(Credit: Jordan Minor, Naomi Urey, Tim Torres)
Yes, this is yet another meditation on gaming and parenthood. Despite their youthful image, video games aren't just for the young. The hobby now includes multiple generations of people who have become parents. In fact, aging game developers gave rise to the so-called "dadification of video games," prestige titles all about grizzled men caring for innocent young wards—a trend that includes 2013's The Last of Us and last month's Pragmata. Dads who play games, make games, and star in games are nothing new. However, this year I became a new father, which dramatically changed my relationship with the medium.
As I prepped for the birth of my first child (born auspiciously close to Mario Day), I drew from plenty of wisdom, including Crossplay's experienced gamer parents and a conversation I had with Reggie Fils-Aimé, Nintendo's former president. So, I didn't expect my transition to a gamer father to bestow upon me great parenting insight no one had previously put into words. However, it's valuable for each of us to talk about how we engage with video games, from our identities to our relationships.
I'm unique in that I have a professional incentive to stay up to date with the video game industry. But as someone who's been playing games religiously since I was old enough to hold a controller, it's been fascinating to document how parenthood fundamentally transformed my connection to this pastime. When time is so precious, I can only do the things that mean the most to me. Becoming a father didn't make me reject video games; it reaffirmed my passion for them.
Handhelds Kept My Gaming Sessions Short and Sweet
With a newborn, I can no longer commit to playing games for hours uninterrupted. I love my daughter, and from the instant she arrived, she received my full attention whenever it was demanded. I help feed and change her. I break down cardboard boxes with the efficiency of a puzzle game savant. I calm her with Metroid music during tummy time. I go to every doctor's visit. I continue to happily give her much of my life. So, you'll no longer find me locked to my PC or console, sweating over a competitive shooter like Marathon.
However, between naptimes, supportive friends and family, and above all else, having the privilege of an amazing partner to share the responsibility with, my weeks of paternity leave included enough time to also proactively carve out a healthy gaming life. Handhelds have been a huge help for tackling tons of recent releases and a big chunk of my backlog. With my Switch 2 and Steam Deck, I've started, stopped, and started again as quickly as needed between daddy sessions. In retrospect, all parents were right when they said handhelds' pick-up-and-play nature is perfect for pivoting at a moment's notice. So much so, I was even playing games as soon as we had a free moment at the hospital.
I discovered playing handhelds in short bursts was reminiscent of reading novels chapter by chapter (though I did read more books during paternity leave, including Super Nintendo by Keza MacDonald and How We Play the Game by Alexis Nedd). Tackling titles in that fashion over an extended period also gave me more time to appreciate them and reflect on their experiences.
I played many Virtua Fighter 5 matches, diving deep into the time-tested 3D fighter while marveling at the Tekken and Yakuza costumes. Sektori combined the neon dual-stick shooter dopamine of Geometry Wars, remixing it with constantly changing layouts that made each run unique. Mullet MadJack caught my attention with its striking 1990s anime-like art style and breakneck shooter-roguelike gameplay. Dead As Disco's beat-'em-up thrills synced to the rhythm of my digital music, a synesthesia experience so mesmerizing I kept saying "just one more song."
Unsurprisingly, this lifestyle lent itself well to quick games. Intense, arcade-style experiences, where it only takes a few seconds to start pressing buttons and having fun, were soothing and helped relieve stress. But I also craved the sense of accomplishment games provide, the feeling that those breaks I took were leading to something more. Otherwise, an entire day would be mindlessly filled with free moments while waiting for the next baby chore. It took a handful of hours each day, but I made it to the end of some awesome campaigns.
I traveled through time in the Scott Pilgrim EX beat-'em-up. I completed Minishoot Adventures and its shmup dungeons. I shot all the bugs (and played as them) in Starship Troopers: Ultimate Bug War. I didn't finish Super Meat Boy 3D, but I played enough levels to realize how well it gracefully translated the original game's sadistic side-scrolling thrills into the third dimension. My new life as a parent is just getting started, but at least I put a bow on those titles.
I Test Myself, Within Limits
No one would judge me for spending my limited time solely with the titles I absolutely knew I would love. Heck, I revisited a bunch of old favorite Switch 1 games with the Switch 2's new boost mode. Still, I wanted to push myself out of my comfort zone, to not just fall into a haze of routine. I wanted to keep my curiosity sharp and not lose my taste for the friction that makes many games more enjoyable and enriching.
It took a few weeks, but I played a significant amount of Dread Delusion, an acclaimed indie RPG, but not necessarily something in my usual wheelhouse. Inspired by classic Elder Scrolls games, Dread Delusion tasked me with wandering eldritch environments featuring lo-fi fantasy visuals. I broke the open world into chunks, knocking out just one quest task or section during each session. Those threads collectively wove into a grand adventure full of imaginative concepts and compelling writing.
