Slashdot Mirror
Online Gaming Addictive?
gihan_ripper writes "The BBC
has a discussion on the addictive effects of online gaming. Reports come from Liz Woolley of Online Gamers Anonymous, and a gamer, Lynn Hall. Liz blames EverQuest for the 2002 suicide of her son Shawn, noting that game manufacturers hire employees with psychology degrees in order to make their games more addictive."
As obsessively posting to Slashdot!
I will start this out by saying that if any blizzard fanbois respond to this with a flame...you're just trolling and are even more out of line than you consider me to be.
I will save the whole "my history in mmo's" speech and instead cut to the chase...
I bought WoW about 3 weeks after release expecting to find a game that does what it says: caters to the hardcore and casual gamers equally. I played WoW for about 2 months only to find out that this game caters to one kind of player: non-mmo vets looking to get their feet wet in the genre. Don't argue it...it's dead on spot true.
When I first started playing I noticed how this game had phenomenal graphics (anyone who says otherwise is on crack or blind), awesome characters, an immersive world, and many many many different ways to customize your characters skill/abils as well as equipment.
However, as time marched on I made the following realization about WoW: If I play more than a few hours a day I can ding lvl 60 with virtually NO hold ups. I never have to unlock any zones, never have to do anything in any order.....hell, I don't even have to do a quest to hit the cap. That's not an MMO, that's some kind of RPG/Action hybrid aimed at appealing to what is in fact the average wow gamer: a high school kid who loves the idea of playing an mmo, rotting on the forums etc...but has never succeeded at one before. WoW takes your fifteen bucks and then hands you the key to instant uberness. When I stand around in IronForge I see DOZENS upon DOZENS of people running around at the cap, pissing and moaning about the game being to easy and that they have nothing left to do except retreat old ground. This has got be the first MMO that hit this state in less than 3 months.
Added, that for a game that boasts PVP and BG content as it's selling points, and as the main things that make it "better" than other mmo's, there's really nothing in the way of purposeful pvp and BG's are probably another 6 months away. And 6 months is realistic....blizz has recently stated that they plan on releasing the first expansion roughly 12 months after release. Let's give them the benefit of the doubt and say they release it on time...which would be a first for the genre. That's another 9 months out. Ironically...this week blizz has stated that they feel it would be in the game's best interests to hold out BG until that expansion. So, as you see, my stating of 6 months for battlegrounds isn't even realistic, that's how hopeful it is. 9-12 months is much more realistic. Imagine if this is the way it really pans out...there will be half a million lvl 60's with nothing to do, and nothing to make the GREAT and HARDCORE players stand out in any way shape or form. That's not an MMO.
I understand that you'll point to sales numbers and tell me how wonderful wow is doing...the bottom line is this: It's selling at the rate it is b/c of it's mass appeal. It does something other mmo's have never done, and for the purpose of not ruining the genre like every other gaming genre has had happen to it. It appeals to gamers who really don't belong on an MMO. They want instant gratification, instant uberness, and instant action. Problem with that approach is it always will equal instant burnout within weeks, and at best months.
Purpose of this thread is not to bash wow....to be honest, a part of me is asking for advice on why wow is worth it long term. I own and subscribe to both wow and EQ2 and as of now, I give 100 percent of my time to EQ2 because of the following reasons: I know, that no matter how good I get, or no matter how much progress I make any night...I'm just scratching the surface...no matter WHAT I do. There are so many enemies and so many "goals" that people won't even come across for another two years, that I truly feel that I'm one character, in a whole world of heroes. Also...in EQ2, EVERY (and I mean EVERY) single thing that you do is recorded on the web as YOUR achievement and then ranks you against all those on your server, as well as all those in th
Yes, indeed. We, of course cannot forget the online console titles like SOCOM II and--of course--Halo 2 also. They too have lots of replay value (SOCOM at least--haven't touched the Halos), which is precisely the problem if you want to prevent a suicidal spiral like Shawn's.
