Omnivores

I picked up a copy of Will Hindmarch and Jeff Tidball's Things We Think About Games a while ago, and have been wanting to mention Thing 051 in particular, which concerns itself with "omnivores," folks that play a variety of different kinds of games - boardgames, card games, electronic games, RPGs, etc. Here's a quote:

"But not only are there fewer omnivores than their enthusiasm might suggest, many self-identified omnivores are lying to themselves. No matter how much you might like to think of yourself as a roleplayer, if you haven't picked up an RPG book, much less sat down to roleplay, since college a decade ago, it's a bit of a stretch."

No doubt that's very true for many folks, but might I suggest that aside from "true" omnivores and the woefully self-deceived, there might also be a third class of player, one with which I unabashedly identify: those who consider themselves platform-agnostic to a large degree, but are also aware of how their tastes frequently ebb and flow. Cara has pointed out before how I tend to be serially fixated on different forms of play, sometimes engrossed in Far Cry 2, other times preoccupied by indie RPGs. A year ago, I was playing boardgames as often as possible, electronic games when I could, and RPGs almost not at all. Lately, those priorities have shifted - I've been reading plenty of RPGs, playing them as often as possible, playing boardgames when I can, and barely playing electronic games at all. Maybe a year from now I'll have a new computer, or the folks that I roleplay with will be too busy to get together. I don't think I'm alone in this, either - it seems like many of us, especially those of without a lot of free time, shift our attention with the seasons, changes of circumstance, or the appearance of new and intriguing games. Isn't that true?