Yeah, I would say 10 years is fair.
I used to play video games all the time, meaning I used to play GameCube games and would be on it constantly. Growing up with all boy cousins video games were a daily activity. I don't know why I stopped - it just kind of happened. I never thought I was too girly or too good for video games per say, I guess I just got a little busy.
After I recently picked up an Xbox One, and started gaming again for the first time in a decade, I had some thoughts.
1. Video games are SO much fun.
Me and my boyfriend have decided to get an Xbox randomly; today we put in Fallout 4 and started playing. I realized that it is a post-apocalyptic map of my current city, and it made me way more intrigued by the game. There isn't anything more fun than that.
2. They seem to have gotten a lot cheaper.
We got a used console, controller and like 5 games for $250. I mean, it's still pretty expensive, but I remember them costing 2 weeks worth of food, or maybe that was just what my parents made it seem like.
3. They're one of the best things to do when you're bored.
It doesn't happen often, but when you end up not being busy for more than an hour, video games could be the perfect thing. Sometimes you don't want to watch a movie, read a book, or even talk to anyone else. I deprived myself of the chance to play video games because I just didn't think they were worth the time. (They so are.)
4. Being an adult, the fear of being a couch-dwelling-chip-eating-lazy-person forever is now gone.
It was probably because of the stereotype of kids playing too many video games contributing to a whole failure of a life. But that never happened to me and, well, most of the people I knew who played video games. We're all adults now - we can enjoy video games without going too overboard with them. If we didn't pay our utilities, we couldn't play any games.