Why Do Gamers Succeed?
Gallup’s 2023 State of the Global Workplace report reveals that only 33% of U.S. employees feel engaged at work.
Video games have become a cultural juggernaut, captivating millions worldwide with immersive worlds and compelling challenges. Take Cyberpunk 2077, for instance—a sprawling dystopian RPG. According to data from HowLongToBeat, the average gamer spends about 25.5 hours completing just the main storyline of Cyberpunk 2077. For those who dive into the side quests and aim for 100% completion, that number skyrockets to around 106 hours. And that’s just an average—dedicated players often log hundreds more, with some enthusiasts reportedly sinking over a thousand hours into Night City’s neon-lit streets. This level of commitment isn’t unique to Cyberpunk. Consider The Witcher 3, where the average completionist playtime hits 173 hours; or Skyrim, where players routinely rack up 200+ hours exploring Tamriel.
Why do gamers succeed so spectacularly in these virtual worlds, yet often appear disconnected and unmotivated at work?
Agile Stories Done Right
This setup is strikingly similar to agile development’s concept of “user stories”—small, manageable tasks that contribute to a larger goal. In theory, agile promises the same clarity and momentum:
Break a project into sprints
Deliver incremental value
Celebrate small wins
Games like Cyberpunk nail this formula. A side quest is an agile story executed perfectly: it has a defined scope, a clear “definition of done,” and an immediate reward that fuels motivation. Many games across genres share this success:
World of Warcraft: Players grind daily quests for hours—averaging 20-30 hours a week for dedicated raiders, per ActivePlayer.io
Destiny 2: Guardians log 50+ hours chasing god-roll weapons
These games thrive because they’ve mastered the art of keeping players engaged through short, rewarding loops.
In contrast, many workplaces assign projects that feel overwhelming due to their size or lack of clear milestones. Employees may struggle to see progress or feel disconnected from the end goal. Without a sense of accomplishment along the way—akin to completing a side quest—motivation wanes.
The Dedication Disconnect
So, if gamers can pour a thousand hours into Cyberpunk 2077—exploring every alley, befriending a vending machine (yes, that’s a real side quest), rescuing a kidnapped partner, and collecting every iconic weapon—why don’t they bring that same dedication to work? The stats speak for themselves:
Steam Charts shows Cyberpunk 2077 still averaging thousands of concurrent players daily in 2025, years after its launch
Elden Ring players have collectively sunk millions of hours into mastering its unforgiving world (FromSoftware reported over 20 million copies sold by 2023, with playtime estimates suggesting 80-120 hours per player)
Yet, Gallup’s 2023 State of the Global Workplace report reveals that only 23% of employees worldwide feel engaged at work, with the U.S. barely climbing to 33%. Gamers are clearly capable of extraordinary focus and persistence—so what’s going wrong?
The problem isn’t the gamers; it’s the system. Work often fails where game quests succeed. In Cyberpunk, a side quest like “The Gig” takes an hour, pits you against a handful of goons, and ends with a shiny new rifle. Contrast that with a typical agile story in a corporate sprint: “Refactor the payment processing module.” It’s vague, might take days or weeks, and depends on a dozen other tasks (and people) to actually work. Worse, the reward is often nonexistent—maybe a pat on the back in a stand-up meeting, if you’re lucky. Games offer instant feedback and dopamine hits; work offers bureaucracy and delayed gratification.
Immediate Gratification vs Delayed Recognition
Video games are masters of instant gratification. Completing a quest in Cyberpunk rewards players with:
Experience points
New gear
Narrative progression
These rewards, delivered almost immediately, fulfill psychological needs for autonomy (choosing how to play), mastery (improving skills), and relatedness (connecting with characters or other players).
Workplace rewards, however, often lack immediacy or tangible impact. Employees may wait months for recognition or promotions, making it harder to stay motivated day-to-day. Additionally, many jobs fail to offer meaningful feedback or opportunities for personal growth akin to leveling up in a game.
Agile’s Broken Promise
Agile was supposed to revolutionize work by mimicking the iterative, rewarding nature of games. But in practice, it’s a pale imitation. Agile stories are frequently:
Too large—spanning sprints or bogged down in dependencies
Lacking the tight, one-to-two-hour closure of a Cyberpunk gig
A main quest like “The Heist” in Cyberpunk is epic but split into phases—recon, infiltration, escape—each with its own mini-reward. At work, a “main storyline” like “launch the new app” drags on for months, with milestones buried under meetings and scope creep. And the rewards? Games shower you with loot, XP, and cutscenes; work offers a paycheck that’s the same whether you slay it or slack off. No wonder gamers tune out.
Look at Assassin’s Creed Valhalla—players average 60 hours on the main story and 140+ for completionists, per HowLongToBeat. Every region has its own arc, broken into quick assassination missions or treasure hunts, each wrapping up with gear or a story beat. That’s agile storytelling at its finest. At work, agile often devolves into bloated “epics” with no end in sight.
Pivot to Success
To bridge the gap between gaming dedication and workplace engagement, organizations can adopt strategies inspired by game design:
Break Down Tasks: Like Cyberpunk’s side quests, projects should be divided into smaller tasks with clear objectives and timelines
Provide Immediate Rewards: Recognition programs or frequent feedback loops give employees tangible rewards for completing tasks
Foster Autonomy: Allow employees to choose how they approach work within defined parameters, mirroring the freedom of open-world games
Encourage Mastery: Offer skill development and growth through training or challenging assignments
Build Relatedness: Promote collaboration and team-building to create meaningful connections among colleagues
Learn from Gamers: The Disconnect Is Structural
Gamers succeed because games are designed to keep them succeeding—small wins build into big victories, and every hour feels purposeful. To tap into that dedication at work:
Shrink agile stories to match the scope of a side quest: clear, completable in a few hours, tied to a visible reward
Ditch vague “improve performance” tickets for specific goals like “cut load time by 0.5 seconds on the login page”
Crank up the payoff: recognition, bonuses, or even a progress bar
Games prove humans thrive on challenge and feedback; work needs to stop assuming we’ll grind for nothing.
Gamers succeed because video games are designed to engage them on multiple levels—emotionally, psychologically, and socially. The average gamer’s 106 hours in Cyberpunk isn’t a fluke—it’s a testament to what happens when effort meets design that respects your time and rewards your wins. If workplaces want that same fire, they need to stop making work feel like a slog and start making it feel like a game worth playing. Until then, gamers will keep ruling Cyberpunk's Night City—and clocking out of the real world. The next time you wonder why someone can spend a thousand hours exploring Night City but struggle with a single project at work, remember: it’s not about effort—it’s about design.
Want to learn more?
Tenger Ways helps with all of your needs across the IT Operations space. We’re your strategic partner with world-class technical chops. Most importantly, we hang our hats on using modern practices, such as “continuous everything” and “bring joy to the workplace” to help you realize business value faster and with happier team members and more satisfied clients. It’s not just hyperbole! Reach out and let us show you how Tenger Ways is vastly different.