Video games and Dreaming

I have found that using video games, along with a combination of some other methods can produce some very good results.

First, pick a game( :bored: ). I find that first-person games work best, especially if you can see some part of your character or vehicle. However, right now I am playing GTA: Vice city on the PS2. This game works very well for me, and my dreams have rarely contained any violence (although there were hookers :spinning: ). Anyway, play the game for a couple of hours at night (don’t forget the reality checks), then shut it off and go to bed. You can use WILD here if you want, but I like to save if for later.

Wake up 5 or 6 hours later. I like to check for new posts on this(reality check) forum, then play the game for about 30(reality check) mins then go back to bed. As sort of a side-note, if you are using a game that will make ambient sounds (cars, people, animals…ect.) I suggest leaving it on (GTA is great for this…just stand by a busy intersection). I have my PS2 sound going through my stereo so I can shut my tv off and still hear the sound, but that’s not necessary. As you lie in bed, visualize the game. Now, I don’t have any difficulty visualizing very vivid scenes, but I know that some people do. Even if you can only see one or two things, focus on them. They will cause you to eventually remember more and more, and you will be able to piece something together. It is a memory exercise and it takes time to develop it (or maybe I have spent too much time playing video games… :eek: ). Focus on minute details of the world. You can make some up if you want, but try and stay within the framework of the game. I find that focusing on the smallest things can sometimes have the biggest impact. It seems to make the transition from your bed to your dreamworld easier. Almost like a distraction so your mind can slip it all by you without you noticing. Eventually you will be dreaming away in the world you have chosen. Of course you might not be lucid, that in itself requires practice as most of you know all too well, but it is still a very fun experience. Once you develop your lucidity skills the fun can really begin… :devil: .

Anyway, I recommend that people try this. Whether you love video games, or don’t play at all…try it. There are tons of great games out there for all different tastes. Some of my favorites are Black&White(pc), Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind(pc), Silent Hill :eek: (ps2), Kingdom hearts(ps2), Medal of Honor: Frontline(ps2), GtaIII&Vice City(ps2). I would really like to hear from anyone else who uses video games for inducing dreams. What games are your favorites for which types of dreams?

What happpend there? I wanted to edit my post…(reality check)…hmmm, guess i just hit the wrong button. How do I delete this?

though Ive never thought about doing it like that, I have had many dreams that were about what game i playen last, GTA:VC (being chased my the FBI), BattleCruiser (flying my shipinto battle), and Battlefield 1942. But i find myself becomeing part of the game, most of time I enjoy it, nothing like seeing a ling of tanks wipe out your enemy tropps…

Great tips though

:confused:tupid: I had a dream about Battlefield 1942 also. It happened one night after I had been playing online for 4 or 5 hours. I don’t remember too much, but I remember seeing three bomber planes lined up side-by-side. I said to myself that it was strange to see three together and that maybe I was dreaming. I think that what kept me from becoming lucid was the way people were acting. I remember trying to get into the planes but the other people who were playing kept stealing them from me and wouldn’t let me in (which was happening a lot while i was playing online that night). Interesting…thanks for the reply, Unforgiven. Try what I suggested and let me know what happens.

I’ve had so many Metal Gear dreams, I think I lost count. :smiley:

Also, if you can see your character, it’s third person, not first, but that’s a nitpick. :slight_smile:

there are no nits here…i said only part of the character (hands, weapon, ect…) not the whole character :crazy:

thanks anyway, though…I think I will go rent Metal Gear 2.

:shrug: I thought this thread might be a little more popular. Doesn’t anyone play video games??

Anyway, I had some strange dreams after playing GTA:VC and leaving it on while I slept. I only remember two of them though (maybe because of all the weed I smoked yesterday…). In the first one, I remember getting up and walking into my kitchen. I got a drink, or something, and headed back to my room. I stopped before I went through my door and “passed some gas” :blush: …but it wouldn’t stop. It lasted for more than a minute. It was really loud, and I was scared that it was going to wake up my family. Then I woke up, and there was a bus parked infront of where my character in the game was standing. No lucidity in this one.

