[Infernarl]

I have heard it said that one's taste in music becomes fixed at the point they start using substances (alcohol, drugs) and they won't start listening to any new bands after that.

I wonder if this is accurate, and, if so, if the same holds true with games.

It would go a long way in explaining all of the (what I would call) irrational game nostalgia.

[Predator Goose]

[Infernarl]

[Legal Step]

that would explain disco's success, but not the decline of disco.
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[Predator Goose]

[Infernarl]

[EU03]

Well, psychologically speaking, you will associate things with an altered mood/state, but they won't re-occur until you're back in the same state.

Then again, I've never used drugs ok.
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[teecee]

i... think it's a neat hypothesis, but i doubt the evidence would be any better than about 50/50 (if a random survey were conducted).





however i do sometimes wonder "where! is! the! new shit???" i mean, isn't this approx the time that someone should be coming up with a radically new & different form of popular music that just blows the stagnation of rock & rap away? so, i guess i'm not really satisfied with where the music scene is at, right this very moment.

thing about videogames is: there are significant innovations being made all the time in videogame development, and all gamers should be able to appreciate this. i think it's been quite a while since the same could be said about popular music.

[Max Cola]

All I know is that Predator Goose's sig makes me want to listen to Talking Heads more than I do already.
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Everybody hurts sometimes

[remote]

Well, when I started using substances I grew tired of most of what I'd listened to up until that point (NIN, Nirvana, Tool, seminal death metal bands, etc.) and started listening to a lot more — actually, this is probably the thing that drove the biggest rift between my old friends and myself (the music, not the substances (they clung to nu metal and I'd had my fill looong before)). I don't use drugs these days except for alcohol on occasion (usually just a beer or a glass of wine) and pot on much, much rarer occasions, and I wouldn't necessarily give drugs all the credit for getting the ball rolling, but, well, they were there. Maybe there is something to their purported mind-opening properties; either way, I'd definitely say that they wouldn't bring one's curiosity to a halt.

Anyway, gaining steady access to high-speed internet a few years ago is what made me more voracious than ever, when it came to finding and listening to new music.

Videogames are a different subject entirely.
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letterboxd | last.fm | steam

[Ebrey]

Similiar experience to antitype here. Prior to junior year of high school (when I started drinking and smoking weed) I listened to mainly 80s and 90s rock. Afterwards I got into rap, country, and 50s-70s rock. In fact there are only a handful of post-1975 rock bands that I still listen to. Though I never did drugs heavily.

Infernari, from my experience the average person has 10 times as much tolerance for the same old shit being sold to them again and again than I do. In fact they get used to the old flaws and are more likely to complain about new problems that come with fresh ideas (for instance they don't notice that half the time spent playing jRPGs is in mind numbingly boring battles).

[Gironika]

Katamari Damacy or Pikmin are good examples for games that did take a new approach at gaming - and which were well received all over the world. It's not like people do not want change in games, but I feel it's just that people start to stick with the "usual" games after a while, as you tend to do when you grow up.

I had an interesting discussion this week where I tried to get other people to understand that they are bound to restrict their choice of things naturally and without thinking about it as they grow older ... something that happens to everyone of us as soon as we get older.
I found myself not being open-minded enough to approach new music, games, films, even people, but I started to try to stay aware of such occasions and ask myself why I would have refused to get to know something/someone in the first place.
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[parkbench]

[Ratoslov]

It's because most people start taking drugs around high-school or college.

[Adilegian]

I have some pretty positive associations with games that I picked up when I started medication for bipolar disorder and ADHD. In fact, my taste in games became especially refined after medication for ADHD because I could start looking seriously at the games beyond their fulfillment of immediate gratification.

I have never invested myself in illegal drug use, though, since I like to remain as useful to myself as often as possible. Addiction wastes so much time and energy.

So! I would say that I began to cultivate tastes after getting medicated simply because I started trying to penetrate the content of games, rather than enjoying the surface qualities of the medium.
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[meauxdal]

[Schwere Viper]

Newb alert.

It's an interesting idea, but I somehow doubt it. I mean, I've been drinking since I was in single digits, and if anything my tastes have grown more diverse in everything, not just games.

Personally, I blame the internet.
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HeavyViper@Twitter ~~~ HeavyViper@Soundcloud
Blog: Machines That Sing