How To Help a Friend With an MMO Addiction?

sammydee writes "I have a friend who is addicted to an MMO (Pirates of the Burning Sea). On a typical day, he will wake up around 9am, browse the forums for a bit, then go online and stay online all day, playing until about 3am the following morning, taking only toilet breaks and stopping to eat ready-meals. While the rest of the house works hard revising for exams, this friend will be playing his MMO instead. Now, I am pretty confident that this comprises an unhealthy addiction; unfortunately, I have no idea what to do about it. Any attempt to physically prevent him from playing the game would most likely result in an outburst of anger and possibly physical violence. Attempts at telling him he has a problem have been met with derision and angry retorts. Slashdotters, what would you do to help out a friend in this situation? Perhaps you are a reformed addict yourself — if so, how did you break out of the habit? Or maybe I should just leave well enough alone and allow him to continue? Any thoughts are gratefully received."

Comments

Delete

[EdIII]

Hack his account and delete it. Keep doing it. He will figure it out eventually, just don't get caught.

When all of his "work" is destroyed, it will make it hard for him to want to continue slaving away. Keep doing it.

If he is not deterred by that at all, well then I suggest seeking professional help and at least getting an intervention started with the rest of his friends.

Make an educational MMO Game

[ergo98]

Work exam material into the game and you have double good!

Really, though, wouldn't it be great if games like World of Warcraft turned into actually practical learning experiences, instead of simply forcing you to learn a lot of completely irrelevant info? Of course I haven't played a MMO(RPG) since a brief stint with Ultimate Online, so maybe kids nowadays really are studying their double-slit experiment results to level up their Quantum Photon Physics skill.

Seek professional help

[kestrelokes]

I had a friend in college who was addicted to an MMO - not quite at the hours you describe, but not far off. Every semester when finals came around, we tried to tear him away from his computer and help him study, but he never listened. When convincing/arguing/pleading failed (and eventually, it always failed), we would hide or break his game CDs, but he would buy, pirate, borrow, or otherwise find a new copy. He failed out of school.

Seek professional help. Talk to the counselors at your school.

Re:It's Called S.E.X

[DoofusOfDeath]

Sex is an integral part of almost all humans, and we need it. Use this to your advantage.

If my male housemate ever try this, all they'd accomplish is me backed into a corner, one hand on an my revolver, half looking at them and half looking at my computer screen.

Re:It's Called S.E.X

[jhfry]

Thats what did it for me. 80+ hrs per week on EQ, while in the USAF...

Since getting clean, I can't get into any games anymore... I'd imagine it's like getting clean from crack, nothing will ever be good enough to replace it. You try to give it a chance but you can't really commit enough to get really into it.

My wife bought me Fallout 3 for Christmas and I haven't even taken the cellophane off yet... though I fully expect to love the game like I loved the other two, I know how it will play out. I will not see my family for a weekend, go back to work on Monday and never play it again because I realize that it's just a game and can't commit to it.

advice from the agony ent: don't be hasty

[epine]

It's not a problem until he flunks out of school, gets booted from the house for not paying rent, ...

My god, you'd fit well into the medical establishment. Studying to become a doctor?

Q: My friend survives on a diet of poutine and coke. A: It's not a problem until his heart palpitates.

I guess nothing is a problem in life until the condition is so severe that the poor sop is ready to cut a large cheque (supposing any funds remain) for quadruple bypass surgery performed by someone who didn't flunk out of school.

Great advice from the perspective of the doctor's retirement fund, not such good advice from the perspective of the future patient.

The underlying anger thing suggests this person is not ready to confront his inner conflict in the context of the larger world. Probably the best move is to distance yourself from the impending conflagration.

If you set yourself up to become the lightening rod for your friend's anger, and you have the patience of a saint, your friend might recover, but your friendship won't. One way or another, your friend will ultimately classify you in the "before" or "after" category.

You do have an opportunity to provide your friend with a small glimpse of leadership and self determination by taking responsibility for your own emotional content.