In the second one, it felt almost like I had a cold or something. It felt like I needed to blow my nose. When I did a whole bunch of blood came out. The blood was really wierd. It was pretty much normal color (…red :bored: ), but it had a gel-like consistancy. Also, it didn’t appear to make a mess on anything except the toilet paper I was blowing my nose on. Which seemed weird since there was so much coming out. Anyway, I started thinking that the blood may be coming out of my lungs instead of my nose. I got really paranoid. My mom was there and she asked what was wrong. I told her that my nose was bleeding, but she said that it wasn’t. I insisted that it was, and I blew it again to show her. This time it was normal. I thught this was strange, but went with it. Then, I walked away from her and blew it again and it was all blood…I think that this one had a quite a few things behind it. The only one I can really link to the game is the strange-looking blood. No lucidity in this one either, but I am beginning to noticeand question strange happenings while I am dreaming. I am almost there :content: .

Just thought I would share these with you. For no real reason other than to add another reply to my thread.

I had one Counter-Strike dream, 2 BattleField dreams, and 1 Morrowind dream. They were all sooooo much fun! :content:

yeah, i haven’t been playing games for a while, but i feel like it would definitely be a good way to incubate a dream, because if i play games anywhere near going to bed, my mind is just buzzing with it… something about video games: either i can’t sleep, or i’ll be dreaming about it like mad.

by the way, my game is Super Smash Bros.
snoodgens.
ian

i often have dream assosisated with video games. Particularly new games.

If a new game is good i can play it for hours 12 sometimes, i get so involves that the RW just seems to dissapear and i become so focused on the game it’s almost a meditative state.

then i usually dreams about the game. GTA3 & Vice city, Wrestling and 1st person games are the most common for me.

many times i have found myself having dreams of being in world war 2 or something similar the strange thing at the time i never really looked into the wars, and all i knew was anything i got at school. Since then the only war dreams i had was Medal of Honor related.

How about a game environment based on the lucid crossroads?
Some custom sounds/music could be used and then played while sleeping to reinforce the effect. I might do this for my own use if I can find the time and can be bothered. To do this properly would take ages, but a rough recreation could be cobbled together from the third party models and textures which seem to be available for some the most popular PC games.

Its funny you should mention this, because I had a lucid dream for the first time 3 nights ago after playing xbox. Although I do this every night, I had a dream I was the master chief from Halo. I did not gain lucidity from reality checks or dream signs, but from common sense. I just thought to myself that this is not possible. After becoming lucid and killing some convenant scum, I woke up. It was really short, but it was so fun. I suggest this method for alot of people.
That night that I got the lucid dream, I also burnt some incense(sp?)for the first time. They were cherry scented if anybody is wondering. Maybe I’ll try GTA: Vice City tonight, or Morrowind. If I become lucid Ill share! Goodnight!

noone else has anything to share? :sad:

I played Resident Evil: Zero on the Gamecube the other day and had a really cool dream(some might call it a nightmare…but it was cool). It was quite long and very vivid.

I am walking my dog through a forest near my house. I stop for a moment to look around at the trees and animals as I always do when I am there. However, things definately don’t look as they normaly do. The sky is filled with big dark clouds, which I find strange since the sun had been out just seconds ago. I see a very large moon peeking out through the clouds. It has a weird face on it, like some crazy elf or something. Then, it turns and looks right at me. It says something to me, but has a strange voice and I can not make out any words. Suddenly I think to myself, “where is the dog?”. So I look down where she had been and see that she is gone. Fear strikes me as I think she may have been attacked by a zombie. I take a moment to think, and wonder why there would be zombies? I say to myself, “probably came from the graveyard.” (there really is a cemetary on one side of this forest) Quickly, (very quick…almost instantly) I make my way to the graveyard. First thing I see is an eerie yellow glow and lots of mist. I get scared and want to run away, but I know I must save my dog. I start calling to her, but she does not come. Then, out of the corner of my eye I see her tail wagging. I look at her and am very happy to see that she had not been hurt. Then I wonder about the zombies again. I wonder where they are. Suddenly, we are surrounded by them. I try to count them but for some reason I can’t. “I forget how to count”, I say to myself. I figure that it must be because I was bitten by a zombie. Just then I get a really strange feeling all over my body. I feel my head and find that the top is missing and I am bleeding all over myself. My brain falls out (not sure why, I was standing straight up) and I see that there is a bite out of it. I try to run again, but there is a something holding me back. I look up at the moon again and see that it has strings attached to all of the zombies. It is laughing maniacally and shouting things. However, this time I can understand it’s strange voice. It is shouting about how it is going to rule the world with it’s “evil army”. I thought, “I guess that means me and these others.” I find out very quickly that I am wrong. We are all being led to field at one end of the graveyard. There are a bunch of large boxes in the field. As we get closer the boxes turn into cages and I see that there are some very large creatures in them. I can not see them clearly, but know they are scary looking. Then, the moon says something in a different voice that I don’t understand and the creatures break out of their cages. The moon then cuts the strings and leaves us to the creatures. I try running after the moon, but know I won’t catch up since I am probably being chased by creatures. Sure enough, I look back and there are four of them after me. I keep running. I try to call for help, but since I am a zombie all that comes out is a weird groan. The last thing I feel is one of the creatures pouncing on my back :eek: .

