Not everyone likes Christmas. Some people would rather the whole festive season never even happened. Unfortunately for them, most of the country disagrees and pretty much shuts down for about a week, leaving those remaining scrooges/practical few a pretty limited choice as to what they can do if they don't want to watch Only Fools and Horses repeats or pay twice as much as usual just to have their wine heated up.

So, if you're one of these poor, unfortunate, religiously sensitive individuals, we've decided to give you a few ideas for things to do over Christmas as you wait for the fun to pass. Of course, this being the gadget section, they're gaming based ideas, but ones you can really get involved in and forget about everyone else. Of course, if this doesn't interest you there's always whoring. Now that's certainly an industry that doesn't have a Christmas break although we probably shouldn't promote it. So, no, don't go whoring. Play these instead.

Skyrim (Xbox 360/PS3/PC)
As we said in our review, this game is huge. Big enough to take up an entire festive period? Possibly. It's not unusual to clock up a good 60 hours of gameplay without actually starting the plot. In fact, if you're genuinely looking for something to help pass the time as everyone around you enjoys Christmas, gives and receives presents, speaks to each other, goes to the pub, eats, moves and keeps their body temperature above hypothermic levels then this is definitely the game for you. Only problem is that repeated exposure will incur you huge charisma penalties when New Years comes around.

Monopoly Collection and Trivial Pursuit: Bet You Know it (Wii)
Best case scenario, you've managed to find other people that hate Christmas as much as you do. There's a group of you and you need something to do that doesn't involve anyone who might try and spread their festive joy your way. What better way to split the group into distinct, warring factions than Monopoly and Trivial Pursuit? You might very well ask why you shouldn't just use the boardgames, but the reason for that is a) it's almost impossible to cheat, b) there's no tidying up, and most importantly, c) there's Monopoly Streets and Trivial Pursuit's gambling/betting version here to add major longevity to games that normally finish after the first punch is thrown.

X3: Albion Prologue (PC)
Anyone's who played X3 knows that even the most mundane activities in this complex 4X space game happily swallow up entire weeks. Watching your spaceweed trader crawl across the screen in real time? Fascinating. Stealing huge capital ships? Actual fun. If you haven't played before, there's a pretty steep learning curve, plus X: Rebirth comes out in the new year, but if you know the series, we just though we'd remind you that it's well worth picking this up for £10 to keep you going over Xmas.

Saints Row: The Third (Xbox 360/PS3/PC)
The most fun we've had in a long time. There's no huge depth to this game, as we said in our review, but just the sheer joy of blowing up everything and getting away with it is more than enough to keep you occupied, especially playing Busted/Wasted (as in that's the point when you hand the controller over to someone else) with friends.

Battlefield 3/Modern Warfare 3 (Xbox 360/PS3/PC)
Don't like people you can actually see or touch? Want to spend the last week of December attempting to take checkpoint Alpha Zulu or murdering hundreds of virtual terrorists while being called a fag? Already have suspicions about your mum sleeping around with angry, filty-mouthed tweenage boys? Both Battlefield 3 and Modern Warfare 3 will fulfil all your fantasies.

Steam Sale
We left this until last because it's essentially ALL the games. That's right, it's all the computer games you could ever want on PC, and they're all reduced. All of them. You can get the new Batman game, the new LOTR game, Bastion and all the rest of Warner Bros' collection for £40. That's only marginally more than a single game. AND THAT'S JUST ONE DEAL.