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[xix]

Ok, let's diffuse this bomb. I think this could be a useful thread, but it's really touchy at the moment. I am going to speak on part of people who are in favor of this thread (if you think I am overstepping my bounds, please respond).

What we want:
To be able to talk about how drug use affects game creation.

What it might look like we want, but don't really want:
To take a stance of whether or not drugs should be used in game creation.

That's all. Don't hate. None of us here are worth your effort.

[konjak]

I'll be quiet after this, but I still think what I quoted was worth my effort.

[xix]

To be honest, I wanted to respond to that, too. It was a very ignorant way of looking at drugs. Drugs are substances we ingest. We talk about them because we want to talk about things we ingest that affect our body chemistry. To broadly claim that all chemicals in our body are drugs is to ignore the choice aspect.

[Anthony Flack]

"Ignorant" hey? A strange choice of words.

It's just acknowledging the fact that our bodies are sloshing around with mood-altering chemicals all the time, and those chemicals go through all sorts of peaks and troughs depending on what we do. Ingesting other substances can contribute to that, but we are never actually "free" from the effects of mood-altering chemicals, and there are other ways we consciously manipulate our chemistry too. Heck, people get high from jogging.

And the only reason I mentioned this was in response to the "all drug-taking that isn't medically prescribed = drug abuse" comment. Our lives are far too intricately tied in with drugs, both internally produced and ingested in food and elsewhere, to ever really be able to claim to be "anti-drugs". So if you're going to be anti-drugs, you need to specify which drugs you mean. If you just mean "oh, all the illegal ones of course"; well, that's actually quite arbitrary in a lot of cases.

I guess what I'm saying is, every drug you are for or against needs to be discussed seperately rather than all lumped together.

[konjak]

EDIT: Never fucking mind... I shouldn't visit forums.

Just... "drugs" in a general consensus is BAD DRUGS.

[Alec]

Hmm... don't think I've ever been high, but I'd hope that its more fun than reading this thread.

You guys should take some drugs! 

[Anthony Flack]

Just... "drugs" in a general consensus is BAD DRUGS.

Oh, I see. So people shouldn't "do drugs", because "drugs" in this context means "bad drugs" which are by definition bad things. I don't think anyone would disagree that it's a good idea to avoid bad things - only problem is, now we need to agree upon which drugs are "bad drugs"!

Incidentally, this isn't a minor semantic quibble at all - it's symptomatic of the entire "drugs" debate which is hopelessly muddled and contradictory. I'm sorry I got into this at all now, though. I certainly didn't think I was saying anything controversial.

[portabello]

My experiences with drug abuse and trying to do stuff:

alcohol-it is next to impossible for me to accomplish anything while drunk.  Even with a buzz going, I have a bit more trouble than I should doing normal things.  Alcohol scares me more than any other drug I have done (significant loss of motor and speech skills, puking, blacking out, waking up in jail)

percocet and vicodin-gringing up and swallowing a couple of light oral narcotics can get me to a pretty good place.  They are very relaxing, a pretty good body high.  They come on quick but don't take that long to start to taper down.  After about an hour or so I feel relaxed and ready to take on the world.  The come down from these pills is really mellow.

Salvia- My favorite legal hallucinogen.  Last time I did salvia I thought my arms were being absorbed by the chair I was sitting on.  According to some friends I was screaming and laughing at the same time.  I don't really remember because I blacked out for part of the trip.  So yeah, not good for doing stuff.

A modest ammount of the reefer:  Gives energy and helps focus.  I'm able to do repetitive tasks without getting bored.  Great for doing laundry or cleaning the apartment.  Precise tasks are still easily accomplishable.

A fairly large ammount of the refer:  Makes anything seem interesting, especially things that are already interesting.  I get a lot of good work done while totally stoned because its just so much damn fun!  Being really high helps me get really into whatever i'm doing.  I might not be working as effeciently, but i'm enjoying every second of it.

A ton of the reefer (Like a long vape session or edibles or alot of kif or something): Getting crazy lifted on thc leaves me pretty much incapable of doing anything other that watching the pretty colors blend into one another or trying to figure out what crazy alien language all the people around me are speaking.  Obviously not a state of mind conducive to getting anything accomplished.