"I don't like hanging around with you when you play games 15 hours a day. It worries and irritates me to think about where your life might end up if you continue to behave this way. We need to think about different living arrangements. I hope we'll continue to be friends. I'll be very upset if we end up falling out over this. One of us needs to start looking for a new place to live. How are we going to sort this out?"

I've been reading a lot of economic theory lately. Apparently, according to economists, humans are rational agents in almost every respect.

This via Colby Cosh, my favourite lucid and agreeable wingnut.
http://offsettingbehaviour.blogspot.com/2009/04/berl-redux.html

Who's to tell me that my utility function is wrong?

Unfortunately, there is a lot of truth to this. Where he means to put the emphasis on "wrong", I would put the emphasis on "who", as it concerns your friend. If you solve for x and x = yourself, I'd harbour some grave doubts about *your* utility function after you showed the common sense to look before leaping.

Get his attention somehow, and keep doing it.

[Anonymous Coward]

My wife would tell you that it took many interventions over a long period of time to finally get me to see the light about my gaming addiction. I had it mildly compared to what I've been reading. While it ultimately had to be my decision, I never would have made it without her intervening and showing me how my addiction affected her and our relationship in general. Crying helped a lot, but that might be awkward in your case...

Some of the advice about leaving him alone because he's an adult is ridiculous. If you care it's worth intervening (obviously you do considering your post), and he'll thank you for it eventually even though he might hate you for it short term. But even if you lose his friendship, it would be worth it in the long run if he breaks his addiction. He's throwing away his life.

I would try to convince him to take a vacation for a while...2 weeks maybe. Hopefully it will end up feeling like a vacation to him. If you can spare the time, keep him busy and social and possibly make it impossible to log on (go out of town with him). You'll probably need to pull him away many times before he sees the light. I would also put some material on addictive behavior in front of him. Being compared to a gambling addict or a drug addict helped open my eyes too.

I don't recommend doing anything sneaky like others have recommended (like cutting out his internet access). That's just going to put barriers up and he'll close you off.

Read BigRedKitty

[Sean0michael]

Have him read this:

Big Red Kitty: Farewell and Thank You

A few posts down is the end of a very famous and highly-regarded WoW blogger. He realized that he had completely neglected his wife and son for years. WoW was his "mistress" and he was an addict, like your friend. Tell him "Don't be like this guy." This guy would easily tell you that real people are a lot more important than the game. As soon as that game goes end-of-life, what will he have? Not even a friend.

If he doesn't respond, you and your housemates ought to save his life -- not an exaggeration. Find a way to cut off his connection to the Internet at the house. Hide his mouse. Remove his power cable, or cut the fuses to that part of the house. Let him borrow your computer for whatever he needs to do for homework.

He may hate you, but you are doing the right thing. He may not see it, but his vision is clearly messed up. Best of luck to you.

Actually, sex won't help (True, unfunny story)

[kklein]

You're joking, but I'm serious: This probably won't work.

I was in exactly the same position as the poster when I was in college (EverQuest). My best friend from the time I was 5 just disappeared. He stopped going to classes, he stopped sleeping normal times (at least this guy seems to have a schedule--my friend was on a totally strange cycle that seemed to rotate). He only ate leftovers or other stuff that he could bring up to his room. Until this time, he and I always used to trade off cooking dinner and actually sit down for dinner each night. He was, in a very real sense, like a brother. Closer than my actual brother, really. I considered his parents basically another set in addition to my own, and the families were very close.

Anyway, I'll never forget the morning that his girlfriend--another old friend of mine--showed up at our place one morning to try to drag him out. He wouldn't even come to his door. She just kept pleading at the door, becoming more frantic. They'd been together for years. Finally she said, "So, you want me to leave?" "Yes." "If I leave, I'm never coming back, is that okay with you?" "...Yes."

She was devastated. I spend the rest of the day taking care of her. She left that evening after I made her dinner, and I think that's the last time I ever saw her.