You can hold down the "B" button for continuous firing.
This woman is a stupid bitch. You know what you do when your kid is spending too much time playing videogames or watching television? You tell them to do something else. Get them interested in coding. Or get them interested in a sport. Or take them to the beach and have a nice weekend together. Or, if nothing else, give them chores to do so that they can't just sit in front of the computer paying videogames nonstop.
You know, when I was a kid - which admittedly was a decade ago - we had a computer and I wasn't allowed to use it most of the time. It was that simple. "You're not allowed to use the computer, unless we say it's okay". So I didn't. Problem solved. My parents saw the computer as nothing more than a toy and a plaything and wanted me doing something more constructive.
I didn't agree with them and, to prove them wrong, I now make a living doing what they used to think was just a waste of time. But the point still remains. They did the parenting. I did the listening and obeying.
How hard is it to tell your kids "no"?
And I'm tired of these fat dykey bitches going around trying to change the world so that nothing like what happened to their children can ever happen to another child ever again. The problem isn't the world, you gravey-soaked fucknut bitch. it's your god damned lack of parenting and responsibility. YOU need to be killed, you stupid nosey cunt.
...about online gaming, I fully agree.
Hello, my name is Stevie...*takes out napkin*and I'm addicted*sob*...to Slashdot posting...*cries madly*
You can hold down the "B" button for continuous firing.
From my experience... 3+ years on Everquest, Meridian 59 every now and again since 1996, Anarchy Online for ~ 3 months, WoW, EQ2 and numerous others have wasted several years of my late-teenage life....
It's like a job, except you don't get paid for playing the game... You get hooked and end up playing for 10 hours after school every single day and all weekend..... I can't believe that Everquest ruled my life for 3 years during high school... *sob*
I'm addicted to Stephen King. I compulsively read every new book he writes; I have withdrawal cravings when he doesn't publish for a long time. I know for a fact that he has a vested interest in making his books as alluring and addictive as possible.
...
I think I'll go form a support group for victims of his evilness
Just the same as driving fast, having sex, using caffine or tabacco, and gambling are addictive...
As long as you have the choice to stand your dumb ass up and leave, leave it the hell alone. When did it become OK to have no self control?
"Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity." -Anon.
Games like WoW are not designed to be artistic masterpieces of gaming wonder. They are designed with one thing in mind. Get you hooked, forever, so they can keep collecting your monthly fee.
Look at the game mechanic. It's a chat room with fancy graphics, you IRC people know how addictive IRC is already. Next, the game has no difficulty factor. You just click on things, they die, and numbers go up. Quick, easy, repeatable gratification. Combine it with humour and the ability to customize digital thingies, mostly the acquisition of equipment. The model is one which rewards not skill or intelligence, but rewards people playing for longer periods of time. Whoever plays more gets more. To get ahead you've got to keep playing.
I've been saying this for a long long time. Just read my blog or slashdot journal and you'll see it there. But, um, you guys keep playing and keep playing. You know it's true, so um, why? My prediction is that after we get rid of cigarettes and all the other illegal substances and things MMOs will be next on the list. Don't you have anything better to do with your life other than click on pictures of monsters and increment numbers in a database far away?
The GeekNights podcast is going strong. Listen!
Well, sure. When I like something a lot, I want to do it a lot. (see: sexual intercourse ) So, to some extent, everything fun has to be somewhat addictive.
And about the hiring someone with a psychology degree to help make games more addictive? Come On! When has anyone heard of someone with a psychology degree getting a job?
It's a good thing they aren't hiring Colombian drug lords to make games as addictive as crack!
