Glasses

If you work on a computer constantly, you're familiar with eyestrain — the awful, tense feeling you get after staring at your monitor all day. A pair of Game-Eyez glasses can help solve the problem. The glasses are (obviously) marketed towards gamers and other heavy computer users.

The vast majority of Game-Eyez users, mainly gamers and heavy computer users, have reported these unexpected benefits.

The shades work by blocking wavelengths of light shorter than 460 nanometers (nm), also known as blue light. The product's creators say research has shown that blue light causes most of the eyestrain; since the wavelengths are very short, your eyes have a much harder time focusing on them.

After trying the glasses for the first time, I wondered how I had ever lived without them. The lenses turned the white parts of my monitor yellow, making it much less harsh on my eyes. Even after gazing at my monitor for half a day, my eyes felt fresh. The biggest drawback to the specs was the change in focus required when I put them on and took them off, which I had to do several times in the course of the day.

Though my reaction to the glasses was positive, not all of my coworkers shared my enthusiasm. Some of them loved the adjustments the glasses made, while for others the results were too hard to get used to. Several people didn't like how the product changed whites to yellows, and they found that it failed to relieve any stress on their eyes. One colleague was disappointed to learn that the Game-Eyez aren't designed to fit over prescription glasses.

After a couple of weeks of testing, I concluded that the product was most useful in the evening or in dark rooms. Focusing on a screen at night can be tough after a long day, but the glasses make it easier. Think of the Game-Eyez as coffee for your eyes.

Ultimately, though I appreciated the short-term benefits the glasses provided, they seemed impractical. The constant focal adjustment necessary after donning them or removing them made matters worse — I found my eyestrain increasing if I took them off several times in a short period. I like having the specs; they're a useful tool for any power monitor user. But their $130 price tag is justified only if you frequently worked at night.