How many hours of video games is unhealthy?

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The amount of time spent gaming may not matter as much as whether video games are interfering in life. It’s not simply a matter of hours spent playing video games. Dr. Peter Gray (2012), a research professor at Boston College, explains that many people spend a lot of time pursuing hobbies and passions, but they’re not addicted to those passions. It’s the same for gaming. Someone can love video games, get much joy from them, play them for many hours every day, and not have a gaming disorder or video game addiction.

I once completed Red Faction on ps2 in about 13 hours in a single hit.
I don't think it was healthy. And I doubt I could do it today..

There's really no simple answer to this question. "Healthy" is a very relative term. Think of it this way. Video games are basically neutral. They can be bad if they're distracting from other healthy things. A good example is the sedentary gamer who is addicted to games and never exercises. This was me during adolescence. They can be good if they're having a positive effect. A good example is a professional game reviewer who makes money and happiness from games, or a game enthusiast who plays games as a hobby as supplement to an otherwise balanced lifestyle.

If you're doing the other things required for maintaining your health, there is really no limit to how many hours of games you can play, and still be a very physically and psychologically healthy person. Think about people who play and review video games as their jobs. Who are we to judge if they're healthy or not? And I know for a fact these people basically play games all day -- just like others would go to a 9-5 job. Provided you are taking necessary breaks to rest your eyes, hands, etc., you won't find any physical problems resulting from video games, especially not any more so than your average desk computer job staring at the monitor all day.

Games can be vastly different in their design, and people play them for different reasons. So it's extremely hard to generalize. It depends upon the person, the circumstances, etc. There is literally no single right answer here, except to say that you should be doing other healthy activities as well, and not neglecting things due to over-focusing on games -- that's the most important part.

In high school, my friend and I would sometimes rent or buy a game, and then sit and play the game all the way through in co-op. It was a lot of fun. Only one time did I feel it was unhealthy when he kept waking me up when I was starting to doze off. This was because we got started too late and it required staying up all night. If we started early in the day, we could do it and not tax ourselves. Some games we did this with were Halo 1 and 2, Baldur's Gate for PS2, Timesplitters, Gauntlet Legends...some others (of course the shorter games were a breeze).

During that time I was healthy overall, doing well in school, etc. This was like a fun weekend activity we did to relax, very harmless. Even during the week we would play for a few hours straight sometimes, but I always made sure I had done my homework and went to bed by like 11. So you do need to have limits.

The connection between real world violent crimes and violent video games is an interesting one. It's a fact that sociopathic individuals are drawn to otherwise harmless things (such as violent video games) in order to live out dark fantasies, but this also applies to violent movies, books, TV shows, etc. Basically, you can see that violence is attracted to more violence, on a basic level. I don't see this as a black and white issue at all, though. For the vast majority of individuals, this kind of media is essentially harmless. It can be a slippery slope, since this is like saying "guns are fine because most people wouldn't use them to kill someone".

I'm a fan of games. Yet I believe they should be kept from people who they would do harm to (and thus would result in them doing harm to themselves or others); but how can we do that, without getting rid of them altogether? I think in the big picture, the games these violent people may indulge in, are not highest on the list of what is pushing them over the edge. It can be hard to predict how someone will behave, and these violent outbursts do happen. And then we find out after the fact that the individual loved violent video games as well. So it doesn't look good, anyone can see that. It would appear that these violent games are indeed having some bad impact in society as result of these killers finding joy in them.

Yet what else correlates with violent criminals? Like I said, games aren't on the top of the list of correlations and possible causations. And I guarantee that next in line would be music, movies, tv shows, books. You're thus looking at a very much freedom, creativity, individuality, responsibility, entertainment, and culturally-compromised society. It could even be a very dystopian 1984 or Farenheit 451 kind of vision. Where do you draw the line? Cut out violent video games today...and tomorrow it's all games, then the same thing with movies, etc. Surely you can see how this could be taken to extremes and would be very bad.

A good middle ground is conscientious society where people take care of one another...and promote health, happiness, etc. So those ticking time bombs don't happen. They're treated before they go off. And they will go off, games or not. Also I feel taking the guns out of their hands is a way to start. That's controversial as well, but...they aren't killing people with video games, the games are just their sick entertainment while they plan things out or try to stay bottled up...if you look at the methods they're using, I think controlling the methods is a smart idea. As for what pushes them over the edge, it's really hard to know exactly what's doing that.

Ummm. It depends on the player and the interest of the player of course!!
Well, let me explain!
If you're a game player, who is playing PC shooting games then you must be an expert to complete the game levels. If you are already achieved many levels, then well, you've overdosed

I've seen my neighbors who are playing PC games all day and when I asked them how they are winning then they suggested that there are cheats, hack codes websites where you can get cheats, hack codes. Using which you can surpass the difficulty level and it is just like to cheat a game by entering the available codes.

Duh! Is that really work?
I found there are many websites like IWantCheats which offers you cheats, codes on subscription, how you know that you have finished using working codes? You should check website reviews and also ask friends.

I think context is much more important than the number of hours. For one, everything else that is going on in your life outside of gaming. Do you have a social life? Do you have a steady income? Are you looking for a healthy diet and do you do sports? If those things are sufficently met, I don't think any amount of hour that are put into gaming are too much. Now obviously, theres no way you would be able to play 16 hours a day and still have those needs met at the same time. Unless you're a really efficient sleeper.
It also depends what you're playing. Being social while gaming is always a good thing, unless it complete replaces any real life interaction, the nearer it comes to real life experience, the better though I think. Like skyping while playing with friends is better than just here and there texting.
The worst kind of gaming is the sort of games that treat you like a rat in a cage. You keep chasing after every dopamine hit and it just sucks the life out of you. Unfortunately often those are the ones that are easy to fall for.

Any fewer than eight hours of video games a day is plainly unhealthy, tbh

Maybe just even 1 hour can have a bad impact on mental health, still if you enjoy playing games the answer could be very different