How old are you and what you do in real life? How you afford your gaming?

26, work as a software engineer with a company making automotive factory systems. Software to control assembly lines, supply chain management etc. Also public facing websites, design work is fun. Previously worked with a financial software house for 3 years.

Good money and no responsibilities whatsoever. Have all the game systems (except PS handhelds, obviously) but spending less and less on games. Huge backlog + doing a lot more "LIVING" rather than gaming, ie going on holidays, visiting museums and galleries, going to gigs, taking up more varied hobbies, etc.

Enjoying life in other words :)

I'm 27 with 2 boys (1&2 yr olds)and work as a Lead Inventory Control at Restoration Hardware. I basically make sure everything we have systemically is also accounted for physically. Dealing with numbers and emails all day. It's a high end furniture company. (Area rugs cost as much as $40k!!!) Pay is great so that's how I'm able to afford gaming. We recently just had furniture sent out to Jennifer Lopez's home. I was so tempted to include myself in that packaging. Haha

36 Computer graphics designer

I'm 41, Union Electrician and electronics and instrumentation technician working in heavy industry. I am married and have one daughter. To pay for games I work overtime.

I would hand deliver the goods myself lol.

Practical nurse, now own all the current gen systems.

24.

Got a degree in games design and i was part of an indie studio, but now I work in IT. May one day go back to game development.

Job pays well, but with a mortgage now to pay for I can usually only buy a game a month if that these days. That's no problem though, I have a huge backlog!

LMAO, I'll sabotage the Halo franchise from within and make lems cry :P

Turning 42 this October,mentality of a 21 year old. lol.I work as a meat clerk at a grocery store.The pay ain't the greatest,but the benefits are better then most would think.

NEETbux.

I'm 35 and I'm a dishwasher.

25, research assistant in a Phd program. Was also a research assistant in undergraduate. Pays well but way lower than what I could get if I got an engineering job in my field. I want to be a research scientist in an industry lab one day, not an applications or test engineer..willing to take a pay cut to reach that goal.

I also do small electronics repairs and mods for some pay on the side (guitar pedals, console/handheld mods). In the process of developing an electronic gaming product that I hope one day can provide extra income.

I have an uncle who always sends me Amazon gift cards for the holidays, that more than enough covers my gaming habit for the year :p

25, IT Specialist. I normally work with servers, vm's, and customer support. Wanting to get my foot in the door for web or mobile development though.

Can afford a lot of things with money to spare, but I was raised to be frugal so I tend not to want much overall, and I still go hard for the deals normally.

There was a poll that showed the average SW age to be about 30... Surprisingly, the average age of SW is higher than most other gaming boards.

I'm 26, live in New York with my girl, who works for NBC. I'm a writer, teacher, and grad student. I write for the same website @charizard1605 does, so I get most of my games for free.

going to be 45 this year. I drive a school bus now going on 3 school years. Have a bad back so I need a sit down job. Make horrible money and no benefits. I dont really game much. Im on this site because gaming is still a passion and a love of mine and always has been.

Turning 28 this September.

A brief history to maybe help get a bigger picture and who knows help people in similar situations, I studied like most people and left education with absolutely no idea what to do with my life and due to my lack of direction ended up in retail till I was 20, by then my need for change was mainly fuelled by money... So I did everything I could and ended up working for a marketing company for 6 years. I hit a wall in my life as most people do and looked in the mirror and realised I wasn't happy... I was 26 with a monthly pay close to £6k AT(including bonuses and commission) and you would think I would be happy but I got depressed and really never enjoyed my job and wanted more from life as I felt that time was just catching up with me and felt anxious.

I took the plunge and made my hobby my work 2 years ago... I struggled at first but now I am a photographer, nothing special just head shots for students and lots of weddings but I have never been happier and I am earning half of what I use to 2 years ago. So if anyone is in a similar position and you don't have kids that are dependent on you then I encourage you to take the plunge, your work is what you do with 1/3 rd of your adult life YOU owe it to your self to live it doing what you love.

30+, living with my parents. Have a situation in which I can't really study or work. But I'm going to make that happen anyway. It comes with great risks though, and it'll take some time. For now I have to live on a... I don't know what you call it in English? Benefit? I receive money to stay alive each month, but it's not much (obviously). That is why I am still living with my parents, so that I don't get all these extra costs. Because of this, and being very aware of what I spend my money on, I have quite a bit of money left every month that I can use for games. Lucky for me, I am well respected at home so living with my parents and much younger siblings has been great.

When I go solicit for a job I may lose the benefit and that could potentially mean no longer having a roof over my head for the rest of my life. So I'm a little hesitant to just 'try' a job to see how it goes. It has to go well in one go and given my anxieties, it will have to be a job that I can rely on for a good part of my future. I do want a job, but not to feel useful. I've had a job once, and it definitely did not make me feel useful. I would do it for the money. And the money would be nice to have so that I could support a relationship and look for a partner in life.

The past two years I've been learning how to program with C#. I've made a little card game and an ASP.net website that is quite dynamic and uses a database and all that. (Just making that website took me like 6 months.) So I'm learning some skills that may eventually land me a job. But learning those things takes a lot of time for me. (Energy is the problem. Effectively the many hours of struggle I put in translate to 30 minutes of actual progress per day. If I'm lucky.) I'm also a bit of a philosopher. Several people told me to write a book. But I don't have a degree and philosophy is not something you can (or I want to) get paid for without excellent writing skills (that I lack). And again, the book would have to be very successful to support me for a lifetime :P

Lately I'm very interested in machine learning and how to create a sentient A.I. I'm a bit of a dreamer, so some part of me hopes I can stumble upon a way to create a very flexible, fundamental A.I. that could solve all of my, and our, problems. I know that is not very rational. But it is nice to have something to hold on to.

