As a person in their 50's who has been accused of being an adult at one time or another, I can say I prefer to play a game rather than watch TV most of the time. I find the games are far more engrossing, and I have to be an active participant, mentally engaged. Whereas something like watching a TV show or movie is a far more passive act.
I've considered this at times because I have sometimes questioned whether a grown man should be sitting in front of a computer playing games, but then I go back to the TV example. Nobody would look down on you think you weren't "acting your age" if you sat in front of the TV for a few hours in the evening to unwind, so why would there be a stigma to playing a game - which, as I mentioned, is far more mentally challenging and engaging than staring at a TV.
Totally also my way of seeing this. I've never felt a need to justify myself to anyone giving me a weird eye over my gaming habits, but if they were merely asking out of real curiosity, the nearest comparison I draw today is with the big-budget TV shows. Somehow there it's the totally grown up thing to spend 80+ hours passivley watching fictious people do fictious things, but if we do the fictious things ourselves, it somehow makes us childish.
Truth be told, I don't think it's a big deal anymore. Lots of girls playing these days, too.
It's been my experience that playing games on the consoles is what is associated with kids but PC gaming is associated with adults for the most part.
Good point, and I guess even at the dawn of PC gaming (Atari, Commodore, x286...) it were mostly adults owning those expensive technical items.
And yeah, agree with DM and Crane that it's easier to make games for adults and have kids play them than vice versa.
I was trying to come up (without cheating via Google) with the game that first introduced quite graphical (i.e. not actual genitalia, but nudeness) sex scenes. Far Cry 3 definitley had one, but I believe it might have been one of the early GTAs? Specifically talking about mainstream games here, not dedicated erotic titles like Larry.
