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Help for an MMORPG Addict?

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the time-for-an-intervention dept.

A worried comrade asks: "A friend of mine has had what many of us (his peers) are starting to consider a serious problem that we are becoming very worried about. He is addicted to World of Warcraft, and not in the same way the rest of us are. While most of us are able to disconnect from the game to take care of our own affairs, he plays to the exclusion of his friends, his job (he calls in sick a lot, it is starting to get noticed) and his life. How do you help someone who is actively throwing their whole life away to play a game?"

4 of 559 comments (clear)

  1. What worked for me by LearningHard · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I was majorly addicted not just to mmorpg but to games as a whole. This period lasted for several years of my life during which I ignored my school responsibilities (I was in college). I also managed to lose a decent job at this time. Thankfully my girlfriend helped me. We started dating before the addiction started. During the addiction nothing mattered and finally she told me that if I didn't straighten up she was gone. I loved her enough that I managed to control my addiction and while I still play a good bit I still leave time for school, gf, friends, etc. I have also recovered in school and after this semester will be 12 hours from graduating with a dual major in both Finance and Economics.

    It takes different things for different people. Lots of things were tried on me but the feelings I had for my girlfriend (now fiance we are getting married this summer) are what won the day for me.

  2. Re:I've been there by tansey · · Score: 5, Interesting

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcoholics_Anonymous# AA.27s_Critics

    From the wiki:

    "Specific criticisms sometimes put forth by AA's critics (some of whom go so far as to call AA a cult) include:

            * There have been at least three randomized clinical trials that studied the effectiveness of AA. Specifically: Ditman et al. 1967; Brandsma et al. 1980; Walsh et al. 1991.
                        o Dr. Ditman found that participation in A.A. increased the alcoholics' rate of rearrest for public drunkenness.[1]
                        o Dr. Brandsma found that A.A. increased the rate of binge drinking. After several months of indoctrination with A.A. 12-Step dogma, the alcoholics in A.A. were doing five times as much binge drinking as a control group that got no treatment at all, and nine times as much binge drinking as another group that got Rational Behavior Therapy. Brandsma alleges that teaching people that they are alcoholics who are powerless over alcohol yields very bad results and that it becomes a self-fulfilling prediction -- they relapse and binge drink as if they really were powerless over alcohol.[2]
                        o And Dr. Walsh found that the so-called "free" A.A. program was actually very expensive -- it messed up patients so that they required longer periods of costly hospitalization later on.[3]"

  3. Dont lash yourself to the mast... by Lanoitarus · · Score: 5, Interesting

    ...just let the Sirens kick you out.

    My friend had a better approach than deleting his stuff. He download a out-of-date version of WOWglider (a blatant hack), knowing that blizzards hack detection system would catch it immediately, and left it running overnight. Came back in the morning to find his account permanantly banned by blizzard.

    Why strap yourself to the pole when you can get the

  4. Re:I've been there by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting
    If the 12 Steps were about personal responsibility, they'd read something like this:
    1. We admitted that our use of alcohol had made our lives had become unmanageable.
    2. Came to believe that we could restore ourselves to sanity.
    3. Made a decision to make that happen.
    4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
    5. Admitted to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
    6. Were entirely ready to have get rid of all these defects of character.
    7. Made a decision to make that happen as well.
    8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
    9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
    10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
    11. Sought the support of friends and family to continue this indefinitely.
    12. We tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

    Which would also make them non-religious.