Single player video games are bad enough, being easy escapism from actually having to live. MM games are much worse. Since MM games are based in a live online world, you cannot save your game at any time and return to it just as you left it later. When playing with other people it is socially hard to stop in the middle of a quest, since you will waste your teammates' time in finding a replacement for your group. You are in constant competition with others in your guild, etc to level up. If you fall to far behind you will no longer be able to do quests with your friends. Finally, the way MM games are financed, you pay a flat monthly fee for unlimited usage. Someone who plays 20 hrs a week gets twice as much "game time per dollar" as someone who plays 10 hrs. This provides a further incentive to play as much as you can. Playing World of Warcraft sucked up a huge percentage of my free time. Even after I stopped playing, I still havn't worked up the courage to cancel my account yet because I don't want to lose my character.
Where's one of those twelve step programs when you need them? "-Hi my name is Greg and I am a WOW addict. -Hi Greg!"
"Overhead, without any fuss, the stars were going out."
Even better, McDonald's and their french fries.
Once again we come up with another irresponsible parent that's looking to lay the blame for the death of their child. Anybody that does not practice any self control (or delegation of it) is making a beeline straight for the darwin awards.
To be fair, yeah I'm an avid player of (back then) EQ and (as of now) WoW. Yeah, I did play WoW obsessively for the first few months. But it's waned down a lot. I've gotten to the mode of casual playing and truth be told I'm just too busy trying to stay on top of RL to really commit to it. My friend who just moved in the area and is going on interviews for jobs, plays a whole lot more, because he's got the time to at the moment. Sure I'm jealous, but that doesn't drive me over the edge. *sigh*
when a teen kills themselves, many causes are in effect. however none of these causes are the actual decision by the individual to commit suicide. blame the parents? maybe. blame the individual? surely. blame a computer game? are you kidding?
this is the angry cry of a parent who does not want to face up to the fact that their son decided that life was no longer worth enduring. perhaps there was no fault in the parenting, perhaps they showed love and encouragement. but in general if you don't blame "something" then the parents, rightly or wrongly, are thought to be a part of the problem.
when, instead of playing the blame game and refusing to face reality, this parent could try to understand what really drove her son's decision to take his own life. but instead she chooses to play the blame game and trod over the memory of her dead son. does it make sense to blame a computer game for the fact that your son did not find life worth living?
MORTAR COMBAT!
People would rather do things they enjoy, then deal with problems which they don't enjoy. In almost every case, people will pick the more pleasant thing over the less pleasant thing. Games are more fun than life, and thus its easy to overdo it. By simply calling all enjoyable things addictive, we're raising a generation of people with no incentive for self control. They don't need to control themselves, they can just blame others.
How can they make something more addictive? In the case of computer games, I just don't see how they can make it addictive, let alone make it more addictive.
I find the game of Go very addictive. Does this mean that 3000-4000 years ago, Chinese philosophers hired fellows from the peasantry who seemed to "just have a good way with people". No. It means that I have a personality that resonates with the game and thus an addictive linkage is formed.
This case is nonsense. I think her son had a personality that was prone to being addicted to virtual realities and gamespaces, and probably many other issues as well.
Who funds this crap? And don't they have real science to do? And can't we please, please just have the real news on Slashdot?
I have never played or even seen someone play a MMORPG. Yet, I am a huge fan of RPG games, enough so that I've been working on creating my own since June. So why haven't I jumped on the MMORPG bandwagon? Well that's an easy question to answer.
I'm afraid. I'm terrified that I will become an addict like so many others, and then my performance will degrade at my job, my grades will lower, I'll become less productive, and I'll sleep less. Then when I realize my life has become so horrible and ugly, what will I do? I'll probably start playing the MMORPG *even more* to escape from my reality.
That scenario is so terribly realistic for me, I'm not even going to take the chance. FFXI will probably be the only FF game I will never play (unless Square-Enix decides to make another FF MMORPG...)
Hero of Allacrost, a FOSS RPG for *NIX/*BSD/OS X/Win
Even slashdot message forums can be addicting if that's all you do...
Sounds to me that this kid used the game as an escape from reality. Did the game make him pull the trigger? NO! He did that all by himself. Is sony to blame for his death? No more than who ever sold him the gun. However, I would like to see online content providers (games , email etc..) start to include some next of kin clause. In the event of your death or you are declared missing etc.. (some extranious condition that can be proved in court) a person that you name on account creation would be given access to your data. There have been numerous cases of situations like this popping up. Undoubtedly more are to come.