Well, did anyone read all that ?(if not, i don’t blame you) No lucidity in it, but a good one nonetheless. I woke up scared half to death.

I haven’t really been into video games since the halcyon days of the Amiga (and the C64 before that!), but I can appreciate how powerfull they could be when combined with dreams. After all, video games (and movies) must rely on a similar part of the brain active in dreams to make their impossible alternative worlds seem real and engrossing. Actualy, I did have the opportunity to play Grand Theft Auto a bit… well, quite a bit to be honest, and it scared me just how much the game was able to infiltrate my thoughts. For instance, catching myself absent-mindedly assessing how difficult each oncoming car would be to ram into, while actually driving down a busy road, was definitely a Bad Thing. I gave up playing it the day (about a year ago now, I guess) that I heard a German student had walked into his high school and shot his teachers - and I had just spent the morning delighting in shooting random people in the game. Didn’t make me feel too good, really.
The first post mentioned the violence in the games not crossing over to the dreams…is that the same for everybody? Or is it part of the attraction?

I play games a lot and have had dreams where I am both the person playing the game and the character in the game being played but I have never, to my recollection, dreamed about an actual game that I’ve played before.

Which is too bad because Homeworld would have made some fantastic dreams.

I wish I would dream about space more often. I haven’t since I was a little kid.

One specific game taht has to do with dream imagery is “American McGee’s Alice”. It’s a dark twisted version of “alice in wonderland”. It is full of strange and weird encironment and creatures. And the ambient sound is amazing too. Wince it’s specifically about dreaming/ hallucinating, it might help. But the only thing is, it’s a third person view. And since it’s pretty dark, it might give u nightmares…but i doubt it though…it’s not scary :content: You can download the full version from kazaa. Or if u wanna try it out, give the demo a try. If you’re still hesitating, check out the website, it gives u a good feel for what the game is about. Good luck! here’s the website alice.ea.com/main.html
:wink:

the only dreams that involve games that i can remember where doom 2, age of empires(though it was in first person view and i was the head of a entire army of egyptains going to attack the greek) ,splinter cell and dungeon keeper 2 (had to fight the enermy horned reaper and lost to it)

I had dream about Splinter Cell last night, I was crouched behind a dumpster, hiding from these three guys trying to kill me… then I suddenly realized what the hell I was doing and created a better dream scenario.

So, Splinter Cell helped me become lucid.

Anyone else…?

I like video games ALOT. Iv’e had lotsa dreams about them, though none brought lucidity they where still fun.
I had one which was a combination of Vice City with Dynasty Warriors 3, I was a general and I was being taken to battle via helicopter, the helicopter’s radio station was set on Flash FM, we arrived at the battle and started to engage in combat.
I also had one about Kingdom Hearts, I was Sora and I was jumping on these strange creatures and collecting coins from them.
I wonder though, has anyone had a lucid dream from the 3rd person, like a game? you walk to an object and pick it up, you see yourself picking the object up, but you also fell it’s weight in your hand? that would be a weird experience…