34, military

19, currently studying chemical engineering and im currently midway through 3rd year out of 4. Have a really good paying part time job with lots of side jobs that pay from crap up to stupid good ($250 to accompany someone for their grade 8 sax exam, $250 an hour seriously wtf, I don't really remember too well it could have been more than that) so I don't really have problems affording games right now.

ha ha me too lol

Do they sit on your lap when you play with them?

I'm 26 and a Network Engineer with an emphasis currently on the transport side. I can afford to play games just don't have the care or energy to always play plus there are other things I like to do.

38, part time student after finally stopping cancer treatment and health issues two years ago that I've been battling since 20. I live with the parents as they are my support, but I still pay room/board.

I save what money I have and am frugal in my spending, plus gaming is my only hobby. A lot of my games I trade in and pay the difference, or wait for Steam sales. I do yardwork (I live on 3 acre farm) and other manual labor I can find. I was a dishwasher up to a few months ago. I also go to yard sales during the weekends and try to flip a profit on good finds through CL/eBay.

I have no "career" as that had to be put on hold, but am now pursuing a degree in English (which may change as I don't think I'm a good enough writer to make a living on). I'm interested in becoming a PC repairman so I can have a schedule that I can conform around my health and also because of the benefits it'd help with my PC gaming , but I need schooling for it.

23, video editor. Not that good of pay, but at least I can afford to buy games and hardware.

I'm glad that you're over your cancer treatment mate

I'm 28. I'm a 2nd grade teacher at a private school so my salary is decent enough to pay the bills but it could be better. I only buy a new game every few months as I generally only have time to play video games on the weekends so it takes me a few months to finish a game.

NO! Gross! How do o come to that conclusion?

28 - work in IT. Make very good money but I have to 2 kiddos and I'm saving for a house. So right now I only buy games when they get to a low price point. It's pretty interesting see the age and work we all do.

Early 30's

Professional dream crusher

Affording games isn't an issue, it's just more about stuffing my investment accounts these days, and time (wife, kids, house, dogs, etc).

@musicalmac:

Does it pay well?

I was thinking about switch to perpetuating nightmares.

You do that over night? I just never heard of doing that job on the graveyard.

Well enough.

And while I'm being slightly flippant about my work, the description above is actually pretty accurate.

37 ... Software Developer not in the game industry so the money is greater than great :)

May we never cross paths in the real world.

27 Me and my family run a cleaning service. From simple apartment building and office cleaning to newly build or renovated houses, shops or offices. Sometimes we polish marble floors, though we are the budget version of that.

Economically, me and my siblings cant even afford to move out(my bro is nearing 26 and my sis 22). I make like 80 euros a month for my self. Im set on getting my self some first need things with that money. I primarily buy indie and older games and mostly at sales. The thing is though that I wouldn't get AAA games even if I had the money. Theres seriously too little in the AAA market that I like, mostly because I got tired of it with one or two genres dominating and the usual troubles like micro-T and crappy marketing etc.

Recently I started salvaging old computers, their parts, peripherals etc. Im planing on restoring retro computers to sell to retro entusiasts who dont want to get into the hustle of building one themselves. I also try to restore early to mid 2000 PCs to sell to people who want a cheap, basic computer. hoping to get into youtube too.

What, are you like a loan officer or something?

24 and going to college for IT security, after that it's likely uni as well.

Worked full time at a grocery store for 3 years before going to college. Right now college funds are enough to support my needs since I live under my parents' roof.

I thought most people here were 18-24 for some reason.

I'm 29 and I jump from call center to other ones. Basically I stay in a call center for the training and leave as soon as we are about to take calls. As you can guess it's not the most stable way of life. Going back to school next month hopefully I like this new program. Luckily for me gaming isn't as fun or important as it used to be.

31, I'm a teacher at a charter school in Bedstuy Brooklyn. I actually make a surprising amount for a teacher since I have 10 years experience and charters tend to pay significantly more than public schools. My wife is a teacher at the same school with similar experience so our combined income allows me to spend a ton on games while raising a daughter and living in a pretty nice apartment in downtown Brooklyn.

I started off in call centers. You should stick around and take some calls. The communication and people skills that you develop can be applied to virtually every job.

what kind of education do you need for a teacher? Up in here only place w/o masters degree you can teach is the kindergarten

23, professional NEET

i sek deks for cash :)

Do you live in Scandinavia?

47, I am an RN

@KungfuKitten: Finland, so technically not scandinavia

@mmmwksil: You must be female working with children?. My brother and his wife foster and he cant do half as much as she because he is a male. This is all males too not just him which I think is sexist and if I worked in fostering or child care I would try and do a strike to make changes. The rules working with children for men is crap. I live across from an infants school and not seen one male working there which I said out loud some times if I'm walking with some one. I always say not seen one male working in that school making sure teachers here.

Any way 36 and body fubar. Kidney failure, transplant and other things wrong.

23, about to graduate with a computer science degree. Would love to work for a game developer since I love gaming, but realistically I will get much better opportunities, pay, and hours elsewhere.