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An Interview With 2old2play's Doodi 238

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the never-too-old-to-play dept.
vinnie2k writes "This is an interesting interview with the founder of 2old2play.com. In it he discusses the future of gaming for older people, why we need communities like 2old2play, and how the gaming industry needs to refocus its efforts on the games it makes. Cool insight and worth the read for any older gamers."
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An Interview With 2old2play's Doodi More

An Interview With 2old2play's Doodi

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  • Old gamers? I must be ancient. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by XorNand ( 517466 ) * on Tuesday January 10, 2006 @09:35PM (#14442704)
    WTF? Since when is anyone over the age of 25 an "old gamer?" Now, Old Grandma Hardcore [blogspot.com] is an old gamer.
    • I'm 25 and as far as my Dad is concerned, 16 is too old to play Games. He still doesn't accept my hobby and asks me on several occasions when I plan to get rid of my consoles. I just tell him i'm getting a few more soon, to which he grunts and tells me to grow up.

      People just don't understand.

      • maybe he wants you to get rid of the stuff so he has more room around his house.
      • I used to get the same thing. I also used to get accused of doing nothing but playing on my computer when I was working on programming assignments for college if I was at their house.
        • I'm *way* the hell past college and I still get that. (Oddly enough, though, if I'm on her computer *fixing* the wretched thing, that's work!) I'm a writer, so maybe what I need to do next time I'm home is whip out a pad and pencil... better yet, I'm gonna hook up some foolscap and a quill... yeah, that'll do it. Programmers, though, hmm -- maybe an abacus? Bunch of slips of papers with ONE and ZERO written on them? Large bucket marked "BITS"?
          • Magazine editor and software developer here (though more editing than developing of late). I sometimes do the initial edits on paper but that's just because at times it's easier to red-ink things that need to be changed then change them all at once.
    • Well anyone born before 1980 is too old to game ;) I'm part of a group (no we're not a clan, clans are for young people) called Below Eighty (eg born before 1980). Most of the people are married, have kids and game for fun rather than anything competitive... And if we do have gaming get togethers, it involves more drinking than gaming :)
    • I agree with you - 25 isn't an old gamer. Not anymore.

      Shit. We grew up on video games. I owned an original (woodgrain) Atari 2600, and I was very young. I was never spoiled with video games, but I do remember playing them as far back as I can remember. Just because I'm in my mid-20's now doesn't mean I'll suddenly lose interest - and it doesn't mean I need different games.

      MMORPG's are a pretty new thing, really. They're not for everyone - you have to have a lot of free time to do anything meaningful i

  • not too old (Score:4, Informative)

    by hb253 ( 764272 ) on Tuesday January 10, 2006 @09:36PM (#14442709)
    I'm 41 and play Counter Strike Source on a daily basis. I am not too old to play.
    • ~31 and am playing City of Heroes right now.
    • I'm 8 years old and playing on xbox live right now screaming at my mom for some chocolate milk [google.com] You see, gaming is the one place where young and old can come together to have fun in a mature and relaxing way.
      • If I was that kids mother I would beat him into a bloody pulp, I'm normally against Child abuse, but that kid went waaaaay too far. seriously, baseball bat to the head time for him, he'd never talk back again!
      • "I'm 8 years old and playing on xbox live right now screaming at my mom for some chocolate milk "

        "mom! you're not in bed yet! get up and get me a glass of milk!... why do i have to get up (from playing games)? you're always doin that mom! that's bull! i dont want mountain dew! i want chocolate milk!

        MOM! GET IT! GET IIIIIIITTTT!!! MOM! PLEASE GET IT! .... WHY?! THAT'S BULLSHIT! YOU LIED! YOU SAID YOU'D GET ME A DRINK AND NOW YOU WONT GET ME CHOCOLATE MILK! YOU SAID YOU'D GET ME WHA

    • My mid-30s neighbor used to regularly have people over for Halo tourneys, and a guy at my church who is approaching 50 is probably the world's greatest Mario Kart 64 player EVAR. All of the really good people in my friends America's Army clan are in their 20s and 30s, and they pwn!
      • "All of the really good people in my friends America's Army clan are in their 20s and 30s, and they pwn!"

        when did 20s and 30s become too old to play games? Anyone 30 or younger has been playing video games for as long as they can remember assuming they got a system in 1980+, so if I'm 30 and dont remember a life without video games why would I be too "old" to continue playing a video game?

