Pickiness

After recent E3, leipzig, and PAX, I often wonder what type of 'gamer' I am. When I was a kid, I'd play every game out there. Now, I'm incredibly picky, and settle on 2-4 games a year.

After reading the transcript of one of the panels at PAX (about girl gamers), where a guy asked, "How can I get my g/f to stop playing solitaire 24/7 and move on to a better game?" (something of that sort) the panelist responded, "you don't, it's what she likes, just like how some guys only and ever play Halo." Which got me thinking on what if I considered each videogame a different hobby in itself, and I'm just changing hobbies every year. That wouldn't make me much of a gamer, just like a die-hard soccer player isn't necessarily a sports enthusiast. (or is he/she?)

Whenever I mention I'm a game designer, or a gamer, people tend to mention games like Crysis, or Halo, or Portal, or GTA, or etc etc, a long list of games I haven't played. so what started as a commonality to start off a discussion, ends up distancing us apart. I don't see much commonality between a person who loves fencing with a person who loves softball, so how come when it comes to videogames, everything is jumbled into one hobby?

I also see many misunderstandings in other fields: since i like Salsa, then I must like Hip-Hop (or the even worse un-categorizable dancing seen at church dances), since I like (theoretical) computer science, then I must like programming, since I like (Discrete) Math, then I must like Calculus, etc.

Or is this just my nature? All of you already know how VERY picky I am with food. I guess, I'm very picky about everything else too. Whenever I generalize an interest, misconceptions come up, when i don't, well it gets too verbose to explain what I exactly like (especially to someone who's not familiar with that category).