My friend just continued this "life" style, even as I called his parents and asked for their help. They couldn't get him to quit. He flunked out of his classes, and his parents stopped giving him money for rent and food (he had been paying his share all this time, which was nice--I'd leave a note for what he owed and there'd be a check there in the morning). Finally I had to evict him (my parents owned the place and we rented from them). It was heartbreaking; he wasn't showering and I had to air that room out for a week. He was pale and emaciated. Just totally a different person (he was a long-distance runner, always in way better shape than me--we were on the cross-country team in high school together--fun times).

He moved into his parents basement, and they tried to kick him out a few times, but basically their conscience wouldn't let them. This went on for at least another year at their place. I got updates on his "condition" through my dad, who had lunch with his dad (and some of the other guys from around town) every Friday.

Then one day, he comes upstairs and says to his dad "I canceled my account. I'm going for a run."

Now he's addicted to long-distance running, and is finally finishing his degree. There was a period for a few years before he started school again where he worked at a shoe store part time (I'm pretty sure he ran out of his large savings--"frugal" has never been the word for his level of financial conservativeness--by paying all those months of EQ bills). Despite these positive steps, though, our friendship is completely broken. I've tried to hang out with him a few times since that time, but he's just different. I don't know him. He's gone.

So what I'm saying is this: I don't think there's anything the poster can do. This addiction won't kill the guy, though, so that's good, but I think that what stops him will probably be running out of money or something along those lines. He's not going to get better, I don't think. He's just one of those people who gets addicted to things. Probably some form of OCD or something. Just give up and focus on your own studies. He's gone.

Re:Actually, sex won't help (True, unfunny story)

[kklein]

Surely with hindsight you can think of something?

Actually, yes I can.

If I could do it all again, I would have listened to him when he said he didn't want to start playing because he was afraid he wouldn't be able to stop, instead of pressuring him to pick it up so we could play together. =(

Re:Actually, sex won't help (True, unfunny story)

[aleatory_story]

I was addicted to EverQuest throughout all of high school. I pretty much missed that _entire_ time of social development. I wanted to avoid it, and EQ made it easy. EQ was the kind of game where you could sit there and do your homework while your group was meditating. I still kept my attendance up and had good grades. I just avoided social interaction.

I had parents and friends tell me that it was a bad idea, but I just turned on my defense mechanisms. It was Them Versus Me. By taking that approach, they became the bad guys. They became someone who doesn't understand because they didn't understand.

The only person who *might* be able to get through to your friend in a direct way is former MMO addict. But of course, as it's been reiterated on here plenty of times, the only one who can truly get through is the addict himself.

In my situation, it was a mixture of things that got me over my addiction. Firstly, the game started to get old. I tried other games like Asheron's Call, Anarchy Online, Dark Age of Camelot, SWG, etc. These continued my addiction for a while longer. But eventually you find the same things in every game and they just keep getting more boring.

Secondly, I started to really re-evaluate myself and what I was doing with my life. I knew I was a social misfit and that had to be fixed. When I started college, I quit my games and started on a clean slate. I developed for a while and it was going great. I was making some real progress. I even got a girlfriend that my friends gawked at.

Then EverQuest 2 came out. Yeah. I went back. It was a relapse, you could say. I went back to my habits of nothing but gaming. I still kept up with my school work but I avoided my girlfriend. Eventually, she gave me the ultimatum of her or the game. I tried to convince her that it was only temporary and that I'd be over it soon, but she wouldn't listen to that. So, I chose the game. I told myself 'I don't want a girlfriend who would give me an ultimatum like that. I want someone more patient.' In retrospect, I know it sounds pretty stupid. This is just how I reassured myself as I continued to play EQ2. It's just how the defense mechanisms work.

I regretted that decision for a long while, though. Eventually, as I expected, I got bored of EQ2. And WoW. And all the other games that were popular around 2004. Eventually *none* of them sparked my interest. I graduated from college and started a job. By that time, I was totally done with MMOs and I haven't looked back.

