Married with young kids and playing GT5? Please share your thoughts here.

[FoolKiller]

Im 18 so i dont really have to worry about children and i can play all day

I'm 31, so I can go to bars and casinos and don't really have to worry about being questioned about my age. I also have a full-time career that pays the bills for the house I live in with my rules, my car I own outright, and never have to worry about a girlfriend again because I am happily married.

And I don't get acne.

I would make the suggestion, however. The same way you get your time off from the kids, you should allow your wives to do the same. Heck, mothers work sooo much. My mom has had it tough, being a single mother and all. She doesn't like these things but I always encourage her to spend time with her friends in order to escape the bill paying, her work, etc.

I've suggested it. She won't do it. All her friends have kids too, so if she goes out she takes the baby so they can make it a playdate. And then that gives me a day of GT5. Even her idea of fun gives me GT5 time.

 

[Geze]

That sounds great. How shall we go about organising it? I would defintely be game but I have no idea how to create an online league. For the previously mentioned reasons I never bothered touching the online part of GT5. Oh, can I add you as a PSN friend?

In later posts in this thread there seems to be already some interest to organize some sort of online action. Let's see what will come out of that. I'd hope that some sort of continuous league could be set up. Oh, and I already added you to my PSN buddies, so that kind of answers your second question

 

[OwensRacing]

/\ Come on you know darn you would trade some acne for a lil of the 19yr old action he is getting..........wait 19yr old gamer prob aint getting any action. hahahaha

hahahahaha I keeed. All respectful fun.

 

[TB]

Chalk me up in the group, too. I'm 33, married and have two boys - 6 and 5 years old. I'm typically home at 5:30pm, eat with the family, go do my son's 30 minute treatment (which is accompanied by either a movie or GT5 - I let them pick), followed by a bath, story and bed around 7:30-8:00pm. My wife has been going to bed around 9:30pm so that leaves me a good hour (which usually stretches to at least 2 hours ) of "me time" which as of late has been evenly distributed between GT5 and whatever catches my eye on Netflix before I head off to bed.

In for DAD racing. Loser Babysits?

I can hardly keep track of the two I have. No one wants to see me with 73.

 

[Ozmondo]

OP describes my situation perfectly, i'm 31, have a 3 month old baby and time is precious.

Buy yourself a baby monitor with video capability. Point the camera at your TV, sit upstairs with your wife+baby, PS3 controller and video receiver and keep an eye on your b-spec that way.

 

[Xavier2342]

OP describes my situation perfectly, i'm 31, have a 3 month old baby and time is precious.

Buy yourself a baby monitor with video capability. Point the camera at your TV, sit upstairs with your wife+baby, PS3 controller and video receiver and keep an eye on your b-spec that way.

 

[FoolKiller]

/\ Come on you know darn you would trade some acne for a lil of the 19yr old action he is getting..........wait 19yr old gamer prob aint getting any action. hahahaha

If I recall, acne played a part in the action I didn't get at 19.

But lets be honest, if he is 18 and has all day to play. He's living with his parents.

I'll stop before I make a MILF joke.

Chalk me up in the group, too.

I wondered when you would make an appearance. Digital Nitrate is on hiatus (technically, on vacation in Colorado) and Neal is having another at this moment (hopefully). That left you as the only other frequently active father-gamer I interact with on here.

 

[axle]

It is good to see so many others in the same boat. 31 and engaged, 2 year old daughter. I work late nights so my gaming time is in the early am or on nights I have off after the little one goes to sleep while the "wifey" is at work. It only gives me a few hours of gaming throughout the week.

I just started to B spec grind. I just get the car leading and let Bob hopefully do the rest. I wouldn't mind jumping in a league, I haven't actively raced in a series since the early days of the WRS on GT3. Back then I could spend hours playing GT3.

 

[TB]

I wondered when you would make an appearance.

Apparently my time to read threads I actually want to read is as limited as my playing time, but better late...

 

[Vmax911]

Great thread. I'm 33 with four kids. Two boys are 7 and 9, two girls are 2 1/2 and 4 months. I've been in a GT5 mood since its the holidays, and have been playing a lot, usually after the kids are in bed (seems to be around 9:00p or so). Typically the evenings are spent with the wife, but she has been wrapped around a few books recently, which equates to GT5 time for me!

My boys love watching me play, and like racing each other in arcade mode. I did make the mistake of trying to play online with them watching once. Of course it just as I got in the room somebody room crashed and decided to let out an expletive. No more online when the kids are up!

 

[FoolKiller]

Apparently my time to read threads I actually want to read is as limited as my playing time, but better late...

And another new member is creating havoc, making TB go, "Squirrel!" mid sentence.

