The Tetris Effect or When Games Get Stuck In Your Head

[aimeeandbeatles]

I commented about this on the raves thread. I figure that this would actually probably go in All Other Games but I'm not too familiar over there and I'm more familiar with the Tavern to be honest. So I'd appreciate it if it stayed here. Thank you.

Anyways on TV Tropes (WARNING WARNING WARNING) there's a name for it, The Tetris Effect, where you play a game long enough and when not playing it you start seeing it all over the place. Anyways has this ever happened to you and, any funny stories?

Here is mine. You guys know Ive been playing Portal. A lot. I was in a grocery store. And then I thought, I put a portal here, a portal there, and then double-fling through I will end up in the produce section because my mother wanted me to get potatoes or something (which rather amuses me, after what happened in the sequel). Then I forgot at the last moment I did not have a portal gun and then I fell down.

So what are your funny stories.

 

[GinandTonic]

Doom 2 made me sidestep in multi-story carparks.

 

[Antilogic]

I tend to hum music from games. But turn-based stuff just doesn't lend itself as well to the tetris effect as FPS or driving games, etc.

 

[Synobun]

This has never occurred to me.

 

[Save_Ferris]

I've tried double-jumping on numerous occasions, none of them ending too well.

 

[red_elk]

I was spotting tetris figures on apartment buildings (windows where light was on). And checking where I should place them.

 

[Mr. Dictator]

Playing Minecraft can make things...interesting.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

I occasionally dream about either playing Test of Time on a vastly different set of worlds (still SF, still alien, really cool) - or of actually being one of the units in a Civ game. That's seriously scary when you're about to be killed by superior tech thrown at you by a pissed-off alien AI.

Second instance: A long time ago I started playing Count of Monte Cristo (a Big Fish Games Hidden Objects game). I got addicted to it - the story, the graphics, the music... anyway, I got intrigued enough to wonder about the book it was based on. So finally I tracked down the unabridged version of The Count of Monte Cristo, and it's on my To Read list (btw, for those who can read French, it's available free from Project Guttenberg).

 

[madviking]

I play a game in my mind. It's called life.

 

[CKS]

I quite often play frac4d (a four-dimensional tetris-like game) in my dreams. Somehow I never manage to clear any levels while dreaming, though.

 

[Zelig]

I get it after the playing the Riddick games - every time I walk through a door/around a corner my instinct is to shoot out all the visible lights in order to plunge the area into darkness.

 

[Azale]

I've had internal dialogue wheels after playing too much Mass Effect. It was really weird.

 

[Kozmos]

Playing chess every day for hours with my friend made us see people as figures and I had a tendency to approach them in L-shaped maneuvers.

 

[Glassfan]

Playing chess every day for hours with my friend made us see people as figures and I had a tendency to approach them in L-shaped maneuvers.

I was a real chess-fanatic in my youth. I had dreams where I saw moves-ahead and end-game play. But with video games it's always been the music - I still pick up snatches of Firefox or Xevious when I'm nodding-off.

 

[ParkCungHee]

I find myself turning corners after checking the opposite direction first, then stepping along the inside angle, from playing too much TF2.

 

[holy king]

i'm banned from vienna zoo because i always jump on their turtles.

 

[The_J]

(WARNING WARNING WARNING)

didn't work, there goes my time .


More ontopic: Had that effect with C&C Red Alert. On every map I saw at that time I planned my basis and attack routes.
Thought I also dreamed of Diable and Fallout, and at least once also from CFC .

 

[_random_]

When I was on a serious Skyrim kick, I was about to make a somewhat risky decision, and I figured I'd just save first and load again if things didn't work out.

At that point I decided to stop playing Skyrim for a while.

 

[Dachs]

I listen to video game music all the time.

So I hum video game music all the time.

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

didn't work, there goes my time .

When I was on a serious Skyrim kick, I was about to make a somewhat risky decision, and I figured I'd just save first and load again if things didn't work out.

At that point I decided to stop playing Skyrim for a while.

One time IRL I made a mistake and immediately went to look for the reload button. That didn't work.