Older people enjoy playing video games because, let’s face it, after decades of battling mortgages, raising kids, and surviving the horrors of dial-up internet, they’re basically boss-level humans already. Video games give them a chance to channel those hard-earned life skills into something fun—like carefully budgeting potions in The Legend of Zelda(because you never know when Ganon will jack up prices) or outsmarting online opponents with the kind of patience only someone who’s been stuck on hold with customer service for three hours can muster. Plus, games are a guilt-free way to stay up past bedtime without worrying about work the next day—because “retirement” is basically New Game+ mode for life.

And let’s be honest: video games scratch the same itch as all the hobbies older folks have always loved, just with more pixels and less dust. They used to collect stamps; now they collect Pokémon. They used to enjoy a good crossword puzzle; now they’re strategizing battle formations in Fire Emblem. The high scores are just the modern equivalent of bragging about how far they walked uphill to school—both ways, in the snow. Besides, mashing buttons to defeat a digital dragon is a lot easier on the knees than pickleball, and the only thing they risk throwing out is their Wi-Fi connection.