Giant Bomb Baby

hey all, just tonlet you know our son was born on Friday which is pretty cool.

How in gods name I will ever be able to play a game again given my exhaustion is thr next question. I am genuinely debating a Jar Time approach of emulating something and playing it for 20 minutes.

Any advice welcome.

CONGRATULATIONS!!

It meters out, and new babies sure do nap all the time, so the odd hours are a little bit offset by that. I remember when my son was brand new I checked out a ton of comic book collections from the library, and given that you can blow through one of those in like 30 minutes to one hour, I read a ton of comics. If you don't have some kind of handheld around, I would see about getting one. I have a Switch and that would seem like a godsend now. We actually have our second babe coming up here in about 23 days, so maybe I'll check back in on this thread then. I did recently unearth my old GBA SP and am going to bring that to the hospital, since I won't be able to leave the hospital until my wife and I are ready to go home.

Babies don't really need that constant doting for very long. Being said, there's nothing like that first week or two of being on pins and needles. I remember our first night home with the baby, with just my wife and I being awake all night asking each other "Is he breathing?" "Yes he's breathing." "What about now?"

But it will meter out fast. and soon enough you'll have a little gaming buddy. my son is six now, and we've been playing a ton of Soul Calibur II on the PS2 and Wild Guns on the SNES.

Have fun dude. Everyone says this, but time is about to start moving very quickly for you.

Congratulations :)

Congratulations!

Thanks all. Yeah, my wife and I have our own switches although her animal crossing town is likely starting to get dilapidated now.

I literally hovered over an analogue pre order today because I was thinking about hand helds, but given he will be almost 1 by the time the thing actually arrives ill wait this round out. I have a healthy GB-GBA collection and a GB Micro so that will see me through just now. I just can't see me going back to Fallen Order on my pc or any of the other long form games I had started before then.

Time already has no meaning.

@regmcfly: I had twin boys almost two years ago. If I could find time I am sure you can too. My suggestion is to give up on multiplayer for a while. and some single player games for that matter. Anything that I couldn't pause was out of the question for quite a while.

Other than that, congrats my dude! Having a baby isn't as hard some some people make it out to be. Not to say it isn't challenging, but Literally everyone before us has done it haha. Best of luck pal.

Congrats!

As others have said: multiplayer is unfortunately going to be out of the question for some time. My first forays back into it were when my daughter was a couple months old, and after maybe 8 rounds of Gears 5 horde she started crying; that was it for the night. Same goes for anything that doesn’t have a pause button. That all being said, if your son is a good napper, you’ll find yourself with an hour or two free more often than you think, at least early on.

After maybe 3-4 months, my daughter stopped napping so consistently and stayed awake longer. That’s when game time gets extremely precious, at least during the day. It wasn’t too long after that she was sleeping through the night, although we may have gotten extremely lucky in that regard. Jeff has mentioned having the baby fully asleep between 5 - 10 pm, and that being primo game time for him and his wife. It’s been pretty similar for us as well. That window will find you eventually, though it may take a little while to realize it.

Overall, I think the biggest change to gaming is it takes the extreme “quality over quantity” approach to game hours. I have absolutely no stomach for an open world game right now, and all my favorites of the year so far (Monster Train, Hardspace Shipbreaker, Deep Rock Galactic) are more easily approached in short chunks. We’re limiting the baby’s screentime, but there are some things like Tetris and the Sims that she absolutely loves to watch. You might also just want comfort food games because you’re going to be so, so tired.

In short (too late), this stuff follows a pattern that’s extremely difficult to predict, but you’ll get the hang of it. You’re likely going to be surprised how much time you have early on, but also you will probably spend a lot of it passing out on the nearest surface available. Again, congrats to you and your family!

Mostly wanna pass my congrats to you! I was in the same position a year ago, and it's a mix of lots to no gaming depending on where you and your family are at at any given time. Somehow my son loved sleeping on me while I played Sekiro of all games at 3 months, but now wants to hit all the buttons on my controller whenever I'm in eyeshot! As with everything else with your new young'n, it's a moving target!

CONGRATS!!!
As much as "Giant Bomb Relationship Hotline" was (largely, rightly) derided back in the day, I think "Giant Bomb Baby Help Hotline" could actually be a pretty great community service. I'll just recommend Monster Train as well as an easy start->stop game (though it's also VERY prone to "one...more...turn" behavior).

Congratulations.

In my limited experience, try games that can be paused or played at irregular intervals. I played through the entire Phoenix Wright trilogy, Steamworld Heist and Hidden Folks. The idea is a game that can be picked at any time and drop just as easily, so no online game.

And again, congratulations.

Have you considered giving the baby back to the stork so that there can be more video game playing time?

@the_nubster:

Tried that. It was a Yoshis Island one way quest sadly.

Anyway, thanks everyone, and for the recs. Definitely gonna get in Monster Train and FROG FRACTIONS HAT.

Hes pooped on me today, his one week anniversary of being born so thats another boundary crossed. Transgressions abound.

Congratulations!

Maybe you would enjoy this: https://www.tested.com/bunch-of-dads/

This podcast features Will Smith, Vinny, Dave Snider and lots of other friends of the site talking about baby stuff.

It's a lot of fun to hear all these stories even as a non-parent. They haven't released a new episode for good while but what is there is still great.

@regmcfly: Congratulations!

You'll find the time, but it's a different balance.

When we came home with our 2nd, my wife went to sleep and took the baby upstairs and I had my first game of Warzone, which I won. Daughter was 18 hours old. You make it work! :D

@forcen: I didnt know this existed. Thanks!!!

@atomicedge: @forcen: I didnt know this existed. Thanks!!!

I was an apex guy before he was born now I don't think I can even aim a controller!

So update

I have been too tired to play games most days, but because my wife now prioritises our only car (they are expensive in scotland) for taking our son place to place, I am back to Bus Commute.

That has been my golden time - I have been playing the MK11 story on Switch (although it wants to connect to the Internet every 3 seconds)

At home, I haven't had time to play a single thing, our son has been unsettled.

Next week I am on paternity leave, so if there are any good easy games that don't need instant reflexes to play, specifically on pc , I'd happily play them

My priority is Frog Fractions Hat Mode.

Not entirely true, when my daughter was a baby she thought it would be cool to sleep two hours then cry or be fuzzy the rest of the day. This happened for months despite trying everything under the sun. Colic is a fucker.

That aside.

Congrats OP, enjoy your time with the baby, they sure do grow up fast.

Cheers I am sleepy