Hi everyone! I was wondering if any of you have experienced the same thing as me. I’m 35 years old and work full-time as a software developer and data scientist in a company. I also work as a lecturer once a week at a local university. As part of my job, I do a lot of reading, including code, tutorials, and scientific papers. Although I don’t have any serious eye diseases, I wear glasses with -0.5 and -0.75 diopters to protect my eyesight during work (anti-reflex surface, etc.). I love story-rich games and reading.

I typically read around 30-40 books a year, mostly heavy science-fiction. My favorite game genres are tactical strategies like XCOM, Phoenix Point, Chaos Gate, Mechanicus, and used to be cRPGs, but that’s changing. When I was younger, I used to play e.g. Planescape Torment and other text-heavy titles without any issues. However, after spending so many hours in front of my computer reading glowing letters on a dark background (typical software developer tools use it, it’s a good setup), I just can’t force myself to read walls of text in games like the Torment Tides of Numenera. It’s a pretty painful experience.

I would really enjoy playing e.g. Disco Elysium but I just know that after a couple of hours, I will switch to something offering a more cinematic experience like Mass Effect, Jedi: The Fallen Order, etc.

Just looking at my various accounts, I can see that in recent years, most story-heavy games I played are more similar to Mass Effect, Dishonored, or Detroit: Become Human than Shadowrun or Disco Elysium. Do you have the same experience? I guess that’s what getting old looks like haha :)