 

[nxp3]

Oh man...I'm such a bad dad to my one year old son. Yesterday I was watching him while the wife was out. I made sure he wouldn't get into too much trouble and went to my room to play GT5. Well he wandered off and I kind of hear him whining a bit. I said I'm going to finish this race and go check on him. It must have been 3-5 minutes and he was crying. So I paused the game and went over. He had somehow got the door to the wash room open and it leads into the garage. Well that door is shut. So he goes into this little room...closes the door behind him and traps himself in there, in the dark. He must have tried severl minutes before calling out for help. And here I was trying to finish a race. He was just balling when I got to him. Poor guy...I'll have to do something nice for him today.

 

[raz_10]

I'm in this group as well, I'm 34 and my son is 13, I need to share the PS3 with him.
I usually get my time in at the end of the week Friday and Saturday I usually play from 11pm to 4am. Sometimes when the missus is working late I get a few hours in of pay.

 

[Gix7Fifty]

To Op
I'm Married/kids/mortgage/dog, wife complains about time I spend playing GT5 but I tell her I'll make it up to her by taking her shopping and out to eat and she is cool with that. I would save the long races (endurance/long championship) for the weekends, wake up early or something. Sometimes Ill come home for lunch and do some of my honeydo's, cut the lawn etc..so I can do other things on the weekend.. probably some grinding. It's funny last night I finally made A-spec 27 and I turned around and told my wife, she was on this laptop and she was like WTF is that supposed to mean,.. lol.

Im sure GT5 has upset a lot of relationships but its cool u came on here for some advice.

 

[Cyberbloke]

I am 39 with a one year old boy. I don't get much gaming time, maybe an hour a night f I'm lucky, but I'm normally too tired to race effectively by the time I get the TV.
For this reason, i have been playing a lot more B Spec than I thought I would.
I look after my boy on my own two dayas a week and get in a couple of hours of B Spec while I'm looking after him. He likes watching the cars go around, an I can give him my full attention when he needs it.

 

[screaminbeagles]

My boys are 3 & 6, I'm 36. Lucky for me, my wife works evenings, 4 days a week. So like others here, race more b-spec than a-spec as I only have a couple hours a night. But after 8, when the bots are down, it's go time. Since my wife works a lot, she doesn't nag. And when she is home, she falls asleep with the boys. Other than that,I just keep on b-spec-ing it while they are awake. Finished a 5 hr enduro race yesterday while at the theatre watching "Yogi Bear"!

 

[wnx_echo0010]

Great thread.

I am 38 and married with a 5 year old boy. My wife totally understands and supports my hobby. I don't play daddy games until my boy is sleeping at ~ 8pm. He and I do enjoy some games together. He likes GT5 and is actually getting decent at slowing down around the corners and staying away from the grass and walls. He only wants to play 2P battle on the high speed ring. He does like the B-Spec as long as he gets to send the commands. I think he micro manages a bit too much .

My wife and I have a good arrangement. A couple of days a week she watches her 'House Wives' and I cook up some laps in the bedroom. Sat and Sun are 100% family time. Every Wed night she heads off to 'girls night' which consist of her and a couple of her friends sitting in a living room gossiping and watching reality TV. Little man and I play games, watch cartoons and eat popcorn and candy. After bed time I get in some quality gaming time.

In total I probably get about 8-10 hrs a week and I consider myself lucky to get that much. Thank you wifey.

 

[RadicalBender]

Ha. Long time lurker. Actually registered to add to the thread.

31, married, two kids, #3 is due within a month or so. It's great to see so many other family men in the same boat. (A:25/B:12)

My son loves cars (he's 1 1/2) so B-spec is actually great for that. I put Bob in an overpowered car, get him to the front and he sits watching with rapt attention while I earn money.

 

[Cyberbloke]

It's great to hear I'm not the only B Spec babysitter on here.

 

[gee_sp0t]

It's great to hear I'm not the only B Spec babysitter on here.

"Who's watching the kids?"

"Bob."

 

[Tartan_special]

Married with a 3 week old girl to tend to in between gt5.
The way I see it is my wife gets to watch all her soaps and crap during the day while I'm at work.
Night time is gt time lol

 

[vuda]

Great thread!
34, Married and 1st child due any day now.
I was quietly thinking about how to manage GT5 playing time after the baby is born but it's good to hear all the dads here are still managing time aside for GT. I'll have to take notes on some of the time management skills here.

 

[Geze]

"Who's watching the kids?"

"Bob."

Last night after short attempt at B-spec, I was telling my wife how Bob really sucks like nothing has sucked ever before, and went on ranting about the unbelievable mistakes and stuff that he makes. Only after letting it out for a few minutes, I realized she had no idea who this "Bob" guy was... Had to do some explaining.

In the end she found it kinda cute that we GT5 players have our own racing "Tamagotchis" to take care of.

 

[Pfei]

I'm 37 with a three-year-old daughter and another one seven months. I manage to play a couple hours a day when they go to sleep. My older daughter loves cars and loves GT. I can't believe that a 3-year-old can do multiple laps without getting bored! I would love to have some more time to play but nothing is more special than spending time with my family.

