Note from Connor: Um, I've seen some very serious gripes on some gamesites about this test. (Apparently because they failed to be scored as a Hardcore Gamer or some such other nonsense.) All I've got to say is: Get a grip on reality, losers, or at least get some brains…this is supposed to be fun, not like, totally serious or something… Personally, I scored as a Casual Gamer, and I consider myself to be pretty damn dedicated to playing. (And I've been around since the days of Pong…) So just remember - take the challenge, but remember to take it with a grain of salt! (Geez! What morons some people are, eh?) Have fun! :)

General obsession
(1 point each - possible total: 110 points with bonus)

The following are the character traits, material possessions, and general knowledge that all hardcore gamers must have. There's nothing too embarrassing here, just sinple, obsessive behavior familiar to all serious gamers.

01. You have a definite favorite: Nintendo, Sega, or Sony
02. You have a definite favorite: Intellivision or Atari 2600
03. It's impossible for you to understand how anyone could like Nintendo games
04. It's impossible for you to understand how anyone could like Sega games
05. It's impossible for you to understand how anyone could like Sony games
06. There are no less than three videogame systems ready to play in your house right now
07. You remember Alan Alda's Atari 400 commercials
08. There are at least four peripheral controllers going unused in your home
09. You bought an arcade-style controller just to play Street Fighter at home
10. At one point, you had a Sega CD and 32X plugged into your Genesis
11. There are portable game machines stashed throughout your house
12. You've owned a set of VR glasses
13. You quickly realized that good VR in gaming is not yet a reality
14. You've played Dactyl Nightmare
15. You own a videogame soundtrack
16. You bought a bigger TV just for your games
17. There is a switch box hooked to your TV for quick changes between consoles
18. You've built a custom rack just for your games
19. There's a room in your house known at the "game room"
20. You own a Game Shark
21. You collect Game Shark codes
22. You've brought a tip sheet to the arcade
23. You've played at least three Sega Model 3 arcade games
24. You were once considered the Street Fighter king/queen of your arcade
25. You take the time to put in real high-score initials - not just AAA (1 bonus point: it's a code name like MAK or IOC)
26. You've never played Killer Instinct and never will
27. You've built some device that would allow you to push the buttons faster in Track and Field
28. You've tried using slugs in an arcade machine (1 bonus point: you made it work)
29. You've been to a Sega GameWorks
30. You've taken a road trip to a really good arcade
31. While driving a real car, you've pretended to be in a driving game (1bonus point: you got a ticket because of it)
32. You know the heads of all the AM departments
33. You know Shigeru Miyamoto's complete gameography (1 bonus point: you own his complete gameography)
34. You know at least one producer from Sega, Sony, and Nintendo
35. You know at least five enemies in the Mario series
36. You know the name of the PlayStation-based arcade board and who uses it
37. You know which arcade boards Virtua Racing, Daytona USA, and Super GT were made for, respectively
38. You can hum the tune to the original Super Mario game in its entirety
39. You know the difference between the regular Sonic music and the invincible Sonic music
40. You can recite the Konami code from memory
41. You know the FMV endings by heart for every Tekken 2 character (1 bonus point: you consider them important cinema)
42. You know what Nintendo means
43. You know what Sega stands for
44. You can name the presidents of all the major videogame companies
45. You know the major and minor differences in Mortal Kombat for SNES and Genesis
46. You've tried to design your own game, only to find out that the idea would never work
47. You've programmed at least one game no matter how basic (or BASIC as the case may be)
