CHARACTER BUFFS

Tiny changes that make PC gaming healthier

- Phil Iwaniuk 

Scour the mainstream media for images of ‘gamers’ and even today you’ll generally find 100 or so variants of Matthew Broderick in WarGames – unathletic, unkempt and occasionally bespectacled too for good measure. It’s a vastly outdated trope that belies the most visible figures in modern gaming. The infuriatingly gorgeous YouTubers who make a living shouting at FUT packs. The shredded influencers doing boxing matches to promote their upcoming trap song or energy drink. But somewhere in that broadly drawn stereotype of the gamer, there’s a grain of truth.

PC gaming is a lot of things: mentally and emotionally stimulating and nourishing, stress-relieving and effective in combating loneliness. What it is not, however, is physically active.

As someone who once raced for 24 straight hours in Gran Turismo as a young and eager staff writer for a magazine feature, I can tell you this with some authority: sitting down for extended periods isn’t immediately compatible with a healthy lifestyle.

In fact the problems are numerous. Sitting with your spine in an unsupported position for long stints can cause aches and tightness. Depriving yourself of natural light (let’s be honest, the curtains are pulled at the slightest suggestion of screen glare hitting our panels) can interrupt vitamin D production and our sleep regulatory systems. And on those occasions when our games make wholly unreasonable demands of our time in a single session – looking at you, Destiny 2 – we might find that our regular eating habits interrupted, and an insatiable desire to inhale something fried has set in.