Anyone ever sought counseling / medical help for their arcade / pinball addiction ?

[KSKID]

Anyone ever sought counseling / medical help for their arcade / pinball addiction ?

Just wondering if there is anyone on the board who may have sought counseling or medical help for their arcade / pinball addiction ?, I keep
telling myself I'm downsizing cleaning out some of my games, trying to
get a handle on everything so I can get the games that need attention
fixed, and focus more on my game room, but it seems like every time
a good arcade or pinball deal comes along my way I keep buying and and
I'm back in the same situation as I was before, too many games, not
enough room / time. Sometimes I feel like im loosing my sanity and games
get the best of me, anyone ever feel like this ? I have been on this up
and down YO-YO for the past 10 years, maybe its time to find a different
hobby.

 

[88mph]

Hey KSKID.

As far as addictions go, I think the arcade hobby is a pretty good one. I don't know of anyone who has sought counseling for arcade stuff, but why not? Think of it as an investment in your happiness. If spending a few bucks to chat with a psychologist can put more fun in your life, isn't that worthwhile? (I should disclose that my wife is in that field, so I am kinda biased.. hehe) There are a lot of people who get counseling for video game addiction (i.e. MMOs and that sort of thing).

Honestly, I think a person should be seeking help if their hobby is causing serious problems in other areas of life. i.e. if you are making a decision to buy arcade machines instead of buying groceries for your family or something like that. If the hobby is becoming some sort of a joyless compulsion that you can't get off your back... well, that would also be a good time to seek help.

The problem is, this can be somewhat of an all encompassing hobby. It has a lot of different levels--wheeling and dealing, electronics, woodworking, nostalgia, gaming strategy, reproing, web forums, etc, etc. The hobby can become part of a person's identity, and can be overwhelming, especially if you have put yourself under a mountain of projects.

When it gets overly frustrating, it's important to be able to just step away and pursue something else. I know some folks with serious collections who have 'phased out' of the hobby for years at a time. Some return to it, others don't.

At the end of the day, just remember that you are the one who owns the games/projects, not the other way around. It's no big deal if the projects don't get finished, or if you don't find every last game on your wants list. Also remember that good deals are ALWAYS out there. Being in it for 10 years, you know this. After a while I realized there were very few 'once in a lifetime deals' in this hobby, so I don't feel like I have to pounce on every good score that comes along.

Good luck!

 

[cleverlyj]

I'm back in the same situation as I was before, too many games, not
enough room / time. Sometimes I feel like im loosing my sanity and games
get the best of me, anyone ever feel like this ?

yes, sometimes. the best thing to do is just sit back and relax. i take breaks from my games sometimes when i get frustrated. you just shouldn't let yourself get stressed about it. i used to try and pickup any game i saw on craigslist, and it got a little nuts. i've decided i'm only going to get games i want to add to my collection now rather than stuff that comes along at a cheap price. that helps.

 

[steve23]

Sound advice!

 

[Umortal377]

yes, sometimes. the best thing to do is just sit back and relax. i take breaks from my games sometimes when i get frustrated. you just shouldn't let yourself get stressed about it. i used to try and pickup any game i saw on craigslist, and it got a little nuts. i've decided i'm only going to get games i want to add to my collection now rather than stuff that comes along at a cheap price. that helps.

I was gonna go seek counseling, but on the day of the appt I found a good deal on craigslist so I had to skip it. Oh well, another time I suppose

 

[orion3311]

I was going to put up a simliar post, but I'll just add to this one. My problem is that I have ADD (more or less recently figured it out). I end up, like last night, spending HOURS on a project until after midnight working on a project. Of course, I have laundry and other things, but my shop is down the street from my house so I forget all about the chores ;-) This is a bad side effect of ADD that you would never think is related - Hyperfocusing. Usually people think ADD is all about NOT focusing - its more or less the extremes - either not, or focusing too much.

In regards to the deals - here's what you do. Stop looking at Craigslist and Ebay. Its that simple. If you have to, block the sites in your browser for a while. At one point I was addicted to IRC chat, and got NO sleep (instead of the 5 hours I squeak through now). I ended up taking the entire computer apart and scattering the parts - I was too lazy to put it back together for a while, and since IRC wasn't easily accessible, I stopped using it. Sometimes its wierd but you have to manually make roadblocks for yourself.

In regards to my problem - I think I should just have the power at my garage shut off at 11pm...but that wouldn't be any fun.

 

[KSKID]

I was gonna go seek counseling, but on the day of the appt I found a good deal on craigslist so I had to skip it. Oh well, another time I suppose

LOL, thats what would probably happen to me if I did decide to setup an appointment.

Thanks for the input guys, appreciate it.

 

[wildwest3163]

no problem at all. Hell, Im managing to make some room in my gameroom, Ive sold 3 games this month......wait a minute, Ive bought 4 in thier place. sigh, oh well

 

[jow]

Is this thread for real?

 

[Deadly]

Some addictions are healthy some not so healthy. Some prefer coffeee, cigarettes, porn. Some .... like our beloved Jow .... find pleasure in owning a game for 2 weeks and flipping it (sorry couldn't resist).

I think all of us hit a brick wall eventually. You'll find the great deal on CL is in fact a game you don't even really like or when you restore the machine you'd been money ahead to buy a plug and play model ya know? Think of the money you need to spend to fix other machines. Also play the games in MAME and see if it's how you remember it - been burned by thinking "Man I played the hell out of that as a kid" and got it home and thought, "Man this game sucks!"

Owning games is cool. Owning a bunch of crappy games makes you a junk collector

You'll get all the therapy you need here. You'll cry, laugh and get verbally pummeled.