48. You've designed your own level for Quake (1 bonus point: it was more fun than any of the original levels)
49. You've sent in a game idea to a publisher (1 bonus point: they called you for a job interview)
50. You can do a fireball, dragon punch, and a flash kick without looking at a move list or ever messing it up
51. You've sent your resume to a game company
52. You've sent your own review to a videogame magazine (1 bonus point: If it was published)
53. You've written an FAQ for any game
54. You've written an angry letter to Senator Lieberman
55. You complained to Sega about switching to cardboard boxes for Genesis games
56. You've sent away for a free T-shirt of patch from a game
57. You preordered Final Fantasy VII and stood in line to pick it up on the day it arrived in the store
58. You've called at least one tip line and known more about the game than the person supposedly helping you
59. You've ever put your own statistics, including your name, into NBA Live
60. While putting yourself into NBA Live, you've lied to give yourself an advantage in height, weight, etc.
61. You've played on at least one online gaming site
62. You spend more time playing games than watching TV or listening to music
63. You have all the Tekken 2 sub-bosses saved on a special and permanent memory card
64. You buy the new GameDay or Madden every season
65. You've exchanged a good Christmas gift for a game you didn't get
66. You've played Tomb Raider until you needed a bandage for your thumb, then played some more 67. You've rented a notoriously bad game just to make fun of it
68. You've ordered at least three Japanese import games and altered your system in some way so that you could play them (1 bonus point: you damaged your machine while trying to alter it)
69. You can convincingly pretend to never have been excited about the possibilities of FMV in gaming
70. You know who/what the Coconut Monkey is
71. You remember Crack Down
72. You've read Game Over or Phoenix and refer to them often
73. You've left a game on overnight because it couldn't be saved
74. You've gotten yourself into trouble at school or work for playing games at an inappropriate time
75. You organized the first multiplayer game ever in your office
76. You've formed your own Quake or Diablo clan
77. You've spend more time downloading a game demo than actually playing it
78. You've called a videogame company for information on a new game
79. You've started your own fan web site for a game or system 80. You know all the IGN affliliate web sites
81. You have your own IGN affiliate web site
82. You actually check the archives on videogame web sites
83. You have videogame bumper stickers on your car
84. You still have a Jaguar sticker on your car
85. You've read a game manual for a new game on the way home from the store (1 bonus point: you were driving)
86. You've made a major videogame purchase with money slated for something more important, like a college fund
87. You believe there is nothing more important - especially not a college fund
88. You've been blacklisted for returning too many games to Electronics Boutique
89. You argued that EA Sports games were far superior on Genesis than SNES
90. You've blamed a videogame loss on a faulty controller
91. You ever hopelessly longed for a game pictured on a console box, only to be disappointed by its failure to make it to market
92. You've used the work "paradigm" in a videogame discussion
93. You've mentally played Tetris with real-world objects
94. You've played an action game until your eyes dried out from not blinking
95. You've been polite to a nongamer in a discussion about Myst
96. You developed a new passion for techno music from playing Wipeout
97. After deciding you can't win in a racing game, you turn your car around to sabotage the race leaders
98. No matter how many times you've played it, you still prefer the original Super Mario Kart over the N64 version
99. You fell in love when you found out Samus Aran was a woman
100. You've never read a videogame manual (unless it was while driving home)