        Video games are entertainment, plain and simple. Do people become too old to watch TV? When TV came out were they

    • Re:not too old (Score:3, Interesting)

      by symbolic ( 11752 )
      I am upwards of 30 and I still enjoy firing up Vice City to raise HELL once in a while. I've also started Prince of Persia- granted my pace is somewhat slow, but I have other things going on so my time is limited. I've played WoW. Lineage2, America's Army, Planetside, and others. Games are something I enjoy, so I don't see putting the kibosh on playing them just because of some arbitrary age thing. I remember one guy playing AA was in his 70s.
    • Yeah I hear ya - I got given World of Warcraft (aka gamecrack) for my 40th birthday - it's the gift that keeps on taking! Luckily now I am officially an old man (grumpy too!) I can afford the monthly fee!

  • I'm too old... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 10, 2006 @09:37PM (#14442715)
    ...to use numbers instead of words and pluralize with a 'Z'.

  • funniest Article title ever! (Score:5, Funny)

    by incubusnb ( 621572 ) on Tuesday January 10, 2006 @09:38PM (#14442724) Homepage Journal
    are you serious?
    "An Interview With 2old2play's Doodi"

    who is this 2old2play and why are we interviewing his "Doodi"?

  • 50 may be the new 30 (Score:5, Funny)

    by RLiegh ( 247921 ) * on Tuesday January 10, 2006 @09:40PM (#14442728) Homepage Journal
    but TFA makes it clear that in the gaming world; 25 is the new 60!

  • On getting a life (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Animats ( 122034 ) on Tuesday January 10, 2006 @09:40PM (#14442734) Homepage
    It sounds more like "gaming for gamers who have a life". Many of the MMORPGs require so much online time per week to advance that you can't have a life outside the game.
    • Can you describe this thing you call a "life??"
    • It's just people can't let go. You can play an MMORPG only an hour a week and still enjoy it. No, you won't make it to the highest level and do all that shit, but that doesn't mean there's still not plenty to do. However people get all competitive about it like there's a standard they have to meet or something. There's not, you can be as casual or as hardcore as you like and it works fine.
    • I have a friend who has logged 83 DAYS on WoW in the last year. That is, 83 x 24 hours. Wow WoW wow.
    • This is a crazy comment. About 3 hours ago I had lunch with a guy interested in running an MMORPG (he has much cash).

      I told him forget it, unless he:

      1. Caps weekly play time to 2 hours so even older gamers can play. I'm 31.

      2. Sets a limited amount of wealth in the world -- call it a gold standard. Inflation kills MMORPGs as it does in real life.

      3. Offers a cheap annual fee ($60 includes license)

      4. Supports Linux.

      He said no. Another guy with much cash wanting to mimic everyone else, ugh.
      • So, you're thinking of that ever popular target group, 30-something Linux users with an interest in MMORPGs, but less than two hours a week to play them...

        2 hours is absurd. Running a seperate server, time limited to 15-20 hours a week, I can see. Keep in mind, you want to cap it above the number of hours your target audience will want to play - they should never notice the cap. At 15-20, that's still a hell of a lot less than many people spend on a MMORPG. I'd also expect progression to be sped up, on that
        • I guess it's relative. I'd go for a 6 hour per week cap, or lower. 15 hours a week takes a huge chunk out of time that could be spent outside, or reading, or cooking, or doing any one of a number of things that have longer-term rewards.

          I had an intensive MMORPG phase, and too little to show for it.

      • Re:On getting a life (Score:3, Informative)

        by Mr2001 ( 90979 )
        Yohoho! Puzzle Pirates [puzzlepirates.com] attracts gamers of all ages without resorting to those tactics.

        Play time is unlimited, however, the doubloon system allows players to essentially trade money for time. There are two currencies: pieces of eight, which flow freely from NPCs and admin-sponsored tournaments, and doubloons, which only enter the economy when they're purchased with real dollars. The prices for most items are set in both POE and doubloons, the doubloons disappear from the economy as soon as they're spent, and
    • There are two things in this world I avoid like the plague. IRC and MMORPGs. I do not look down upon anyone who gets addicted. It's not their fault. They just wanted to play a game. No one told them these companies have figured out a way to inject heroin over tcp/ip.

  • /.'ed (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 10, 2006 @09:45PM (#14442759)
    Hey, you're never 2old to be /.'ed!

  • Damn kids (Score:4, Funny)

    by Rodness ( 168429 ) on Tuesday January 10, 2006 @09:45PM (#14442760)
    A 26yo declaring that anyone over 25 is "too old"? Let me be the first to stand up and yell "stupid young whippersnapper!"

