Alex Navarro assistant Editor	Currently Playing: F-Zero GX (GC), Animal Crossing (GC), Ape Escape 2 (PS2), Madden NFL 2004 (PS2)

The Metamorphosis

I've been playing video games for about as long as I can feasibly recall. Sometime around the age of 6 is when I got my NES, and since then, I've been playing games pretty much nonstop. Now, the thing is, I had, for the most part, managed to keep my gaming habits steady with my other interests, regardless of how many hot new games might have been coming out at the time. Recently, I've come to the somewhat unsurprising, yet still distressing, realization that this is not really the case anymore. While I do still maintain other hobbies away from the world of games, I'm finding my general list of interests progressively being swallowed up by gaming.

Could I have been the next Kobe? Probably not. But maybe, at least, the next...Todd Fuller?

One could easily attribute this sudden loss of interest in non-game-related activities to the simple fact that I work in the game industry. While I won't deny that my job does put me in front of a TV screen with a controller in hand on a much more regular basis than in any previous period of my life, there's much more to it than just my job. What I think may be the biggest culprit here is that there are a multitude of games on the market that create absolutely fantastic representations of some of my favorite pastimes, with some even surpassing the actual hobby itself (at least in my mind). Want some examples? Too bad--you're getting some anyway.

First, take skateboarding. I spent a number of years as a punk teenager skating around various skateparks and random concrete structures, ducking cops and pathetically trying to land 180 kickflips without breaking my face open. While I was never a particularly good skater, I always had fun with it. Then, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater came along. As much fun as I was having sliding a whole two feet down a metal rail before inevitably landing groin-first on the aforementioned rail in a bad comedy-skit-like manner, busting out 720 Japan Air to 50/50 grinds on my PlayStation, without the threat of legitimate injury seemed far more appealing. I've got plenty of scars from my skateboarding days, and yet, Tony Hawk has left me with little but some occasionally sore thumbs. Now you're saying: "Well, of course you prefer Tony Hawk; you suck at skating!" Granted--let's move on to a different example, then.

"But Alex," you say, "these are all physical activities. Clearly you're a lazy, slothlike fellow who can't handle even the most rudimentary physical effort. Couldn't this fact be the cause, rather than games?"

You're very mean, you know that?

Anyhow, while yes, these two specific examples involve a fair amount of physical activity, the physical side is not what disinterests me about them. Rather, I think what has turned me off to some of these hobbies is the simple fact that I just find the video game versions to be a lot more rewarding. Becoming a professional skateboarder or basketball player involves years of hard work and dedication, and to a casual pursuer of both sports like me, there just isn't enough drive to want to do all that nonsense. I'd much rather just pop in a copy of last year's NBA 2K3, create myself in the game, and play alongside my favorite NBA stars within a matter of minutes. In comparison, playing a sloppy game of basketball against my friends in the sweltering heat just doesn't seem nearly as appealing.

As soon as they make a better one of these, it's all over.

For the sake of brevity, I'm going to forgo lamenting on and on about the many other hobbies I've seen slip away from my roster of interests, only to be replaced by video game doppelgangers. Instead, I'll simply state that while I am aware this is not necessarily the healthiest thing for me, by the same token, I also don't care. Maybe games are turning me into a pasty-skinned, soft-bellied, wimpy shell of a man, but until I literally find myself transformed into some sort of monstrous vermin, due to my lack of useful activity and physical well-being, I'll just continue along the same path. Thankfully, not all of my particular interests have been destroyed by gaming just yet, as I've still got the drums to keep me in line. Though, if Konami manages to make a more accurate version of DrumMania with a peripheral drumkit that actually works properly...well, who knows what might happen?

Sigh...I'm doomed, aren't I?