Computer Gaming Vs Lucidity

Do you, or have you, kept a fictional gaming journal (pretending you actually experience your gaming world, akin to your LD’ing journal):

  • Yes, I currently keep a gaming journal.
  • Yes, I have previously kept a gaming journal.
  • No, I have never kept a gaming journal, and wouldn’t be interest to.
  • No, I have never kept a gaming journal, but might be interested to.

0 voters

Hi all,

After reading this thread, Lucidity Centre Stage, I thought it would be interesting to see how many people have noticed a correlation between their computer gaming experience, and frequency or success with lucid dreaming.

To restate: Have you noticed any correlation between the times you play computer games heavily, or become deeply engrossed in a computer game, and an increase (perhaps even a slightly delayed increase) in your frequency or intensity of your lucid dreams?

I ask for a very specific reason. Last year I was deeply engrossed in the Myst game Uru, so much so that I actually kept a journal in which I pretended I was actually visiting these worlds, for real.
I would write as a would-be adventurer, thrown into an alien world, exploring vast alien structures and worlds, and - generally - behaving like your average LD’ing journal addict :tongue:

I dated my gaming journal, which was kept separate to my LD’ing journal (of course), and upon retrospection noticed a fascinating correlation.
During those heavy periods when I kept the gaming journal, writing one to two pages per gaming session (including sketches of animals, foliage etc) I had an abundant increase of LD’s.

I have been pondering this correlation for at least the past year, but don’t feel I have enough data for any sort of conclusion. It would certainly be interesting to research this.

What are your experiences, if any?

That’s funny. I just got back in Halo 2 and have had 3 LDs in the past week. That’s the most I had in one week. I only had 5 since I am still a novice at LDing. 3 LDs in one week (with heavy video game time) compared to my 2 LDs in 2 months (with out heavy video game time) makes you wonder.

I did a study on this at another site: www.astralsociety.net some time ago and have noticed a direct correlation between time spent playing FPS video games and frequency of lucid dreams.

In conclusion, I found that for both myself and my subjects, more time spent playing FPS video games meant a higher frequency of lucid dreams. Some will attempt to debate and belittle this study by arguing that video games run the mind down and make it harder to think. However, the mind is highly active while playing intense FPS games and must learn to think quickly, therefore training itself to be sharper and more aware.

NOTE: Sorry about the screwed up link, but I had to do things a certain way, because of parental controls not liking the six letter A word.

Yea i had a slight increase when playing Oblivion for a long time… went into what i call gamer mode in which i do not notice anything outside of the game…also did the journal thing…thought i was playin for 30 mins and it turned out i had been playing for nearly 8 hours…went to sleep right after and had an LD …
EDIT* (sry accidently hit the enter button which for some reason posted it…) Normally i have like 1 LD every month…changed to 2 in a week and 1 more 4 days later.

I had my latest LD when I was on holiday, away from computer games for about a week. However, I don’t play many first-person games, so that might have something to do with my small chances.

I don’t play games that often anymore, but when I was younger I found it hindered my LDs.

If I had a game that I ended up playing for hours, I would end up dreaming about it, but because I was so used to it in WL it never triggered an LD and the dreams took over my regular dreams for a while, so for me at least it always hindered.

That was before I knew what LDing was though, if I was to do it now I may have a different result since I know to look for dream signs and odd things.

this thread makes me want to plat more video games

Halo 3 coming soon! Oh yeah, and Oblivion rocked. I know, I know… I am a 360 fan boy.

I’m not a big gamer, but when I do play them it doesn’t seem to affect lucid dreams. But then, I get them so rarely that it’s hard to tell…

PS: I love the Myst series. You have good taste!

I have never kept a gaming journal, and though I found the idea funny, I think I wouldn’t be interested to.

Recently I’ve heard about a scientific article about video games enhancing some capabilities (attention, concentration, etc.)

I think it depends heavily on the video game. As for me, most of the video games (and computer related environment) don’t provoke dreams. If I play, say, Tetris, I don’t have Tetris-related dreams. And I dream very rarely of the forum, though I’m spending hours on it.

This became very different when I started playing World of Worldcraft. Though it was not really first person - my point of view was located behind my character - the 3D environment is realistic enough IMO to make your brain react as it’s a real experience, that is, try to replay during dreams game situations in order to enhance its reactions. After one month, all my dreams were Wow-related nightmares, so that I eventually stopped playing this game.

Nevertheless, I didn’t notice any increase in LD’s. I could have used such dreamsigns in order to induce LD’s indeed but I didn’t.

I have noticed the similarity between games and LDs. Theyre both fantasy worlds in wich you participate in. If I were to keep a game journal, I would have played oblivion, but the game is on my computer, and my computer isnt that powerful…

Yea I just can’t find anything better to do…soooo when I’m playing a game of that type I’ll do everything to make it seem real…

Well Karma, I’m only too happy to feed your addiction :tongue:

I’m a huuuuuge Oblivion fan, I think I’ve racked up over 150hours of game time by now :cool:

Why thankyou :content:
I only really noticed a significant increase in my ld’s during the time I was keeping the journal, and pretending that the game events were actually taking place.
I had about 4 ld’s in one week, which directly corresponded with the week during which I played Myst a lot and kept the gaming journal.
The correlation seemed too significant to ignore :yes:

Lol, that would be quite an interesting LD if it were Tetris related :eh:
I quite agree that it depends on the type of video game. It could possibly depend on the type of person your are, how involved you become in your ‘fantasy’ world - and I suppose a great deal of other factors.

And yet, the correlation remains. :neutral:

does anyone play Age of Mythology online???
i love that game…also, is Kingdom Hearts any good???

I guess it depends on what kind of game you were playing. For me it has been the exact opposite. I have never had a lucid dream after a very heavy gaming day. But one disturbing thing is that i do dream about playing the game in every following dream and these dreams are usually less vivid and less enjoyable than most normal dreams.

Ive dreamt of 2 games

tibia mmorpg
And tetris :happy:

None of them is first-person.

Games like UT2K4 and TESIV:Oblivion are.

hmm. never seen any correlation between gaming and LDing. if there was one, i would have an LD daily :tongue:

seriously. i play games on my pc daily. every single day. its like eating. i need it to stay alive and sane. i can easily play from dawn till dusk (or in my case, from dusk till dawn :tongue: ). i usually stick to just one game, and play it obsessively for months, until i get bored with it and find a new one. while playing, i have almost every single detail/command/quest memorised. if anyone is having a problem with that game, i can find the answer before they even have time to finish mentioning what the problem is about.

in short, i obsess over games. alot. but it hardly ever has any influence on my dreams. i have only had a few dreams in my life that had any game elements in it, and there hasnt been any correlation with what i did the day before. in the 9 LDs ive had so far, i can only remember 1 where i had anything from games in it, and there it was just a single item that was wildly misplaced. maybe i just think about games differently from most other people or something?

hi ive sorta kept a mental journal of games and dreams. often go through it at work or at 6thform. after thinking on it a while ill have dream about it were what i was thinking about evolves into even better stuff i would onyl think about when in bed.

I have a theory that the actual journal keeping of the game experience itself is pivotal - if there is any correlation at all to be found between ld’ing and gaming.