I Can Talk About It!

In the last post I mentioned there was something I wanted to talk about but had to wait. It just got posted so now I can talk about it! Actually, I probably could have talked about it before, but I didn't want to chance it.

In another previous post I mentioned Borderlands 2 and that "I have been playing it, and playing it, and playing it, and I will likely keep playing it, and keep playing it, and keep playing it." Turns out there is more to it than that as I was actually playing it without sleep to try writing a review! (This was completely my idea and choice, by the way. Though it is posted at OverclockersClub.com, where I am a news editor, no one there asked me to do it.)

After I got my copy of the game, I installed it and started playing and only paused playing to use the bathroom, eat, and make some notes. Immediately after finishing the playthrough, I started writing the review, which surprisingly went well. Sure at times I was forgetting the beginning of a sentence before I finished it, but then what would you expect when you've been up for 40 hours (just under 30 hours of which were in the game). There were no egregious errors in my writing, or unrecoverable sentences, so I'm pretty happy about that.

Part of the reason I put myself through this was to see how I would feel about the game after so much time in it. Essentially, I was testing it for burnout, which is not something typically tested for in reviews (I think). I am very happy to say that the very next day I ended up playing the game until 2 AM, because I lost track of time. Yeah, no burnout for me!

If you've clicked to keep reading this post to see my thoughts on the game, you'd better stop and click the link above or the one coming up. Instead I'm going to talk about what it was like to actually go for 29 hours and 40 minutes in game and to write a review with 39 awake hours behind me (40 hours by the time I finished). Borderlands 2 (Sleepless) Review at OverclockersClub.com.

Normally even a little sleep deprivation will mess with me and lower some of my inhibitions. Basically I start saying things I normally wouldn't say, often with comical effect, which is not uncommon. With so much time awake though, this actually did not happen and I'm not sure why. Mentally I was pretty okay, except for the issue with writing sentences I mention above. Fortunately the purposes of the sentences I never forgot, just the wording, so I wasn't derailing within a sentence. Physically though, the effect was noticeable, especially the next day.

I've known for years now that when I sit in front of my computer for long periods of time, my body adapts to it by, for example, reducing the blood flow to my legs. I noticed that years ago because my legs were colder than the rest of my body after a long gaming session. Recovered from that pretty quickly, but then that was not as long as this. I did not notice this same issue with my legs, but once I started moving around, and into the next day, I found my limbs were trembling some. It was almost like my body had adapted to not moving much and it just hadn't recovered from that after a night's sleep. Two nights of sleep though, and I was fine.

Along with the trembling my body also felt very exhausted. The muscles in my forearms were actually aching as I was writing the review on my keyboard, but I pressed on! (It isn't like it hurt.)

Actually writing the review, and coming back to it for "After Sleep Updates" was a lot of fun, especially those updates. Going back and better explaining what I meant or adding something important was cool because it was me trying to improve what I wrote. What I wrote was also something I thought others would find interesting, and I knew would get read. What's not cool and fun about that? I'll find out soon enough. The forum thread for the review is open!

(To be honest though, I'm not just concerned about if the readers hate it but if they love it too, because then I might need to do another sleepless review! Can I do it again?  Sure, I'm just not sure if I want to lol)