Similarly, as an unabashed homage to turn-based JRPGs, People of Note was not a game I was thrilled to check out, either. But over time, I grew to admire the music-themed adventure and how regions were creatively inspired by genres like rock and EDM. Likewise, the combat wonderfully emphasized staying on beat and recognizing styles.
However, I knew when a game wasn't really my bag. Sometimes, I found myself wasting precious time that could be better spent, for example, on the baby. There were games I sampled but ultimately gave up, and giving up made the games I stuck with seem even better in comparison.
Screamer (the game, not the infant) had many interesting mechanics for a racing game, including offensive and defensive options that verge on fighting-game territory. But collectively, I found the mechanics too fiddly, and the visual novel story mode disappointed. Shadow Tactics: Blades of the Shogun demanded far too much patience for its brutal stealth action; even cheat codes couldn't save it for me. Demon Tides had a fantastic structure, an open-world platformer with islands to explore like a supersized Bowser's Fury. But the strict controls were too tuned for players obsessed with speed runs. Maybe I could've forced myself to like those titles more with more time, but that's time I no longer have due to parental obligations.
Games Help Me Stay Connected to My Wife and the Zeitgeist
Being in the trenches with a newborn is isolating. It's just me, my wife, and this little potato who needs us for everything. But much of the joy of video games comes from being connected to the larger community through shared play. That connection felt even stronger, made me feel less alone, while playing games in the zeitgeist and staying current with the discourse.
I played the recently released Mouse: P.I. for Hire, and I enjoyed it a bit more than most. It's a little too long, but as a boomer shooter, it eventually gave me awesome weapons and mobility, especially in its creative final stretch. It had far too much talking for my liking, but the old-timey monochrome Mickey Mouse cartoon aesthetic was as visually arresting as Cuphead's, while delivering a much darker, early-20th-century vibe.
I also caught up with a new round of major Switch 2 ports. South of Midnight remained as excellent and underrated as ever, a 2025 game of the year candidate and new modern classic for Black representation in gaming. Kena: Bridge of Spirits was a somewhat generic action title, but well-made and gorgeous. I've only just started Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, but I respect how it's secretly an adventure game. Plus, cracking whips at Nazis is as glorious as you’d expect from the Wolfenstein developers at MachineGames.
Best of all, gaming remained a reliable way to connect with my wife, as we shifted into this new season of our lives. That's something we've cherished since visiting a Barcade in the early days of our relationship. We played through every episode of the superhero workplace dramedy Dispatch, making decisions together. We created the most adorable Pokémon habitats in Pokopia. We recreated our new little family in the Tomodachi Life demo. She watched me play Hitman as we got ready for IO's 007 First Light. We even played baby-themed versions of Wordle.
With a newborn, marital tension is all but inevitable. It's no one's fault; your whole world's been upended. Video games as a bonding activity, a way to make sure we actively held onto each other in the storm of new parenthood, took the hobby from an optional distraction to an essential tool.
Learning to Engage Games in a New Way
Video games are at the forefront of many real-world issues, including studio layoffs and price hikes caused by tariffs and the AI bubble. Having a child drew me even deeper into reality, making me more aware of the world's dangers. However, escapism is inherent to gaming's appeal and shifts your priorities, making you care more about what you spend your time on. It's a lot harder to doomscroll when you're washing a bottle while guilty pleasure reality TV trash plays in the background. So for me, gamer fatherhood has been a beautiful balance of recognizing when and when not to assert agency in my life, grabbing the controller when I can.
My baby is what matters now, and that means sacrifices. But to care for her the best I can, I can't forget myself. I sleep less, but I still rest. I exercise less, but I still eat my vegetables. I play games less, but I still load them up because they nourish me. So instead of being in opposition, my new love and my old hobby are a perfect pairing. My baby is the star of the show, and video games are lovely recurring interludes.
I've only just started this lifelong journey. More changes are in store that will surely change my perspective. Now I must balance family, work, and hobbies. In a few short years, my daughter will outgrow her outfits featuring hand-drawn game characters and hopefully start actually playing games with me. I'll keep her away from GTA VI, but Lego Batman looks promising. I'll never go back to how I was before her birth, including my prior relationship to games. I don't know if I can still tolerate Death Stranding's infant mortality or Resident Evil Requiem's child CPR scene. But a change is not an ending. My baby is my whole world. It makes my heart full that video games, my lifelong friends from my childhood to my adult career, still have a special place in that world, too. With effort, I can have it all.