"noting that game manufacturers hire employees with psychology degrees in order to make their games more addictive"
An undergraduate psychology degree doesn't really qualify you to make games 'addictive'.
There's a big difference between someone with a psychology degree and a psychologist.
---
I support spreading santorum
Online games are adicting, and people are causing global warming.
What's next?
Pretty Pictures!
Duh University.
Its a good thing that I'm soo indignant to the fact that WoW and most mmorpgs have a monthly fee. Otherwise I'd probably be hopelessly strung out on it. I'm still trying to get over my Starcraft Addiction.
He who knows not and knows he knows not is a wise man. He who knows not and knows not he knows not is a fool.
Of course online games are addictive. offline games are addictive. People get addicted to things they enjoy. That's not news, it is common sense.
Blaming a game for someone's death? Well that's taking it a bit far. If someone was unbalanced enough to have a game as a potential trigger, then they should not be playing said game.
"why don't you just slip into something more comfortable...like a coma!"
Did anyone read that as "Online Gambling Addictive". I was trying to figure out why the kid who killed himself over Everquest was in that caption.
In other news, gravity makes apples fall, human beings can drown in water, and Michael Jackson is one creepy SOB.
Less than 65% of people using IE to access w3schools for the first time in over a year, and the same year seeing a doubling in Firefox use there. (Not that such stats are always accurate or even useful, but that could explain the upcoming beta...)
You can hold down the "B" button for continuous firing.
I guess I'm just glad someone's hiring the kids with psych degrees. Most of the people I knew who took a lot of psych just liked it because it was easy. But then, most of the people I know aren't working in the field for which they studied.
I think the use of the word "addiction" in this context cheapens it. When you've known people with psychical addictions--alcohol, drugs, etc.--it's a long stretch to extend that to a video game. Sure, there's gambling, but I think that's kind of an aberration: there's something chemical happening in the brain of those people that makes it a very serious situation.
I would consider MMOs to be closer to the situation of someone who carries the NYT crossword around with them everywhere... or the guy in my office who spends every available hour golfing. it's a satisfying activity for those people, for one reason or another. In this case it's not generally accepted by society, so it's an "addiction". People don't say that about the old men who spend all their time playing chess.
That said, there are certain social misfits who are completely unable to approach any endeavor from a point of moderation. But if it wasn't the game, it would be cars, or music, or pot, or model trains, or... who knows? Some people can't do anything as part of a healthy balance.
m-
You catch enchiladas by picking them up behind the head and holding them underwater until they don't kick anymore -VeGas
water is wet.
I've actually exchanged some emails with Woolley for a past online column I wrote that mentioned her son. So before the normal rabid gaming reaction begins, let me state that she is a very nice and intelligent woman. She suffered a great loss and is trying to make something good out of it.
That said, I still don't agree with some of her positions. I think she's gotten some bad information from certain psychologists who poorly compare the brain chemistry of someone having a really instense experience to that of crack cocaine - which is simply sensationalist hyperbole.
As several will note, anything can be addictive. People can form a fetish relationship or obsessive fascination with almost anything - it's not a reason to start banning or regulating everything that fits on a shelf. We should be more worried about mental health in our culture on a general basis. Why is going to a therapist still such a blemish? And of course, who can afford it? Video gaming itself is just a symptom of these kinds of problems. You could try to ban gambling, but that won't really help a gambling addict.
Remember when people thought that D&D was evil and the work of the devil? And then it turned out that it was just that these people took the game way way too seriously and were problematic to begin with...
Yeah, it's a pretty funny concidince that these are practically the same genre. You don't see people still killing themselves over D&D anymore, do you? 'Course it's kinda rare that someone admits to playing the game, since it has such a "geek" stigma, but face it, RPG's are fun to play and some people do them more then they should do other things in "real life." Dosen't matter if it's pen and paper or on the PC/console.
