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South Korea Grapples With Online Gaming Addicts
Thanks to Yahoo News/Reuters for their story discussing the problems associated with online gaming addiction in MMO-crazy South Korea. According to the article, a 12 year-old named Lim's "love affair with the fantasy game [Lineage] saw him fall foul of the law after he stole $16,000 from his father and ran away to feed a passion for online gaming." This issue is particularly marked in Korea since "...about 70 percent of South Korea's 48 million people have access to the Internet, with 11 million using high-speed services, the world's highest broadband penetration rate." The article ends with the note that, "while some game industry alliances have been pushing game makers and distributors to provide purchasing guidelines, the likelihood of authorities imposing regulations that may pull the plug on a lucrative 500 billion won [$420 million] industry seems unlikely."
South Korea specifally - It has highly a concentrated population, especially in Seoul, so being highly networked isn't as much of a problem and was heavily pushed for.
Also, there were no japanese consoles up until recently (due to old import laws) so gaming became an entirely PC thing, and with the high broadband rates network games (not just MMORPGs, but stuff like Starcraft as well) and cyber cafes became extremely popular with a lack of competition.
The culture does seem to be different as well, as there is an emphasis on participating in the group given the descriptions I've seen of some of the teamwork showed in Lineage.
P.S: There's the upfront+monthly costs because there's upfront+montly costs in making the game. They have a long development time with a large team due to the amount of content necessary, and they have highly monthly costs due to servers (relatively cheap) and staff continuing to work on the game (not relatively cheap).
There are some free or cheap upfront games, of course, but they tend to be more modest efforts and/or be specifically targeted to smaller groups. Not to say they aren't worthwhile; "A Tale in the Desert" is a free download, $13.95 monthly, and apparently is quite good (I have never tried it, if only because I spend far too much time with games as it is).
For years I railed against MMORPGs, and their addictive qualities. I have a friend who clearly spends way to much time with them. Not going to bed until 6AM when he has class, etc. It's like he gives himself completely to the unreal world to escape, which only aggravates his real world problems.
Anyway, over a month ago I bought FFXI. I've been a huge final fantasy fan ever since I beat the first one back in elementary school, and since I have a strong willpower, I figured I'd give it a try.
The game is certainly enjoyable, as it requires cognitive thinking which more or less, is more interesting, or less risky, then everyday affairs. But I am able to drop it on a dime for a better social event.
Ergo, my values and thinking structure prevent me from getting attached to the game (or anything for that matter) when a better alternative arrives. I feel no loyalty towards the game, and no feeling that I *must* reach a certain level.
So it's as if I'm watching TV, since I can get up anytime I want, but generally I like to watch my favorite shows.
My point is that it's the personality of the user which determines their addiction to it, so the Korean trend is not likely a product of their culture so much as it is a product of more addictive personalities being exposed to the game, instead of other addictive activites which we tend to have many of in America.
It's possible their culture has an effect in creating addictive personalities, but that would be another issue altogether.
"I only speak the truth"
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(there are very few gaming cafes here in the US for example)
There are 3 in my city of 100,000.
There are 3 in my city of 100,000.
There are about a dozen in my town of Daesan, South Korea, pop. 30,000.
Seosan, pop 150,000 (about twenty minutes away), has hundreds. As many PC Rooms as bars, easily.
L
First of all your asking g33ks a sociology question; but since we are free to speculate I'm going to have to say that, in the absence of any data other than a suspected higher percentage of users that this may be one answer. In other words, since there are more people using there are more abusing. The article leads me to believe, however, there is more to it than that. Some have alluded to the status this type of activity bestows. This quote seems to buttress that.
I don't think there is any US equivalent to this yet. Also I haven't heard of any US cases of the more extreme examples as reflected in this quote.
Summary: the sheer number of users may account for the higher incidents of Asian aberrancies. There is certainly more information needed to explain things further.