 

[bdyche]

I am a 32 year-old happily married husband and a dad of a 1 year old adorable girl. I also happen to be an avid Gran Turismo player, have been so since GT1. I arrive home from work every evening at around 6:30pm after which I spend like an hour or so playing with my daughter and feed her dinner. At around 8:00ish we put her in bed and my wife stays with her until she sleeps. The latter process usually takes around half an hour or so and it is only during this time that I get like half an hour of ‘me time’, which I, admittedly, happily spend on GT5.

Obviously, half an hour later, once my daughter is fast asleep, my husband duties come into play, and promptly (not always) I turn off my ps3 and and go to have dinner and watch a movie or TV with my wife. Notwithstanding all this, with an average of one hour a day of play time (weekends included), I somehow managed to reach A-Spec level 20 and B-Spec level 14 but at this rate there is no way I can ever reach level 40, get myself an X2010 or take part in an endurance race anytime soon, if ever.

I am not complaining, mind you, not at all – as much as I love my hobby, I am fully appreciative of the fact that the intrinsic satisfaction of being an active father and husband significantly supersedes the short-lived, albeit huge fun derived from GT5, or any great game for that matter. The reason why I opened this thread is to see whether there are others in a similar situation out there who would like to share their thoughts and/or useful time management tips. Fire away guys!

I'm right here with you, but I've got a 2 year old son and a 1 year old daughter. My wife is pretty good about getting the kids down for a nap just before I get home from work, so I get a little time to play. Sometimes she even watches the kids just to let me play, though that isn't too often. To make things even worse, GT5 is my second hobby - iRacing takes top priority, so once I've got a race in for the week I'll fire up GT5. In an average week I probably get about 10-12 hours between iRacing and GT5.


Depending on yours and your wife's schedule, I'd try and get some racing in during kid nap time on weekends, or maybe work something out that you get a couple of hours free on your day off and you watch your daughter so your wife can have a couple of hours free for herself. With my wife I usually do some housework to earn extra racing time (really just to give myself some freedom to play when I want).

 

[chippy]

I had a blast reading all these posts. Never assumed how many of us are still alive and kicking! Thanks again for making this thread even more worthwile.

As for the Daddy League, bear in mind the respective time zones and all. I, for example, live in Malta which has Central European Time (GMT+1). My guess is to organise various Daddy Leagues depending on continents - for eg 1 for Europe and 1 for North America. Sorry if I missed some other contributors to this thread from other parts of the globe. 👍

Oh, and please make sure to organise them quite ahead of time so that many of us can have the appropriate time to sort out their time-tables accordingly. As of lately, my playing time was consistently B-Spec and havent driven myself for a while. I realised how out of practice I was after testing the Zonda yesterday which H.Potter (my favourite Bob) won for me yesterday. I could barely stay on track for 10 seconds on the 'Ring. Damn those cheeky MRs!!

 

[Eskay]

I have a 4 month old which means Bob is a busy fella. Actually my baby likes to watch the action anyway so its not too bad, sadly it has to be Bob as I don't have four hands and two heads.

A-spec time though is a case of sacrificing sleep time or when my little man is sleeping or the wife has him.

 

[jagsta]

What a good thread for folks in our situation. I'm 35 and the father of two boys, one 22 months, the other is 3 days old! I managed 30 mins of gt last night, but honestly was too tired to enjoy it!

My gt time is strictly evenings after my partner is in bed. I used to manage 2 or 3 hours a night but it'll be a while before that's possible again with a newborn in the house. My gt time is strictly when there's no family stuff to do, although I race best in the mornings not when I'm tired. I'm just glad to be able to get some playing in, there is life after children!

 

[bullie77]

Great thread.

Almost 34 years-old, married, father of a 6 year-old boy, and expecting a boy and a girl for around mid-May. Also have a 8 year-old male dog and a 3 year-old female.

Presently I can't complain about the gaming time I have. Usually get home between 7pm and 7.30pm. Walk the dog's, play a little with the kid (building a Velociraptor model kit at the moment with him), help the wife cook the dinner, wash the dishes (the twins do give her great excuses for passing me these jobs...), play a little bit more with the kid (usually chess - which reminds me I promised him 3 games today) and then I have time to play.

At least until May...

After that, probably my gaming play will become a bit shorter (starting later)...

 

[ilonioum]

27 years old, married, our first baby girl is due in a week. Working till 5pm then doing some work at home, having dinner, watching a movie with my wife and then till 12.30am playing GT5. When there is no chance to play I do B-spec, helps a lot. Recently bought a second TV to be able to enjoy the game a bit more. Thank god my wife understands me and lets me play when i'm into it and she even likes to drive herself, thanks to G27 and the playseat life's good, glad to be married.

A-spec - 22
B-spec - 23