What about those people who just have to watch Oprah everyday? Some of their lives suck too. Clearly, some other factors should be more to blame than MMORPGs/gaming companies for why people kill themselves and/or destroy their lives.
The eternal struggle of good vs. evil begins within one's self.
I can stop whenever I want.
Online games are not just addictive, it's also driven by economic factor. WOW Sweatshop in China has caused some concern in the European WOW servers. These are professional traders of virtual items.
I was addicted to video games since atari2600. When I find a game I like, I play it for massive hours. I was the first to 1500 wins in Warcraft3. Its just not MMORPGS, its video games in general: They're fun . If you make a game thats fun, MMORPG or otherwise, people will want more from your company, and will buy your next product. The longer you hook a player is directly related to how fun your game is. Seeing how a wide audience is now getting addicted, instead of just a few, people are investigating it. I hope games keep getting more fun... But I fear a possible, impending monoplositic world where you only have a handful of fun games in each genre... But since they're so fun, no one will care there are no other choices. You can only play one video game at a time anyway.
God spoke to me.
From the article:
I do not believe all online games are inherently bad or evil.
But I do know, however, that some of the game manufacturers do require their game developers to have degrees in psychology to make them even more addictive.
Um, no. No they do not. What game developers might do is hire a Psychologist who has studied Human Computer Interaction, a branch of Cognitive Psychology which is concerned with, among other things, the usability of computer software.
As games become more complex, it becomes necessary to design an interface which is easily used, but not restrictive. Anyone who's played an MMORPG knows the importance of a good HUD. That's what's at hand here; game developers are hiring more Cognitive Psychologists to aid in the design of their game's interface.
The area of Psychology she's referring to is Psychopathology (i.e., "mental illness"). Psychologists in this realm study addiction... very different from those who study HCI.
Maybe this is some FUD she picked up from her lawyer, Jack Thompson? (Refer to second article)
I can understand that she's upset, and I am not going to get into how much EQ was to blame but..
"...noting that game manufacturers hire employees with psychology degrees in order to make their games more addictive"
That's such a poor excuse of an argument... Companies hire people with psychology degrees to help with product development / placement all the time... They don't sit in some back room and say "hey how's the best way to get people to play these 24/7 and kill themselves"... in fact these companies don't care how MUCH you play, simply that you pay per month (I've paid for UO for over a year and never played it... yeah thats stupid I know)
I don't see how this is different then a company making a new widget, and talking with psychologists to see which color they should make the widget to increase sales.
It's like the violence in videogames thing... ok you want to ban violence in them? Then lets start burning books, cancelling 80% of TV shows, destroying movies etc that don't involve pretty rainbows and cute rabbits. If hiring psychologists are so evil I want all advertising to be stopped too, as I may become addicted to Pepsi.
I agree with the consensus here that anything can be addictive and it's ludicrous to legislate the concept of saving people from their own obsessive-compulsive tendencies.
With that being said, I do believe to some degree, in some games, the addictive nature is integrated into the design. It's less that the game itself is addictive as it is the methods to achieve desired goals become "job-like" in their requirements to force people to collaborate.
Everquest is a good example. The high end game requires that players work as a team and form guilds. The pressure comes when these guilds require their players to routinely show up and participate on a regular schedule. If you aren't consistently online, you risk being removed from the guild or being passed over. As a result, the game becomes less of an addiction and more of an obligation or burden. I find this to be more detrimental than the notion that the games are psychologically addictive.
I was going to write a really long, insightful response to the whole MMORPGs are addicting thing, but I've really got to get a team together to take out two archvillains in City of Heroes, get some more crafting levels on my Monk in Everquest 2, help my wife out with an adventure in Everquest, and do a little Realm vs. Realm action in Dark Age of Camelot.
Anyhow. No, MMORPGs are NOT addictive.
