Why don’t more games have eye rest warning timers?
Although there are others who have asked for a pause feature (link1, link2), my intention is to ask about providing a feature within Unreal Engine, that allows any game creator to easily activate a timer which when it finishes it’s countdown, can pause single player games and multiplayer games.
The feature would need to have some intelligence programmed in, to detect the right time for pausing. For example, to not pause while the player is jumping over lava.
Actually, instead of providing this as an option, it should be made compulsory for all games to have. Long hours of gaming have strained my eyes a lot. Youngsters won’t listen to anyone who tells them to rest their eyes. It’s high time we did something concrete to stop people from ruining their eyesight. Sleep loss is also a major factor here, but providing the necessary tools within a game engine can help as a first step in creating a culture where people rest their eyes.
It’s also necessary to give the right advice to people. For example, the 20-20-20 rule is nonsense. The right way to rest the eyes is to keep the eyes closed for around 5 minutes after approximately 20 minutes of gaming. Normal vision is too precious a gift to ruin permanently, for the sake of a bit of entertainment and virtual points in a game.