A Random Thought

You may or may not know that I'm a video game nerd. How often do I play them? Practically never. It's not really tempting. Plus the only console we have is xbox, which is only like 3 years old but now almost as outdated as Nintendo 64 (which was SA-WEET).
So growing up I played a lot of video games. Not because my mom and dad let us just sit around and dink around all day (when we got our Sega Genesis we had to actually log in and out on a piece of paper) but usually when I'd go to friend's houses and stuff we would play for hours, until all hours of the morning.
It all started when we got our first Nintendo when I was like 7 and had no idea what all the hype was about. Until I was a little older and discovered Zelda, which was SOO cool (when I could get it to work...the proven process was to take the game out, blow really slowly, lips pressed to edge of the game, all the way up the game (a tid bit of spit is helpful), replace game before condensation evaporates from the inside, push down, push down again to pop up the game, repeat at least 12 times, wiggle the game side to side at least 4 times while game is in the console then turn it on, rejoice that it worked, and pray that it won't go wonky before you are done playing). Then I was all up in the 3 Mario Brother's, Excite Bike, Master Blaster, Spy Hunter, Friday the 13th (the creepiest game ever. Still scares the crud outta me. Did you ever play that one? You actually try to save other camp children by hunting down JASON who, once you find him, you try to kill him by chucking rocks while he throws machetes at you. Did anyone ever WIN that game??), Bubble Bobble (the innocent game I'd play after Friday the 13th to un-creep me), and anything else I could get my hands on.
But what the heck is with video games these days? What ever happened to beating the bad guy and winning the princess (and pulling vegetables out of the ground to throw at bad guys, what??)? It's SOO not like that any more. And it used to be a no-brainer. You go from the left of the screen until it stops moving all the way to the right, where you would either fight the bad guy or go down another tube to find the bad guy who you had to bop on the head a total of 3 times to kill.
Anyway, I've been hearing that the gaming industry is like the only one not suffering from the recession and is still thriving. And as a mom I'm going, "uuuhhh...are people insane?? Get off your butts and go play outside." But then I remember all the time I spent playing video games and can honestly say I think I have benefitted from them.
What do you think?? Did/do you play video games? Do you think they helped or hindered??
(speaking of "hinder", when the heck are they going to kill off Mohinder on Heroes? Can there be a more annoying character??)