Anybody ever get a case of the Tetris effect?  You know, seeing blocks fall after you're done closing your eyes or dreaming about them?  If you're anything like me, then there are just some games you play A LOT.  Those games in turn then sneak into my dreams, and my subconscious; making themselves omniscient in my life.

So the Tetris effect, I think is pretty common.  You've at least heard of it.  But what other games stay with you when the TV is off?  For me, there have been a few.  Dance Dance Revolution had me stepping along to every song, imagining how the arrows would go with a certain beat.  The brain is a silly ol' thing.  It had me stepping around to patterns that will never be recreated in a DDR game.

Tony Hawk's Pro Skater series also got me real good.  I used to play just about every Hawk game there was.  From THPS2 to Project 8, I really really dug that style of skateboarding game.  Now I've since moved on to Skate, but THPS has a distinct memory of popping up in a dream.  Basically the dream had nothing to do with the game itself, I was just going around town doing stuff like any other dream, but it was in the THPS 3rd person perspective, and on a skateboard.  I was basically controlling a video game skateboarder around my real life, and was a little annoyed that I couldn't turnaround real fast.  It still had that wide turn game mechanic in the dream.  I played the game a lot.

And lately, I've been playing Peggle on my Mac non-stop.  Brand new to it, I fell hard and am totally in love with the game.  A lot has been said of Peggle here at The BBPS, so me gushing about it won't be exactly new, but it has got me seeing pegs and patterns long after the Macbook is closed.  Thinking about bouncing balls and power-ups.....oh me.  I will say this about the game though.  If you were the kid that built the Mouse Trap game up just to watch it go, not to play, you'll like Peggle.  If you only watch The Price Is Right with hopes that they'll play Plink-O, you'll like Peggle.  If you enjoy puzzle games that are equal parts skill and luck, if you enjoy pinball, and if you enjoy Rube Goldberg machines, you'll enjoy Peggle.

So readers and fellow BBPSers, please tell me you've had similar experiences and I'm not just going crazy?  Do you dream about running fast and collecting rings?  Have you accidentally said a game's name in place of your significant others?  Are the only musical notes you know green, red, yellow, blue, and orange?  Good work games.  I'd say dreaming the game while asleep is pretty high replay value.

Comments (7)

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written by Dexie, February 16, 2009

I used to have the DDR problem, EXTREMELY badly.

It's been replaced recently by an Ouendan/EBA problem, so...

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written by Brent the Closet Geek, February 16, 2009

I have a finger twitching problem from Amplitude. When I hear certain songs like Dieselboy - Subculture or Slipknot - I Am Hated my fingers want to move to the best like they did while I played.

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written by Dan Zuccarelli, February 17, 2009

Holy crap Brent, I do the same thing. I was bigger on Frequency so I'd see it as a tunnel and start tapping those three fingers.

God Damn I love that game.

in my Tony Hawk days I used to see crazy skate lines everywhere. Like as I was driving I would skate along the curbs and rooftops

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written by Dr. Cossack, February 17, 2009

Interesting topic!

On my end, I must admit to have had a few dreams based on Mega Man Battle Network, of all things. It was especially strong while I was playing the last game of the series, since I knew that it'd all be over soon.

I suffered from the Tetris effect too, although not quite as strongly.

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written by Mark Peachey, February 17, 2009

I can't point to any particular game, but I will often dream about puzzle solving or plannig strategies for whatever game I'm playing at that moment. Sometimes I'll actually get the solution while I'm sleeping...

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written by Brent the Closet Geek, February 17, 2009

I used to dream about Starcraft too, endless battles on infinite canvases with no supply limits.

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written by MC, February 17, 2009

I've been playing a Mech based game and thinking about Zombies a lot, and I had a dream where in the future, the US Army was mopping up ten of thousands of zombies with huge mechs.... I remember one of them backhanding a huge mob of them and sending 20-30 of them flying.

Why all my cool dreams involve killing scores of zombies, I'll never know.

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