Challenge Level
(1 point each - possible total: 55 points with bonus)

More game-specific, the following section gauges your dedication, skill, and game-playing stamina. These are the game challenges that separate the real players from the casual users and the hardcore from the lightweights.

01. After finding all 120 stars in Super Mario 64, you kept playing, just in case there was a 121st, or Luigi, or just to look around more (1 bonus point: you loaned a 120 star save to friends so they could explore)
02. There is at least one pad of graph paper in your house filled with sketches of level designs
03. You know Guile's "handcuff" trick
04. You have more than 10,000 career Quake frags
05. You know the Quake routes for every level
06. You've made your own Quake skin
07. You've played Quake with just the ax
08. After beating Tomb Raider you went back and found all the useless secrets
09. You can fight a sophisticated (not button-mashing) battle with every Virtua Fighter character
10. You've played more than 100 multiplayer matches of Command & Conquer
11. You know all the lyrics in PaRappa the Rapper by heart (1 bonus point: you sing them at inappropriate times)
12. You received an "A" on every level in Nights
13. You've successfully navigated all the shortcuts in San Francisco Rush
14. You've placed first on all the tracks in WaveRace 64 (forward and reversed)
15. You've played a whole season of World Series Baseball despite a miserable record
16. You've charted the moon gates in an Ultima game
17. You've played every Bard's Tale
18. You've broken the backboard in the original Dr. J vs. Larry Bird
19. You know the automatic goal move in NHL Hockey and in what version it was removed
20. You can figure out the pattern to any 16-bit boss in less than two minutes
21. You've finished at least one Infocom text adventure
22. You know which Infocom games support "oops" and "x" and which don't
23. You've blocked an extra point in the original Madden, only to see the point be given to the opponent's team anyway
24. You know the Bo Jackson automatic touchdown play in Tecmo Bowl
25. You've ever successfully used the "Bloodlust" spell in WarCraft II
26. You can play Tetris until it ceases to become harder, and you only quit when you get bored
27. You've been involved in a Bomberman four-way spoil (1 bonus point: you initiated the spoil)
28. You know all the secret character codes in the original NBA Jam
29. You could still get 100% shooting percentage in every bonus level of Galaga
30. You've successfullly fought the dogs that crash through the window in Resident Evil (as opposed to running away)
31. You can effectively use two guns at once in Virtua Cop
32. You know the 99-second cheat in the original Track and Field
33. You know when not to use hyperspace in Asteroids (1 bonus point: you condiser it a mystical power)
34. You've seen all the cut scenes in Ms. Pac-Man
35. You've successfully bred a healthy Norn in Creatures and kept it alive long enough to breed it again
36. You always let a few Lemmings die to hear them scream, but never enough to lose the level
37. You've beaten at least one first-person shooter that wasn't developed by Id
38. You know what Shun Di's drinking does for his abilities
39. You've played through FFVII more than three times
40. You've finished all of the Final Fantasy games released in the U.S.
41. You've finished at least one import Final Fantasy game not officially brought to the U.S.
42. You've finished all the Final Fantasy import games despite the fact you don't know Japanese
43. You've beaten at least three rented games without returning them late
44. You've beaten more than one game on the very first day
45. After beating a game, you played it all over again just to see if you could beat it faster
46. You've earned enough free lives in a game to give yourself enough time for a bathroom break
47. You understood the opening cinematics for Panzer Dragoon I or II
48. You've entered and won a videogame competition of any kind (1 bonus point: you won more than $100)
49. You play all your favorite games on the hardest setting
50. You've taken a picture of a high score or made a videotape of an especially good videogame performance

Endurance is key
(possible total: 10 points)

Sometimes all it takes is the sheer willpower to just keep playing. The following mile markers are for the hardcore only. (Give yourself only the points for the goal that matches your best performance.)

You've ever played a game for:
Six hours straight (2 points)
Eight hours straight (4 points)
10 hours straight (6 points)
12 hours straight (8 points)
more than 12 hours straight and then had to call in sick to work due to lack of sleep (10 points)

What's in your closet?
(1 point each - possible total: 20 points)

One of the easiest ways to determine how much of a hardcore gamer you are is by tallying all the videogame systems you've called your own. You're not a hardcore gamer unless you've owned:
1. 3DO
2. Amiga
3. Arcade Game
4. Atari VCS / 2600
5. Atari 5200
6. Atari 7800
7. Colecovision / Adam
8. Intellivision
9. Neo Geo
10. NES
11. SNES
12. Nintendo 64
13. Odyssey 2
14. Pong / Pong clones
15. Sega Genesis
16. Sega Master System
17. Sega Saturn
18. Sony PlayStation
19. TurboGrafx-16
20. Vectrex

We're a little concerned if…
(1 point each - possible total: 40 points with bonus)

Fun is fun, but the following examples push the limits of ordinary obsession to a worrisome level. Score a lot of points in this section and you know you're hardcore.

