Games are family, there to Inspire or Comfort in times of need and never Judge. It's helped me numerous times over the years when I had my first Kidney Transplant which has been going well for 13 years now. Thanks to Video Games it helped me remain calm under pressure dealing with logistical situations and gave me a positive outlook on life. I must say I feel privileged and humbled to have played hundreds of games over the many years since being introduced to "Pacman" on the Atari and look forward to many many years more. Based on the upcoming title being released, it is looking like a promising future for gamers and I'm glad to have been apart of it and appreciate GOG efforts in bringing these titles to the Storefront. Crossing my fingers for a possible release of maybe "Prehistoric Kingdom" or "Humankind" on GOG.

Spoiler for Planescape: Torment


Halfway through the game, an NPC asks you a question. It's a philosophical issue that has been a theme throughout the previous hours of gameplay, and there are probably more than a dozen answers to pick from. But it's a completely false choice: the NPC just says something like, "Huh, figures that you'd choose that" and carries on.

But it is a great choice because it mattered to me, the player. It mattered that I considered it very carefully, and picked the answer I thought was best. It taught me that choices don't have to have gameplay consequences, or even story consequences, to be great choices. If the player is immersed enough, the act of making the choice is consequence enough.

This is an experience only interactive media can provide, and has probably encouraged me to try all sorts of weird indie walking simulators. And in tabletop RPGs, I now take great satisfaction in creating fun backstories even if nobody else reads them.

I think the most important and helpful lesson I've learned from videogames this last year has been that devotion is a bad for business.

I've learned a lot of english and discovered you can fit a whole ladder in your pockets :).

I learned from Fallout: New Vegas that "truth is...the game was rigged from the start". Such a great line ripe for interpretation beyond the obvious sense. Rigged in a meta sense talking about the videogame? Or a metaphor for life itself? Anyway, thanks for doing the very cool giveaway.

As a gamer with a disability I've to teach myself how to find games that I could access and not be bothered when games I want to play aren't accusable. I've found the same is true for other day to day activities. Sometimes this patience reveals new ways to access what I thought was out of reach.

everything is a choice

I learned the Hexedecimal System when playing Might and Magic 4-5 and Heroes of Might and Magic as a kid in the 90ies. I wanted to have better Stats and learned that FF = 255 and that's the max Strength. and as for gold FFFF was possible 65535. one coin more and it flipped over and -1 happened :) Never forgot hexedecimal and got my Nickname in that time ;)

I've learned to not bother entering contests on GOG. There's a chance they won't actually pick winners, and if they do pick winners, they might not actually give them the prizes, or they'll give the prizes to scammers.

It's really a lose, lose lose.

Sometimes it's best to walk away from a problem for a while and return later with fresh eyes.

Eh, might as well enter...

Probably the first thing games helped me with was English. Then again, admittedly with some aid from Cartoon Network (untranslated at the time), it was the computer in general that turned my initial very negative reaction to having to learn another language in school into diving right into it (and eventually ending up being far more comfortable with it than with Romanian, usually thinking in it and at times having difficulty when I talk to someone from here and have to translate my thoughts back...), but with no Internet for the first several years of having a computer and the English seen on it otherwise just being the UI and instructions of programs, it was games that offered a much broader scope, the general use terms.

The most important thing I've learnt from video games, especially old RPGs, is that you gotta keep trying, and that's the only way you can succeed.

I have developed really good eye-hand coordination and that has saved me from dropping / losing important small items from my hands. USB keys, tiny Torx Screws, keys, glasses, etc.
:)

Spiritfarer has taught me that when my friends and family die, I'll be designated the role of afterlife master chef and spend a great chunk of my time constantly cooking their favorite meals for them aboard some cruise ship I helped build. As a reward, I'll be given a cat that does not need to be fed. :P

In all seriousness, Spiritfarer did make me reflect about my personal relationship with past regrets and unfinished business. It was a quote (about dying) from one of the island inhabitants that jolted me: "Leaving what could have been is sometimes harder than leaving what has been."

That there's always time to have some fun and never take life too seriously.