I’ve lost track of how many of my gaming friends have had to stop playing or give a game up entirely because they contracted some form of injury or pain in their back, hands, wrists or forearms. Given how much gaming is growing, along with the penetration of computers and smart phones, it’s not likely that the amount of associated injuries will decrease. Fortunately, there are some steps you can enact.
TL;DR image from Shutterstock
The video below, uploaded by StarCraft 2 broadcaster Thomas “JaKaTaK” Labonte, features peformance coach Frank Maas and covers everything you should do when you’re gaming. Namely, that includes what your posture should be like, how you can relax, meditate, deal with emotions, stress, psychosomatic pain, taking micro breaks, what cushions to get, how high your screen should be, and more.
Maas directly references Blizzard’s RTS game in the opening — he helps other professional gamers in SC2 with avoiding injuries and ways to cope physically and mentally with the rigours of competition — but the principles can apply to any game, PC or console.
StarCraft aside, the tips on posture and tension are handy even if you’re just sitting in an office or your desk at home.
How good or bad is your posture? And what steps do you take to make your environment more ergonomically friendly?
This article originally appeared on Kotaku Australia
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