spot, and they do it very carefully, as where no one else notices they do it. but i spot it right away, and know that they did it. Its not just the enviroment i notice, but the tiny minute actions people do as well.
Its funny, someone carefully grabs something, to be ready to throw it. but i'm one step ahead of them. i see them do it. then they wonder how the hell i knew they was going to throw it, and what they were going to throw. Or they wonder how i saw them get ready.
Also, you seem to notice where people's eyes go. If they are about to hit you, watch their eyes. 90% of the population will Look before they strike. Which tells you where they are about to hit. giving you the upper hand.