    *sigh* Kids these days...
    • 26 my arse! from TFA "I think the best musicians out there were the Beatles, in terms of what they did for music " - I'm 40 and even that's young enough to recongnise that ABBA were so far beyond the Beatles it's not funny! I mean who saved us all from ponderous prog-rock if not ABBA and the Sex Pistols, who showed the world that you have squeeze a brilliant song into under 4 minutes. Ahh 1977.

  • too old? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by drew ( 2081 ) on Tuesday January 10, 2006 @09:51PM (#14442797) Homepage
    The founder of a group called 2old2play is younger than I am? I went to the article expecting to see some insightful commentary from somebody at least in his 40's. I stopped reading when I got to his age.

    Then again, now that I look closer at his name and the name of the group, I have a hard time believing he's over 18.
    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • It's actually covered in the interview. His original nickname was Doodirock, pronounced "Dude, I rock", but due to mispronunciation it evolved into "Doodi". Doodirock isn't hugely more mature than Doodi, but many people come up with their handles when they're younger, and by the time their old they have two many contacts with their old handle to try changing it.

        • Re:The name "Doodi" (Score:2, Funny)

          by Anonymous Coward
          [...] and by the time their old they have two many contacts [...]

          That sentence fragment makes my eyes bleed.
          • I was using the troll numbering system, which only has four digits, one, two, many lots. Translating into base-10, what I actually said is that they have 13 contacts.

            I can't find a good excuse for the their, apart from this is slashdot, and I was trying to fit in.
      • If you RTFA (although you really didn't miss anything by not doing so), you'll find out it's actually a contraction of his original tag "doodirock", which was supposed to be pronounced "dude I rock" but kept getting pronounced "doodie rock" and eventually just got shortened to "doodie".

  • Strange (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Da3vid ( 926771 ) on Tuesday January 10, 2006 @09:51PM (#14442799)
    I find it strange how the stereotype of gaming has been given to younger people. There doesn't seem to be anything inherent in gaming itself that keeps itself from older people. Perhaps it is only the industry which gears itself towards younger people, because it has more widely available material to be used. If the industry had sufficient material (perhaps just better storylines?), I can't see any good reason why gaming wouldn't be popular among all ages aside from social stigmas.

    -Da3vid-

    • Re:Strange (Score:3, Insightful)

      by JanneM ( 7445 )
      Much gaming entails mastering a given game over many hours of play. You can't really enjoy online FPS:s until you've put in a lot of hours of practice first, for example. For "mainstream", visible gaming, you need to be able to put in quite a lot of hours, preferably in fairly large chunks of time.

      People over college age tend to have jobs and family. They do not have all that many long stretches of free hours, and when they do, they will tend to spend it with their spouse, their kids, their garden, whatever

    • Re:Strange (Score:3, Insightful)

      by lawpoop ( 604919 )
      I think the thing is because electronic video games are relatively new. When they first came out, the only people into them were youngsters, because only youngsters are into new things.

      Now that successive generations are growing up, those people who were once kids are now adults, and still into video games. The stereotype will change once those people start getting to be elderly. Then everyone will be into video games.
    • That's because us old folks (I'm in my 40's) find gaming to be boring. We've found more interesting things to do.

  • This is so timely (for me anyway) (Score:5, Interesting)

    by conteXXt ( 249905 ) on Tuesday January 10, 2006 @09:56PM (#14442820)
    Today I was playing some Enemy Territory (Sniper mod) for a few hours.

    Server was a Clan branded one, and a few of the members joined in the frag fest (well as much of a fest as sniper mod can be, but I digress).

    To my surprise, they asked me to try out for their clan.

    My response? How late do you play as I am old (well not really but I have responsibilities)

    Average age of the clan? 32.

    That was a surprise to me.

    I guess certain games attract different age groups (duh) but I would have thought that a *clan* would generally be younger folks.

    Anyone else have this experience?

    • First clan I joined back in the Team Fortress days had a wide range of people. Youngest was 16, oldest was 53. Median age was probably in the 20s, but we had a number of older people that played. Wasn't a problem, just what they did with their time rather than watch TV or the other activities that many people do for entertainment.

      You'll actually find that a lot of the quality groups out there are older gamers. PArt of it is just a maturity thing. When teamwork becomes important, maturity becomes important a
    • Same here, I played Ghost Recon a long while back, and was invited to try out a clan. After being accepted, I found out that most of them are working people over 25 or so.

      Good thing about this is there was never a Rambo in the clan who ran around shooting everything, we spent a lot of time communicating and plotting the attacks.
    • I'm currently in a gaming clan where ages range from 15 to i think near 50. Most of us are in our upper 20's and lower 30's (I'm 31). We've got brothers and sisters, a father(40+) and son(15), and a father(45+) with son(19) and daughter(17).
      We stress maturity and comraderie over frag count. WE have no patience with whiny kids, of any age.
    • I've played in two clans where the average age is probably close to what you've desribed - however, how they *act* is another matter entirely. Sometimes it seems like there's a real disconnect between age and maturity.
    • Thank you all for your great responses.

