Ever started a quick game and looked up to realize you’ve been playing for hours?
Congratulations, you’ve experienced flow. A state of heightened focus and immersion where time melts away and your senses are heightened. Your reaction times are faster, movements more instinctual and everything in the real world fades into the background. It’s almost like slipping into a trance where your mind and body are in complete harmony.
Flow is what happens when things just click. Athletes call it being “in the zone”. Musicians get lost in the rhythm. Writers watch words effortlessly float onto the page. And gamers? They get sucked into an exciting world with big challenges and bigger rewards. Play the right game and suddenly hours feel like minutes. Players find themselves hooked by a loop of action, reward, and anticipation and end up playing for even longer than they planned.
What is Flow?
Psychologist Mihály Csíkszentmihályi explained flow as a state of deep concentration and total involvement with the activity at hand. In this state, our brainpower is so strong we even forget about hunger, fatigue, and most interestingly, time. It’s a state of mind with a powerful focus where our goal is clear, and every movement, decision, and thought follows inevitably from the last. The result is peak performance and intense feelings of satisfaction.
Video games are engineered to make the experience flow. Perfect challenges push us to our limits and make us push back. Whether that means tackling a difficult level, thinking through a perfect move, or chasing an optimal speed. Our brains love it when we strike the right balance.
When the gaming is good, we feel deeply rewarded and try even harder the next time. It’s the perfect storm of challenge, control, effort, and reward.
Why Games Pull Us In
Thankfully, most video games are actually really good at scratching these itches. Built on challenges and stimulation, as long as you’re playing the right game, you’ll be:
• Challenged: Always something to beat, conquer, and move on to next.
• Instant feedback: Every action has an immediate result, keeping us hooked.
• Creative: Spaced for you to think and opportunities for your ideas to play out.
• Escapism: Be transported to different worlds, offering a break from reality.
How to Maximize Your Flow State
Looking for the best gaming experience? We have you covered.
• Minimize distractions: A quiet space with no interruptions helps you stay immersed.
• Challenge yourself: If a game is too easy, you’ll get bored. If a game is too hard you’ll get frustrated. The key is to find that sweet spot where challenge sits squarely in the middle of skill.
• Set a time limit: Because time flies in flow, use an alarm to keep yourself from losing an entire afternoon.
• Play a game you love: Passion provides the push. If the game excites you, you will play it for love, and for the challenge. This will pull you along in the game from the first stage of play, and ease your entry into the flow state.
Flow Beyond Gaming
The flow state isn’t limited to video games either. Artists, musicians, writers, paramedics, and athletes feel it as well. It’s a singular immersion into whatever you are doing. The more you practice finding flow in games, the easier it will be to find it in other areas of your life.
So, the next time you start up your favourite game, consider the focus and sense of ease you feel. Whether it’s a slow methodical thinker or a test of reflexes and reactions, flow is the proverbial sweet spot where all the best gaming takes place.
Seeking your next flow-filled adventure? Discover the games at Wildz and get lost in the thrill of play!