I can't really say whether or not substance abuse helps or hinders my creative process, but it does make that process a whole lot more fun.

Drugs may be bad, but I still like them.

[fish]

My experiences with drug abuse and trying to do stuff:

alcohol-it is next to impossible for me to accomplish anything while drunk.  Even with a buzz going, I have a bit more trouble than I should doing normal things.  Alcohol scares me more than any other drug I have done (significant loss of motor and speech skills, puking, blacking out, waking up in jail)

percocet and vicodin-gringing up and swallowing a couple of light oral narcotics can get me to a pretty good place.  They are very relaxing, a pretty good body high.  They come on quick but don't take that long to start to taper down.  After about an hour or so I feel relaxed and ready to take on the world.  The come down from these pills is really mellow.

Salvia- My favorite legal hallucinogen.  Last time I did salvia I thought my arms were being absorbed by the chair I was sitting on.  According to some friends I was screaming and laughing at the same time.  I don't really remember because I blacked out for part of the trip.  So yeah, not good for doing stuff.

A modest ammount of the reefer:  Gives energy and helps focus.  I'm able to do repetitive tasks without getting bored.  Great for doing laundry or cleaning the apartment.  Precise tasks are still easily accomplishable.

A fairly large ammount of the refer:  Makes anything seem interesting, especially things that are already interesting.  I get a lot of good work done while totally stoned because its just so much damn fun!  Being really high helps me get really into whatever i'm doing.  I might not be working as effeciently, but i'm enjoying every second of it.

A ton of the reefer (Like a long vape session or edibles or alot of kif or something): Getting crazy lifted on thc leaves me pretty much incapable of doing anything other that watching the pretty colors blend into one another or trying to figure out what crazy alien language all the people around me are speaking.  Obviously not a state of mind conducive to getting anything accomplished.

I can't really say whether or not substance abuse helps or hinders my creative process, but it does make that process a whole lot more fun.

Drugs may be bad, but I still like them.

thank you for not getting into a moral debate.

you're right about alchool.
its prolly the worst shit out there.
im borderline alchoolic myself, meaning whenever there's booze, i will drink lots of it. to the point of losing hours of my life, waking up locked in a deserted subway station, covered in my own vomit. god times.
thats why they call it substance abuse.
also, i cant work shit when im drunk.
but i do get all dandy and dancy.

also, i played a bit of everyday shooter with a bit of a reefer the other day.
fucking amazing. now i know what it feels like when jon mak makes sweet beautiful love to your mind with his guitar and abstract programmer art. it feels good.

[xix]

I find that a slight buzz on alcohol will keep me focused on anything "dangerous". I'm not proud of it, but I know I've never driven more safely in my life than the first time I drove with a couple beers in me. In fact, a slight buzz will get me doing pretty much everything I want to do but am normally too cautious to do it - which is why drinking and bar hopping is great. The problem is keeping myself at that place - not enough and I'm worse off than when I'm sober, and too much I'm a complete idiot. Which is why bar hopping sucks.

But a couple beers in me and I will rock it at drawing or programming or whatever.

Weed has a different effect on me. Any small amount will get me high enough to not be able to do anything besides call girls over and tell them that, "they should totally come over". When that fails, and it pretty much always does, I end up having pretty good, deep conversations with my friends about art. Sometimes I come up with my best ideas stoned because it lets my mind go from topic to topic without judging at all. When you stop yourself to document it all (sketchpads work, but I just got a camera so we'll see just how great that is later), you can come back and filter it later.

Cigarettes make me more productive. It's like caffeine, except it works better. Too bad they smell.

I've only had trace encounters with other substances. Salvia puts me in a weird position. I felt like things were collapsing, too. My sense of space was completely messed up as dimensions kept expanding and contracting. A couple times I've had opium which I think is a lot like weed except it makes me slower and sleepier.

By the way, I find that drugs in general let me let go of trying to be cool. I can have a really fun time being wacky when I'm fucked up, but when I'm sober it's a no go. It's especially awful when I try to be weird when I'm sober and days later I see my work and it just makes me cringe.

[fish]

i cant dance if im sober.