How long can you last?

by perryvandell

Earlier in the year, I pre-ordered Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood on Amazon and thought "You know, it's been a while since I last played Assassin's Creed II, and I'd like to refresh my memory before playing Brotherhood." And so, I made the moronic decision of doing everything you can possibly do in AC II a couple weeks before AC: Brotherhood Baby, I promise I'll be neck-stabbing dudes again! I j...

Baby, I promise I'll be neck-stabbing dudes again! I just need some time first... came out. And I mean everything. I did all the missions, bought both the dlc, solved all the truth puzzles, found all the feathers, etc. Needless to say, I was pretty exhausted of completing everything that game threw at me, and didn't need to revisit renaissance Italy anytime soon. Of course, right as I finish Assassin's Creed II, Brotherhood arrives on my doorstep, daring me to spend another 20-25 hours neck stabbing dudes and losing what little sanity I had left. As of right now, Brotherhood is sitting on my desk un-played while I continue my adventure in Dragon Age, something that went on hiatus about a month or two ago and something I've been meaning to get back to. It was only recently that I thought long and hard about what game endurance was, and why I need something of a "genre break".

I won't speak for the rest of the general public, but when I play a game like Red Dead Redemption, I never feel the urge to play GTA IV afterwards. If I play Oblivion, I'm not going to revisit Fallout 3 and the capital wasteland. And if I play InFamous, I'm never going to say, "That was fun, time to play Prototype!". Why? Because If I did, I would probably go insane. Sure, the games I mentioned above aren't carbon copies of each other, but their game mechanics are so similar to each other, that the two games start to blend together if I play them consecutively. It's at this point that the game transforms from a fun, engaging experience into something of a chore. Let's say I played Prince of Persia, and then moved on to Enslaved. I'm not doing Enslaved any justice by playing it immediately after a game with similar dynamics. Sure, Enslaved might still provide me a fun experience, but it's not going to the same punch as if I played a turn-based JRPG before hand. It's kind of like with foods. I love me some good pizza, but I'm going to grow sick and tired of it after eating it consecutively for a couple days. It's the same thing with video games, on just a much longer scale.

How long can you last? This is also why people who do game series marathons seem crazy to me. Whenever I hear someone talking about playing every single Final Fantasy game one after the other, I can't help but wonder if they have a death wish, or feel they need to be punished. After I complete a Final Fantasy game, I have to take a break from RPGs period. The thought of going through dungeon after dungeon, battle after battle, chocobo after chocobo is enough to give me shivers. Again, I'm sure there are people out there who actually do enjoy this kind of stuff, just like I'm sure there are some people who enjoy playing Russian roulette.

Either way, I would say my game endurance depends on the type of game. If I'm playing an action-adventure game that's 6 hours long, I'm not going to be turned off to playing another action-adventure game. However if the 6- hour game turns into a 15+ hour game, then it's usually in my best interest to play something that is a tad different. That's just me, but what about you guys? How long can you play a game before having to change things up? Do you take breaks before going into the next installment of a series, or do you finish 100+ hour RPGs and beg for more?