      I had suspected that I wasn't the ONLY one still playing these games, as I started playing them around 27, but I really hadn't guessed that so many people were still playing so competetively.

      BTW in case anyone was wondering, I am now 39.

      Hope to play with you all (keep it clean) at some point down the road.

      Cheers and good day.

  • old timer finds new game (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 10, 2006 @10:02PM (#14442859)
    I'm an old timer. I recently found a very challenging game, exciting, and fraught with risk. The game is called Automatic Transmission. Take it apart. Try to put it back together. Hope that it works. Fun.

  • A new market awaits (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Saint37 ( 932002 )
    The targeting of games to younger people creates a market opportunity for a small visionary company that realizes that in the future, gamers will come from all age demographics.

    http://www.tradealyst.com/ [tradealyst.com]

  • I found it sort of strange that they referred to 25 as being old, senior citizen old. When I played Star Wars Galaxies (before it tanked), the average age for guild members was in the ~23-26 range. Most had jobs, a couple had children, a lot had wives/girlfriends.

    I think I was the only one under 18 at the time (2 years back, I turn 18 this month). Most players that were in my age group were incredibly annoying; there's no doubt in my mind that the guild just wanted a more mature gaming group.

    Granted, I n

  • I don't play games (Score:2, Interesting)

    by JCOTTON ( 775912 )
    ...haven't played any computer game since Trek on a PDP-11. SUCH A WASTE of time. If my kids spent half the time that they play games on learning a computer language, then they would be pulling down six figure salaries. Afterall, sitting in front of a tube is sitting in front of a tube. I do that 8 hours a day. But I get big bucks for it.
    Can I rant on crossword puzzles too? Basically, supporting old apps is the same as a giant crossword puzzle. Think about it. When was the last time you got paid

    • Re:I don't play games (Score:5, Insightful)

      by LordLucless ( 582312 ) on Tuesday January 10, 2006 @10:34PM (#14443030)
      SUCH A WASTE of time. If my kids spent half the time that they play games on learning a computer language, then they would be pulling down six figure salaries.

      Which is the most important thing, after all.
      • If my kids spent half the time that they play games on learning a computer language, then they would be pulling down six figure salaries.

        Well a lot of good coders aren't paid 6 figures. A lot of good coders are still out of work, and a lot more make adequate salaries at the expense of 80+ hour weeks.

        You might as well say that the kid should be out learning to be a plumber or a carpenter.

        In any case if they get into games in the right way and have a bit of curiousity they can start modding and building addo
        • Note that I was responding to, not endorsing, the quote in italics at the top of my post. If you're going to respond to that, rather than to my comment on it, it's better to reply to the grandparent that it is to reply to me.
      • No they wouldn't.

        Six-figure salaries for code monkeys are GONE, boy.

        Unless you're counting in rupees...

    • Re:I don't play games (Score:4, Informative)

      by titzandkunt ( 623280 ) on Wednesday January 11, 2006 @12:06AM (#14443454)

      "... If my kids spent half the time that they play games on learning a computer language, then they would be pulling down six figure salaries..."

      If you love your kids, then for God's sake don't be saying shit like that around them!

      When your dog bites someone and has to be destroyed, you tell your kid that it's gone to live on a farm where it can chase rabbits all day without getting in trouble.

      Say your kid catches you downing your first stiff scotch of the day at 08:30. You tell them its "special medicine" for grownups.

      Your wife boots you out, so you tell the kid that mommy and daddy are going to spend a little time apart so they don't yell at each other so much.

      - These are all inconsequential, harmless, miniscule white lies compared to the black, satanic, evil untruth that software development is a desirable and highly-paid profession.

      T&K.
    • "When was the last time you got paid to do a crossword?"

      Started and finished the NYTimes Friday crossword on a NJT train. Guy next to me gave me a business card, said to call him on Monday morning.

      On the next Wednesday I accepted a job offer at 70% more than my then-current salary.
    • If my kids spent half the time that they play games on learning a computer language, then they would be pulling down six figure salaries.

      The whole reason you can get paid six figures to program is that not that many people know how to do it. If everyone who played games instead spent their time working as a programmer, programmers would get paid about $7 an hour.
  • 25 seems to be the base for the site. I took some time to check out the users and most of them are in their 30's and 40's. Seems like a place to get away from the cheating, screaming, kids of the gaming world. Im on similar sites for ps2 and I think there should be more of them. Having a site for all consoles and PC seems like a good idea.
  • I'm unnerved by the name of this site. It requires participants to admit to themselves that they are either "old" or "too old" to do X.

