When you become a parent, two things that are very important to gaming become suddenly scarce: time and money. Between having to care for a helpless person and the estimated $250,000 that raising a child will cost you, this should come as no surprise. Suddenly, you can’t spend an entire Saturday playing those 3 new releases you bought that week.

Back when I had disposable time and income, I would buy quite a few games. Play them a bit, but then suffer from the typical ADD that a non-hardcore gamer will suffer from. To me, finishing the original Metal Gear Solid was a noteworthy achievement. Still is, really. Most of the time, I was playing little bits here and there and eventually moving on to something else. It cost me money. Lots of it.

I didn’t do a lot of gaming after Oldest Son was born. I had an XBox, and it suddenly became very lonely. In a telling sign, though, I’d bought Metal Gear Solid 2, but never ended up even starting it. A few years later, I got the Nintendo Wii, and the same habits were coming back. I knew it wasn’t sustainable, especially after I picked up the PS3. I knew that things would have to change.

So I started to focus more. Since I was on a limited budget, I had to start really scrutinizing the games I bought. And once I got them, I was bent on achieving a reasonable level of completion so that I could get my money’s worth. I’m completing more games than ever. I’ve spent an unheard of (for me) 60+ hours playing Burnout Paradise. I unlocked all the characters and stages in Super Smash Bros. Brawl. I finished and Platinumed Prince of Persia. I’m close to beating inFamous for a SECOND time. On Hard difficulty, no less. I think I’ve actually become a BETTER gamer now than I ever was.

Another example: When inFamous and Prototype came out within a month of each other, I was looking at the uncomfortable proposition of buying both games. Mamajuice would not have been pleased. My wallet would not have been pleased. But my new focus led me to realize that I could bide my time on Prototype, since I’d be busy playing inFamous (likely twice). Eventually the price would come down, and I could wait till then. In the meantime, Greg bought Prototype, and we reached an understanding that we’d do a trade when we’d finished our time with our respective games. I’d just saved $60, which I estimated will buy about a week’s worth of milk for the boys, the way they go through it.

Sure, publishers and developers probably won’t like that last paragraph, but there’s only so many gaming dollars I (and Greg) have to go around. And really, our arrangement might have resulted in more sales for them. Greg (or I for that matter) may or may not have bought Prototype. He also might have waited for a price drop, or, even worse, hit up his local Rogers Video Previously Played bin (he’s found so many great deals in the PP bins in his town, it’s ridiculous) and found it there, which results in nothing for the game companies. But, with the promise that he’d get to swap for inFamous, he can justify buying it now. Same goes for me. Suddenly, I can justify buying one game to the wife, because I’ll essentially get two games for the price of one. As a result, there are two new games sales made, when it could have been less.

Everybody’s on a budget these days, but especially us. We have to be a lot more wily to get our gaming on. A lot of things change when you have kids, I just didn’t realize how they would change from a gaming aspect, and really, for the better.