FPS's and your health

[Paul]

I've found that I cannot play FPS's in one player mode. Whenever I do, I get nauseous. I was just playing HL2 earlier, and one hour later, I have a pounding headache and was feeling carsick. This happens to me with other FPS's too, I get a sick feeling when I play in 1 player mode. Maybe its all the looking around. Anyone else get this?

[[Gandalf]]

HL2 is said to (and I know from experience) give you headaches. I have played many FPS's like Call of Duty, RTCW, Enemy Territory, FarCry, Doom 3, Joint Operations, HalfLife, etc... What I noticed is that personally Half Life 1 & 2 really make me dizzy and headachy (lol), which is why I stopped playing them after less that an hour. All other FPS games, and any other game rarely makes me sick.

Some advice I have is this:

1. Experiment with the resolution and graphics settings, there might be something which is causing your problems in them. Resolution makes you change persective and stuff, so look at that.

2. It could be your monitor (doubtful). Try changing the brightness of the game and monitor.

3. Play on some sort of slow settings, I know that when I used to play Wolfenstein 3D (a whiiiiile back) and I played too fast that would give me a headache. This is relevent for newer games too.

[Martin]

If you are on a CRT, up the refresh rate!

You'll want to put it to at least 85 Hz, more if you can.

Make sure you play in a well lit room. Take a five minute break every 45. Make sure you're hydrated and not hungry.

[[Gandalf]]

Ya, I keep my monitor at 85hz too, but many games automatically switch to 60Hz - so that might not be an option... If possible though, try this too (but for HL2 even the biggest HL1 gamers say it gives headaches and everything you described to an extent).

For your eyes its healthy to look away from the monitor every 15 minutes, and take a 10 minute break every hour.

[Paul]

Weird, I can play MMORPG's for hours without getting any of that. Must be the fast paced movements Has anyone ever cut off any of the headcrab ppl's heads with the grav gun and the discs? I can only cut them in half at the waist

[Martin]

You can only get them at the waist, unfortunately.

[Mazer]

I can't remember if HL2 has much of a camera bob, but could that be it? What other FPS's do you play and have the problem with.
The only time I've experienced this kinda stuff is with the original Dark Forces. The camera bob was just ridiculous, and if you ran out of ammo for all weapons and had to resort to your fists the sound effect for punching (I don't know what was worse, hitting something, or missing) just made your stomach want to implode. Cool game though.

[Paul]

Seems to be only the first person shooter games, HL, HL2, even duke nukem o0, consol ones like perfect dark, etc. Some to a lesser degree. I've always found HL and HL2 to be worse than others. And only in the 1 player mode too, I never have any trouble with multiplayer FPS playing.

[Neo]

HL1 is the only fps that gives me a headache. However when i play counterstrike i feel fine...

[person]

halo and halo 2 works fine for me, but wat iv noticed with most games on the computer is that after u stare at ur monitor for a long time ur eyes r harder to focus on, and after dat, comes the headaches (this happened to me while playing HL1 a long time ago)

[rizzix]

lol no its has nothing to do with the hardware eqiupment etc.

as martin mentioned you have to be hydrated and full at all times during the game. why? HL2 and other similar games (including the multiplayer ut2k4), playing them results in an adrenaline rush. So you feel kinda wierd after some perticular type of games.. in ut2k4 if u ever happen to be in a game thats well balanced on both sides, and you happend to be one of the top3 players in ur team, you'd feel seriously sick afterward (specially in smaller maps). most players usually leave, after a good game (take a break).

note that the symptoms dissappear within 10-20 min of rest.

[Martin]

I kinda remember the raycasting in mine and bugz's raycaster being somewhat nausea inducing. http://www.compsci.ca/v2/viewtopic.php?t=532