Vincent J. Murphy
Spandex Justice
However, the audience for video games seems to keep getting older and older, and I suspect we'll have video games for quite awhile.
But ask yourself why you REALLY like to play video games. What's fun about these things? And how do you feel about those reasons?
Is it because you want to face new challenges, socialize, and observe a new fantasy world? I doubt think anyone can argue these things are unhealthy, in moderation.
Or is it because you want the sense of accomplishment that comes from the level-up hamster wheel, which rewards you primarily for playing longer rather than playing better? Is it because your seeking an escape from reality?
(One could argue that these games give us the detachment from self that eastern religions advocate. I suspect otherwise, but that's far too complex to think about here.)
There was a scene from Minority Report in which someone was spending time in a virtual reality simulation of his peers praising him for receiving an imaginary reward. How much of the attractiveness of these MMORPGs comes from the very same desire for false success?
Things shouldn't be banned because they are unhealthy, but you shouldn't defend the healthiness of something just because someone is trying to ban it. The worth of an activity is in the eye of the beholder, but you shouldn't discard your own judgment just to spite people you disagree with.
Free yourself of all prejudice and bitterness, then ask yourself whether a desire for pre-programmed, treadmill success is healthy? Are you a better person after you have finished, or are you just older?
And, if any games developer happens to come down with an odd case of misplaced utilitarianism in capitalist world, maybe you should ask yourself what effect your game has on people. There are certainly MMOG games that lack any explicit level treadmill. Second Life comes to mind.
The human desire for fun exists in order to stretch our mental and physical abilities. Yet so many things we call "fun" actually contract these abilities. Worse, things we do to "relax" like watch television or smoke leave us even more stressed out and tired than when we started. The Taoists encourage us to be relaxed and alert, yet so many times we Westerners are entranced by our anxieties. We've grown so used to that state that for "fun" we invent new anxieties to entertain us on our computer and television screens.
Trying to stop it with lawsuits and laws is laughable, of course. But that does not stop my mourning.
Look, even though it's a lawsuit, and even though our buddy Jack Thompson is getting in on the action, this lawsuit isn't as ridiculous as you'd be led to believe.
The kid's mother is trying to find out what (if anything) in-game would cause her son to commit suicide. Sony Online said "no way" when she asked them for information so now she's suing them for it.
The article doesn't mention cash. If she wants cash as well, then she loses some of my respect. But it appears that this is a case of a grieving parent attempting to find out what would cause her child to take his own life. Parents get blasted for not taking any responsibility and simply blaming games (and they should get blasted), and it's possible that that's the case here, but it appears that she is looking for a real justification and not simply jumping to conclusions.
Your brain is not a computer.
"Anything that has the potential to generate significant changes in mood, effect or feeling is potentially addictive to someone, said Faragher[.]"
Let's go ban some art.
This just in... Air is good for you!
(Honestly, if gaming wasn't addictive, we wouldn't have things such as MMOs and CCGs)
Insert Sig Here
For parents that need help
What joke, they arent addictive at all..
well back to leveling my Rogue.
"I am a kernel in the linux army"
Even after I stopped playing, I still havn't worked up the courage to cancel my account yet because I don't want to lose my character.
Blizzard doesn't delete characters from cancelled accounts. You can cancel, not pay for a year, and then reactivate your account and have all your characters still there.
This is great for hardcore gamers. Cap in a couple months then cancel until a significant content patch comes out.
So why haven't I jumped on the MMORPG bandwagon? Well that's an easy question to answer. I'm afraid. I'm terrified that I will become an addict like so many others
The problem with MMOs, like so many other things, is the pressure to keep up with the Joneses. The answer, is not to try.
It is no mistake that I have never belonged to a guild, because the external pressure to level up, etc... erases the benefit of belonging to one.
I'm playing WOW, and I only team up when I feel like it. If someone should happen upon me and invite me to a group, sure, I'll join. But when the quest is done, so am I. No peer pressure to stay online, no need to try to keep at the same level as my etherious frends, no fuss, no muss.
