One
Symptom: You have an alarmingly developed level of hand-eye coordination, thanks to many many hours of subtle thumb flicks and controlled button pressing.
Side effects: Able to get dressed really quickly, can catch the bottles that the kids across the street throw at you, BEFORE they hit you in the face.
Two
Symptom: Cynical distaste for the more dull moments of life, because let’s face it…good games are rarely boring, and we’ve come to expect a similar high standard in the real world (brings to mind the incident when we snuck up on the postman all Sam Fisher like)
Side effects: Non-gamers will frequently inform you that “you need to get a life”, “get a grip on reality”, and that your gaming habits are “unhygienic”….I don’t know about you but I brush my teeth first thing in the morning…before I play obviously.
Three
Symptom: You become resilient to headaches due to years of careful ‘flash training’ with titles such as “Halo” and “Ratchet and Clank”.
Side effects: There is now little reason to stop playing a game at all, apart from your partner, the need to eat, and erm the electricity bill.
Four
Symptom: You start believing you can do all the cool stuff you can in your games, in the real world.
Side effects: Awkward moments when you tell your in-laws that you can stop time, various cuts and bruises after you try out some parkour in the shopping centre, for the fifth time. Trying and failing to perform barrel roll parking stunts in your car, then paying considerable sums of money to have it repaired.
Five
Symptom: Feeling you need to upgrade to the fastest internet connection humanly possible, because those noobs online won’t own themselves.
Side effects: Everyone else in the house struggles to load up the Google homepage, while you are hosting a 20 minute Search and Destroy on CoD. You start to accidentally use the phrase “lagger” in out of context situations, in real life, “f**** laggy traffic light”.
Six
Symptom: Divide up any free time you have available, into wedges of levels and non-existent trophies in your brain.
Side effects: Clothes never get ironed, food supplies diminish as facial hair thickens, friends don’t get a call back, and whatever it is you’re supposed to be thinking about, doesn’t get done.
Seven
Symptom: All your spare money gets spent on games and gaming equipment.
Side effects: Partner not impressed with the single plastic flower you present on Valentine’s Day. The framed pictures of your wonderfully romantic holiday get thrown aside to make room for your UBER massive LED flat screen, the whole in the roof is getting larger, and meanwhile £400 worth of DLC coolly streams onto your console.
Try not to take these too seriously, but if you have any others you’d like to see here, write em up in the comments section and if I agree with you, I’ll think about adding them to the list.
