Blitz/short games a bad idea?

I haven't played a live chess game online or OTB against an actual person (computer yes) in I don't know how many years. Wanting to get back into it, my question is are short games good practice? Or do they reinforce bad habits?

I'm not afraid to lose as everyone loses/blunders, I just want to know if it's more productive to start with longer games.

If your goal is to get better at playing the game, then I would stick to longer games where you have the time to analyse positions. As you get better, you'll inevitably get faster.

Thanks for the insight. So if I have 5-10 free minutes, will playing a quick game do more harm than good? And should look for other ways to use that time?

Playing a lot of quick games is a good idea to get familiair with a lot of different openings and positions. I find i'm not scared of unfamiliair openings any more because i've seen about everything for the first ten moves.

But to really get better at a normal chess game, just play turn based or normal timed games.

Playing a lot of blitz games can induce a superficiality into your longer games. If you are a disciplined kind of player you can shrug off most or all of the negative effects of fast play but there will be some risk in most cases. Of course, the more blitz you play the more danger and also the more you get the hang of blitz play, but the key to better blitz is good knowledge of chess, which comes from study and slow play.

I think it is best to play both.  The worst part of blitz, otb anyway, is you can't review the game later.  I think it is great for learning opening though.   You can rack up experience quicker playing blitz, but slower games will give you better experience.  It may be best to do both.  When you go back and look at the games, blitz games are often won or lost on blunders, while in slow games you have an oppertunity to devolop ideas and plans then prove that they are better than your opponents.  After a lot of practice you may be able to work that into your blitz games.  If you only have time to play one long game a week, but time to play 4 or four blitz games as well do both, but don't give up on long games.  I certainly wouldn't avoid blitz games completely.

I dont mind nearly as much in losing in blitz as I do in a long game. I count it as 100% my fault if I do lose in a long game but sometimes it is just not possible to foresee an attack in blitz. The point is that in blitz it can give u a losing mentality, the desire to win would be less than in a long game. If u keep losing blitz games and play a long game and lose, u will probably be less disheartened which is a bad thing.

Longer games are better for OTB...games shorter than 5 or 10 minutes are really bad (for me anyway).  My "quick" rating is like 800, my "slow" rating is probably 1100.  I am sure once you are over 1400 or so the quick games are probably good practice for opening ideas

If you play 15-20 minute blitz or longer you will get a better quality game. Ive noticed this after after playing only 10 minute games and was getting frustrated about running out of time. With the longer time controls I was getting a better opportunity to work on my endgame without being in any real time pressure.

I would consider your online chess rating superficial and the blitz ratings to be closer to your true strength. Real chess isn't 2 days per move, real chess is being under time pressure. When you see a player rated over 2000 online and then check his blitz rating and he's 1300 there is something fishy about that.

Yeah I agree.  Blitz is not bad for your game.  I would say doing play under five minutes.  Once you get to the level where you are playing expert or higher, your games will probrably come down to the wire using all of your time control.  If you notice at a tournament, the lower rated sections finish a lot faster (and they take more byes).  I also agree that it is a good way to see some typical responses to the openings that you will prepare.  If you have never seen a line before, look it up. 

There is an inverse relationship, when you are just starting chess play a lot... but the higher you get, you have to study more and play less... and you have it right... the problem with continuing to play more and more is repeating opening mistakes.