I'm not powerleveling either, but I can deal with that. Like anything else, a game only has as much power over you as you let it have.
"Inattention makes clowns of us all" -Bean
You hit the nail right on the head. I wanted to add that TFA had absolutly no substance, just a few allegations that some people allow themselves to become addicted to MMO's and one person killed himslef because of it... big deal, people become addicted to Meth, coke or any number of other more dangerous substances and kill themselves all the time. When you allow yourself to become dependant on something, you must accept the consequences. Disclamer: This isn't to say MMO's are bad, I spend about 5-10 hours a week playing WOW and I enjoy it immensly. I just know enough not to let it ruin my marriage or friendships (some of which developed through video games).
You hate your job? There's a support group for that. It's called "everybody" and they meet at the bar. -Drew Carey.
Shawn was a high school buddy of mine, and it's surreal every time this hits the news.
We all happened to be gamers, my little posse of guys that didn't fit into the other clicks. Some of us were somewhat popular, some were gossipers, some (like myself) were computer geeks, but one thing we found we had in common was gaming. I'd sneak my N64 into the big projector room by the library so we could play Goldeneye during lunch break. Before the administration became uptight about lab usage, we'd play Quake anytime several of us showed up to school early. We tended not to have the greatest social skills (Shawn maybe being exemplar there) but we got along anyway; we were all decent guys just wanting to get the heck through high school so we could go have our own lives.
I'm not going to pretend I knew Shawn super-well; sometimes he'd hang out with us and sometimes he wouldn't, but I know his problems didn't come from video games. I have nothing but sympathy and sorrow for his family, but Sony didn't destroy Shawn; he did that himself. At least one guy from our little rag-tag group went on to get addicted to alcohol, too, but that's not the fault of the brewing companies, even if they know full well that alcohol can be addictive, even if they put plenty of research into making the stuff taste good and encourage recurring business. Bigger surgeon general's warnings would not have helped.
I need to disclaimer all this by saying that I personally haven't developed any self-destructive addictions. I haven't gone through it, so my perspective is void of first-hand experience. That said, I still put the responsibility not to allow some activity (smoking, playing video games, whatever) take over a person's life, on that person. We should avail them to help, and support them in finding help if we see that they are slipping, sure. But what sense does it make to talk about freedom and liberty if we won't also talk about accountibility and responsibility.
Shawn was a good guy, but I'm not sure he entirely understood that every effect has a cause, that things don't "just happen". His gaming addiction and his suicide were built piece-by-piece, over a long time, including the few years when I knew him. It was obvious he had problems, but it wasn't obvious, or inevitable, that those problems would culminate in the way they did. Every choice he made contributed. Maybe if we'd shot hoops instead of playing Quake, his choices would have been different. Maybe mine would have too, and maybe I would have wound up in some suicidal spiral instead. I find it more plausible that my not having committed suicide is a result of the decisions I made in life, rather than the existance of addictive and/or damaging things in life. Laws don't keep people from getting hooked on crack, and just because nicotine is legal doesn't mean everybody gets addicted to smoking.
Again, I truly feel for Shawn's family, and the families of everybody who has ever committed suicide, for any reason.
...enough to wean me off the addiction themselves eventually. for example WoW is boring me now after about 5 weeks of average playtime.
sigs suck
I'm not saying you can stop every suicide by paying more attention. But the mother needs to look the kid's whole world rather than just World of Warcraft to find what may have influenced him to commit suicide.
Let's say a gang of bullies made a kid's life completely miserable, and the kid's only escape was going home and playing blues songs by BB King on his guitar after school. If his mother takes away his guitar, and the kid kills himself soon after, would you blame the guitar manufacturer for making an "addictive" product? Or BB King for encouraging an "addictive" style of music?
$8.95/mo web hosting
The 12-step program is one of the things discussed in the summary! I know it sounds like a joke, bu there really *IS* one now!