    It seems that that is a failure of marketing 101. Age is a sensitive issue for many, and with the advancements and new thinking behind aging and longevity, the generation of baby boomers, and younger, are going to be fighting it and delaying it at every turn. This web site's core audience is not very likely to admit to being too old for anything.

    This could be different in an
  • I recently got back into Action Quake 2 after a 6 year hiatus. I was old at 25 but good.

    The first month I sucked. I figured it was age.

    Now I see that gaming skills require construction honing. I'm decent now, and have noticed my hand-eye coordination is better in real life. Gaming also gave me back my old edge in scanning a room to notice things faster than others (great in a business with long punch lists!).

    Practice, practice!

    Old fogies, come back to Action Quake 2.

  • Bring back adventure games! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by nighty5 ( 615965 ) on Tuesday January 10, 2006 @11:22PM (#14443255)
    I'm 30 years old, but I remember playing the my first Sierra [wikipedia.org] game, Kings Quest [wikipedia.org].

    From a very early age I was programming, TRS80's etc. Lucky my old man was a programmer, we had all types of all gear lying about.

    My Favourites were:
    Space Quest [wikipedia.org]
    Police Quest [wikipedia.org]
    Hero's Quest [wikipedia.org]
    Leisure Suit Larry [wikipedia.org]
    And last but not least: Zork [wikipedia.org]

    I am disappointed to see they no longer make such games, now moving to more action type games. Adventure games were cool.

    • Adventure games were cool.

      I showed a text adventure game to one of my cousin's kids, and he (who's 13) just didn't get it. Too much reading, not enough pictures with 3d effects and stereo sound.

      Explained that the graphics are the best possible: the power of the printed word to evoke mood and setting in the human brain.

      "You're standing in an old white farmhouse. The long dark hall leads east and smells of stale mouse droppings. A piano leans drunkenly by the near wall. On the piano is a brass oil lamp a

  • 2old my arse (Score:4, Interesting)

    by ross.w ( 87751 ) <rwonderley@gDEBIANmail.com minus distro> on Tuesday January 10, 2006 @11:56PM (#14443406) Journal
    I'm over 40, and I regularly play Lego Starwars with my 7yo son (highly rcommended game btw). And I play Doom 3 after he's gone to bed.

    Since when was there an age limit?

  • I see a great need (Score:4, Funny)

    by schnitzi ( 243781 ) on Wednesday January 11, 2006 @01:08AM (#14443707) Homepage
    EA Sports presents: "Extreme Shuffleboard".

  • never to old to game. (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Brtchlin ( 810424 )
    my husband and i are clan gamers. mostly battlefield 2 for us and the rest of our clan plays everything from WoW, GuildWars, i've even seen them playing StarCraft. our clan caters to the older crowd. my husband is 47, and he's not the oldest member of the clan. http://www.elderwolves.com/ [elderwolves.com] sure we do have younger people playing with us, but thier mostly very respectful. to be honest, i really do not think gaming is strictly for the youngin's, nor is gaming strictly gender bound. for the longest time i th
  • He must have missed that the average gamer is his age or older. Us mid 20s - mid 30s ARE the target market. Video games since we grew up with them and have disposable cash.
  • I was playing this free korean shooter game named "gunz", when people started giving out their age. Apparently everyone in the map was around 14, except me, clocking at 30.
    One of the kids then proceeded to tell me "how brave I was to keep gaming at my age, and not care what people think."

    The kid diplomatically chose to interpret my obliviousness as bravery. Now I suppose I have to acknowledge the age gap and go hide in some dark place where teenagers can't find me.

    Or not.

  • I'm 24, and kids fucking ruin MMORPGs for me. Not all of them, just the immature ones.

    I stopped playing WoW because I just got fed up with them. When I started playing there weren't many kids playing, and when I left there were apparently still not many kids playing, but for sure, the loud, vocal, wankers were all 12 year olds and less.

    I got fed up with having instance-run arguments with morons who couldn't reason and were as rational as my cat. Especially since they can never be bothered to type properly a
  • is what will happen to those gamers that cut their teeth on the early Microprose games? Microprose made great games with fabulous manuals. Even the boxes for their games kicked ass. In large part, the counter-strike type games with a bazillion keys to control everything are directly descended from these games with a large dose of Doom-style w-a-s-d keys thrown in. Back then, there wasn't any consideration given to crossing a game title over (for obvious reasons) to a console with a limited number of but

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