01. The first thing you do with a new game is check out ALL the options
02. You've beaten a novice in any game by as much as you possibly can because you just couldn't stand the idea of going easy on them, then bragged mercilessly about the victory, just to be cruel.
03. You've become arch rivals with another player in the arcade by high-score initials only
04. You've deliberately defied a parental order not to go to the arcade or play games at home because you knew games were worth the potential punishment
05. You've ever been waiting outside of a closed arcade when the owner shows up to open shop
06. You've shopped around for a better token exchange rate
07. You've lied to an attendant to get a free game at an arcade
08. You've spent more than $500 on a single arcade game
09. You consider payday and game-buying day to be synonymous
10. You've used a videogame to predict the outcome of a real sports game (1 bonus point: you've bet money on the outcome)
11. You've bet more than $100 on a videogame competition (1 bonus point: you won)
12. You've considered dropping out of school or quitting a job to join the Professional Gamers League
13. You failed a class because of spending too much time playing games
14. You were excited by Mortal Monday
15. You know exactly what you were doing on Sonic Tuesday
16. You noticed Lara lost weight from the original Tomb Raider to Tomb Raider II
17. You've tried to find hidden naughty bits in any game
18. You've bought a special case of beer for a night of gameplaying with friends
19. You've wished you could get in the Game Players' "box" or drink a beer with Bill Donohue
20. You worried about Sonic's career after he was excluded from Knuckle's Chaotics
21. You think videogame characters have careers
22. You eat Donkey Kong or Sonic spagettios on a regular basis
23. You've written fan fiction based on a game
24. You know all the bios for all the game magazine editiors
25. You have memorized and can quote the Donkey Kong Country vs. Mortal Kombat argument from the movie Billy Madison
26. You buy even the worst game magazines just to be sure you won't miss anything
27. You saw either the movie Swingers or Mall Rats just because you heard there was some videogame footage in them
28. You still think Saturn has a chance to overtake PlayStation and N64
29. You own a PlayStation link cable and have used it
30. After buying the SNES version of Mortal Kombat, you bought the Genesis version just to get the blood
31. You've broken at least one controller by slamming it on the floor in frustration
32. You're saving unopened games for collector's value (1 bonus point: some of them are actually worth money)
33. You've ever dreamed the solution to a videogame puzzle, only to find out in the morning that you were right
34. You've ever dreamed that you were in a videogame
35. You think it was a bad idea for Next Generation to give a cover to Blasto
36. You've ever thought that you had some kind of problem because you loved games so much
37. You wonder why Timothy Hutton is on the box for A Mind Forever Voyaging

Social life suffers
(1 point each - possible total: 40 points with bonus)

It's one thing to spend your free time playing games, but when your passion for games starts interfering with your normal social life, that's when you join the ranks of the hardcore.

01. You've pretended to like someone just for their games (1 bonus point: you actually learned to like them)
02. You've convinced yourself a girl was attractive just because she liked videogames
03. You've broken a date to finish a game that could've easily been finished after the date
04. You've talked your date into watching you play a game (1 bonus point: you actually got her interested)
05. You've taken a date to an arcade and not left when she got bored
06. You would drive further to find a Virtua Fighter 3 machine than you ever would to meet a date
07. You've failed an ultimatum from a girlfriend in favor of videogames ("It's either me or that game tonight." "Well, I guess I'll call you tomorrow then.")
08. You've ever put on a videogame just for background noise when guests come over
09. You make your dinner decisions by what arcade games the restaurants have in their lobbies
10. You've ever snuck into E3 (1 bonus point: if more than once)
11. You've ever driven a really long way, only to be turned away at the doors of E3
12. You've used vacation days to visit a game company headquarters, knowing full well you wouldn't get any further than the parking lot
13. You've taken your PlayStation on vacation with you (1 bonus point: you bought a new game while on vacation)
14. The local EB clerks know you by name (1 bonus point: and you know theirs)
15. You refer to be called by your Quake name (1 bonus point: if it's something creepy the The Undertaker)
16. You wished a character in a game was real to have as a girlfriend
17. You consider a six-second "load time" a serious problem
18. You belonged to a college dorm videogame league
19. You've gone to a party and ended up in the host's bedroom playing NHL Hockey on a Genesis
20. You've dressed as a game character for a party (1 bonus point: it wasn't Halloween)
21. You have well-known and vehemently enforced house rules for any videogame
22. You use Madden-isms or other videogame talk among friends
23. You've paid to see a movie based on a videogame
24. You refused to see the Street Fighter movie because you didn't feel Jean Claude Van Damme was man enough to play Guile
25. You've ever tried to explain to your mom that your Leisure Suit Larry game was not pornography
26. You've stolen money from your mom, dad, or girlfriend to buy a game or go to an arcade
27. You've ever considered resorting to violence in a videogame debate
28. You've ever considered a friend less intelligent for his/her views on videogames
29. You've ever settled a personal score with a videogame duel (1 bonus point: you won)
30. You've ever argued the Jaguar was/wasn't a true 64-bit system
31. You've ever argued who could win in a fight, Mario or Sonic
32. You've permanently lost a good friend because of a Sega vs. Nintendo argument