** A Sketch a Week **
http://www.sketchplease.com
There's a good article titled "Is Your Gambling Habit Healthy?" at http://www.ch4nce.com/story/2004/10/7/22341/0323
In general, http://www.ch4nce.com/ has a whole bunch of articles about online gambling, gaming, casinos and stuff like that.
There's a decent short article about this in an old issue of Game Developers Magazine: https://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/store.php?item_i d=287&category=22&book=
Unfortantely, the article is not readily available on-line. However, if memory serves me, the article pretty much says that the choice of "addictive" is a bad choice of words. That other things that we describe positively don't necessarily have the same negative connotation associated with them.
Which makes sense. Why not use the word "appealling"(sp?) or "engaging" or any number of other adjectives... I hope in the future the "addictive-ness" of games is left aside for better terminology...
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As long as you have the choice to stand your dumb ass up and leave, leave it the hell alone. When did it become OK to have no self control?
Some people have little self-control. You're going to have to live with that fact because there's nothing you can do about it. So whether or not it's "OK" with you is irrelevant.
devil's advocate: When did it become okay to prey on people with no self-control?
May I gently suggest that you RTFA?
This parent has dedicated a part of her life to helping people in a position similar to her son's. That's actually a very constructive thing to do. Even if obsessive gaming is only a symptom of other problems, she's doing what she can to help others avoid the fate of her son.
Face it, if this were really an angry parent throwing blame at an easy target then we would see lawsuits, not support communities.
This lawsuit seems as ridiculous as parents suing McDonalds because their kids get to fat from eating the stuff.* I have been an online gamer since the early 90s. I started out with text based games. Infact after 12 years, I am still addicted to MTrek http://mtrek.game-host.org/* I wouldn't dream of suing the creators of this game for my lost wages, money wasted on failed college classes, or any of the other misfortunes I have suffered over the years as a result of _my own_ addictive personality. I am the one who made the decision to prioritize a game over other more important aspects of my life.* As I grew older and more mature, I realized I have a problem, but the game isn't it. It is all me. I am also addicted to nicotine and alchohol, but I have learned to control myself and place my responsibilities over the mental need for these vices. I have set limits for myself. I buy one carton of cigarettes a month, and I buy a 12 pack of beer a week. I only play my game until 8:00pm at the latest. That gives me about an hour a day after work, and I don't play it at all on the weekends.* I realize that if I slip and start playing outside of the limits I have set for myself, I will quickly be drawn back into the game to a point where my work performance would suffer(and of course my commission) and my obligations to my friends and family would be neglected.* Sadly, many people can not control themselves and the resulting downward spiral is no different than that of a heroine addict. The real question is, "Why have we become a society of whiners and ankle-grubbers who feel that the burgoise owes the less-fortunate for the misfortune they have brought upon themselves?"
no.
And they are trying to legalize it. Let the wierdo's play thier version of crack as it isn't actually hurting anyone but themselves.
Honestly, where's the "Right to be Stupid" act when you need it?
Empathetic-- 94% You tend to walk in someone else's shoes a hundred miles before pointing a finger.
I read the FA, which says nothing bad about Everquest or Online Gaming. Even the referenced old story had Wooley suing for information about the content of Everquest, not to blame them for the suicide--at least, so far. In the FA, Wooley states:
;)
My son, Shawn, committed suicide as a direct result of being addicted to the EverQuest game.
She is attributing the addiction, not the game. However, the subtext implies that she's fishing for direct evidence of non-game-like psychological techniques use to influence the players' psyches.
I think the worst part is the 12-Step concept to "curing" addiction. Okay, so I'm heavily influenced by Penn & Teller's Bullsh!t episode on 12-Steps. It appears the best thing for addiction recovery is understanding the addiction. However, the blame and responsibility is ultimately on the person him/herself.
The scary part is, I have some of the symptoms of MMORPG addiction on offline, single-player games. Mostly it's the food, sleep, and housekeeping neglect. I need to reevaluate my time management.
I need another cup of coffee