 

[jow]

Some .... like our beloved Jow .... find pleasure in owning a game for 2 weeks and flipping it (sorry couldn't resist).

Where did this whole thing come from? I asked Phet and his dumbass doesn't know.

 

[Deadly]

Jow was makin light of when you went through a period of selling games you owned for a short time.

"Where did this whole thing come from? I asked Phet and his dumbass doesn't know. "
Anger management for you Jow - make the appointment now heh

 

[jow]

Jow was makin light of when you went through a period of selling games you owned for a short time.

"Where did this whole thing come from? I asked Phet and his dumbass doesn't know. "
Anger management for you Jow - make the appointment now heh

You arent getting any of my jokes. Its ok.

I knew you were joking, and I threw Phet's joke in there, too. Nevermind.

Carry on.

 

[Deadly]

Point goes to Jow Score - 3-1 bastage

 

[Phetishboy]

Jow was makin light of when you went through a period of selling games you owned for a short time.

"Where did this whole thing come from? I asked Phet and his dumbass doesn't know. "
Anger management for you Jow - make the appointment now heh

I actually sited many examples in several threads, but Genital Jow chose to drop his drawers and bury his head in the sand as if it were Frizzy's lap.

 

[jow]

I actually sited many examples in several threads, but Genital Jow chose to bury his head in the sand as if it were Frizzy's lap.

Yeah, one whole example. Well done, Sleuth Williams.

 

[gmadden]

One solution is to find ANOTHER hobby that interests you and allow yourself to hyperfocus on it, although I'm not sure that is much of a solution!

My latest is plants. Now that the house is done and the grass is in and growing, I have all of these empty planter beds. So, rather than just going down to Home Depot or a local nursery and buying some plants, I searched around and found that you can buy directly from the growers (the plant propagaters), at least if you pretend to be a small startup nursery. You can get flats of 105 rooted plugs for about $50 each via mail, (a 2 flat minimum) and they usually have assortments. Then you buy a case of peat pots on the web and transplant the plants to the peat pots. Four to six weeks later they are ready to transplant to the flower beds (assuming you manage to keep them alive.) You'll also have plenty to pot and give to your friends (or maybe even sell...). I did a flat of ivy and of mixed houseplants. A flat of succulents is next. Also ordered a mess of tulip bulbs and roses...

Then you can get a propogation heating pad and a misting system and try propogating them on your own!

Yes, I think there may be a little ADD involved in this sort of behavior, but what the heck, it is fun, you learn a lot since there is a bunch of research required to get started, nobody gets hurt, and it's got to be better than medication.

 

[LOGICAL_PSY]

A visit to a psychologist will cost you as much as a decent project game.

 

[CubeSnake]

Well, I can't speak for myself, but I certainly can for a friend of mine. About 7-8 years ago, we had a big party at my place. My friend, I'll call him Bob- saw my arcade and went nuts! He said he never saw anything like it in a home before and wanted to make one, too. I put him in touch with all the good guys, gave him a list of all the shit-heads NOT to deal with and the madness was born. I kid you not-within 1 year he had amassed well over 600 machines-mostly vids but quite a few bowlers (big heavy bastards) many, many jukes, mostly Seeburgs from the '70's, some pinballs and some other misc. arcade-related coin ops like fortune tellers, etc.
He never got in to anything older than say, 1975, but man what a load of crap he has! The biggest problem is he is not at all discriminate about what he picks up. He has multiples of multiples. Domino Man, for example-he must have 14-18 of these alone. I know the last time I was over at his place I counted an even 20 Tappers.
So all kidding aside, this can be a bad thing to someone who is a compulsive hoarder like him. I have told him many times to just pick up what is appealing to him and try to shoot for the best example that is possible. The mentality he has however, is that he "can make 1 super cherried out" machine from many. He has yet to show me how that will happen. You can't even move through his house anymore since there are literally games on top of games. You can't play but more than a few. I really fell bad that I was responsible for this but I fell he had a latent collecting/hoarder mentality lurking within and if wasn't arcades, who knows where this could have gone?
Jay

 

[KSKID]

Well, I can't speak for myself, but I certainly can for a friend of mine. About 7-8 years ago, we had a big party at my place. My friend, I'll call him Bob- saw my arcade and went nuts! He said he never saw anything like it in a home before and wanted to make one, too. I put him in touch with all the good guys, gave him a list of all the shit-heads NOT to deal with and the madness was born. I kid you not-within 1 year he had amassed well over 600 machines-mostly vids but quite a few bowlers (big heavy bastards) many, many jukes, mostly Seeburgs from the '70's, some pinballs and some other misc. arcade-related coin ops like fortune tellers, etc.
He never got in to anything older than say, 1975, but man what a load of crap he has! The biggest problem is he is not at all discriminate about what he picks up. He has multiples of multiples. Domino Man, for example-he must have 14-18 of these alone. I know the last time I was over at his place I counted an even 20 Tappers.
So all kidding aside, this can be a bad thing to someone who is a compulsive hoarder like him. I have told him many times to just pick up what is appealing to him and try to shoot for the best example that is possible. The mentality he has however, is that he "can make 1 super cherried out" machine from many. He has yet to show me how that will happen. You can't even move through his house anymore since there are literally games on top of games. You can't play but more than a few. I really fell bad that I was responsible for this but I fell he had a latent collecting/hoarder mentality lurking within and if wasn't arcades, who knows where this could have gone?
Jay

Over the years I have seen the photos of some of the KLOV members homes and believe me I think there are people on here that need help worse than I do , when you start putting games in every room of the
house and there are just narrow trails to navigate or when you have game parts stacked to the ceiling inside the house I think its time to do something.