How Farmville is a good idea.

Have you played a Free-to-Play game lately? Maybe some Spiral Knights or a Facebook app by Zynga? Or any Facebook game, really. You may have noticed the energy meter, which slowly drains as you play the game.

Now, I realize what this mechanic exists for. The hope is that you'll pay to play the game more than this meter allows. But there's a side effect that comes with it. You see, I like to balance my gaming with time spent doing more productive things. Like blogging. When I run out of energy in Spiral Knights, it helps me to realize I have better things to be doing than playing a game at that moment, and I can drag myself away. As opposed to, for example, Skyrim, which has claimed near a hundred hours of life despite the fact I don't even own the game.

This perspective may be the equivalent of looking at the faintest rosy glint from a pile of polished dung, but I'm not nearly as opinionated about this sort of thing as some people.