The Next Generation reader
(1 point each - possible total: 10 points)

An easy way to spot potential hardcore games is to simply look at who's reading Next Generation. But it goes deeper than that. To read the magazine is one thing, but to really get involved is the true sign of a harcore gamer. The following examples represent the kind of commitment to Next Generation (and consequently the videogame market) that only hardcore gamers have. And thus, you're not a hardcore gamer unless…

01. Your bookshelf contains a nearly complete library of Next Generation magazines
02. You've begged Next Generaton in vain for a copy of NG issue one
03. You can clearly identify the difference between ads and editiorial in Next Generation
04. You've written an angry letter to Next Generation
05. You've disagreed with something in Next Generation so vehemently that you swore off the magazine forever
06. You've applied for a job with Next Generation
07. You've accused Next Generation of having a Nintendo bias
08. You've accused Next Generation of having a Sony bias
09. You've accused Next Generation of having a Sega bias
10. You've accused Next Generation of having a PC bias

Some things are just sad
(1 point each - possible total: 15 points)

We had to draw the line somewhere, and the following examples go beyond the level of healthy appreciation into the realm of possible madness. And although we don't actually approve of any of these, we're still willing to give you some credit for being so devoted. You many be the hardcore, but you're also a little sad if…

01. You have a Sonic or Chun Li tattoo
02. You can actually pull off an 80-hit combo in Killer Instinct
03. You've spend an entire weekend playing games in your underwear
04. You ordered pizza while playing games in your underwear and didn't bother getting dressed for the deliveryman
05. The following Monday you bragged to friends about spending your entire weekend playing games in your underware
06. You spent two hours trying to make the "Nude Raider" code work
07. You created your own "Nude Raider" images and posted them online
08. You've ignored chest pains to continue playing a game
09. You've ever paused Street Fighter to see Chun Li's underwear
10. You've turned on the Atari Jaguar VLM after taking some kind of hallucinogenic drug
11. You've ever said: "I love you, Mario"
12. You've ever said: "I love you, Sonic"
13. You've ever said: "I love you, Crash"
14. You've ever said: "I love you, Lara"
15. You've read this far and would keep going if only there were more quiz questions

Ok, gamers...Add up those points and determine your score!

What your score means

If you scored:
0 - 24 Button Masher: Face it, you haven't been in an arcade since the days of Chuck E. Cheese. Maybe you picked up this magazine by mistake

25 - 74 Casual Gamer: Your idea of thrilling gameplay is calculating number differentials in Myst

75 - 149 Gamer: You like games, sure, but they aren't quite a matter of life and death to you (yet) are they?

150 - 224 Hardcore: Games are a matter of life and death to you. Congratulations

225 - 274 Next Generation: If you're not working in the game industry, you should be

275+ Sad: Ok, we're impressed, but we're also more than a little bit scared, too

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