So, to sum up: it sometimes unfortunately takes big life transitions like going from college to a career to really wake someone up. Right now, in their life, they are at a point where they are content. They enjoy their games. You cannot argue this with them because it will only make it worse. You can only try to be subtle about it. Try to make them jealous. Bring over hot girls that they can't have. Go on trips with your buddies and come back and tell him how awesome it was. He won't be receptive at first--not at all. He will have some clever retort. But you will have planted the seed of corruption. Eventually, when he's tossing and turning trying to sleep, these things will eat at him.... not that I speak from experience in this department =x

Eventually, he'll get over it. Fortunately, MMO addictions are a lot easier to recover from than drug addictions. They can ruin lives just as well, but fortunately once you get a taste of some good fun in real life, you quickly forget why the hell you were playing those games in the first place.

A very unusual WoW addict

[Brewmeister_Z]

My next door neighbors are a retired man (in his 70s) and his wife. He started playing WoW this past winter. He told me his highest character is a 62 and he has a few others as well. I think his grandson got him started on the game. I would say he is officially addicted since he has just bought a second computer so he can play 2 characters at the same time.

However, he has the advantage of not having to work anymore and the only major thing this could be negative toward is the relationship with his wife. Makes me wonder what it will be like when people my age (30s) get to retirement. Imagine a nursing home being like a 24/7 LAN party!

I used to play WoW and other MMOs but then I got a girlfriend and now I am married. I don't really miss it. When I do go back to play or see what is new in the updates, it doesn't draw me in the way it used to.

My solutions was to cheat

[AsmordeanX]

I played WoW a lot. To the point of being unhealthy a few times. How did I get away from it? I cheated.

MMOs are hard to cheat at but a friend an I found a world emulator that was about 95% accurate. We spent the next week going everywhere, doing everything, getting everything. We made custom weapons/armour that made us walking gods. We set Illidan in a duel with Ragnaros. We swapped models so that we looked like Magmadar or C'Thun.

After a while we got bored and tried the normal game. It sucked. We couldn't one-shot things. Gold took hours/days to accumulate. Everything just seemed so tedious.

I went for three months without playing. I picked up WotLK and played for a week and got bored. I uninstalled it and haven't thought about it since.

Re:It's Called S.E.X

[TellarHK]

The problem with gambling vs. MMO's is that the comparison fails to cover the companionship issue that group play brings in. You could almost compare MMO addiction to a battered spouse, in some of the emotional aspects.

Kent

[Anonymous Coward]

I was addicted to WoW for 2 years, in the end my family sat down with me, including my older brother who I have a huge amount of respect for. And they just straight up told me I was wasting away and that I had so much potential to excel at things other than a computer game. That gave me the jolt I needed, Iogged on to my toons, de'd all the decent gear, deposited it all in my guilds bank, deleted my toons one by one. That was last Friday night, the following Monday I joined them gym, have been 3 times this week as well as 2 6km runs. Lifes goood. Maybe that's what he needs? Some sort of intervention by people he respects (Family, friends, maybe an old teacher etc.)

Re:It's Called S.E.X

[bemymonkey]

Uh, actually... *raises hand*.

I've become somewhat addicted to my newsreader (not to mention Slashdot comments), and it's really been cutting into my studies.

Seriously, my girlfriend kicks me out of bed when she leaves in the morning, then I get a cup of coffee and start reading. Some time or other I'll pack up my netbook and go to a lecture... bam, laptop's on the desk, newsreader open. So I leave the laptop at home, oh, wait, Google Reader works on my smartphone - crap.

I know I could get much more productive stuff done (or at least some reading related to my chosen field of studies) during this time, but I just can't stop. I've become an information junky (and not the good kind - the crappy kind, like what kind of new geek toys there are, and the crap that's here on Slashdot)... This sort of behaviour goes on until about 1 or 2 in the morning. Drives my girlfriend crazy, too.

I dunno, is it an addiction? Or just the same thing as reading the newspaper every day, just a bit more excessive?

I really gotta get off here. It's 9:24AM on a Saturday, the sun's shining outside, and I'm laying in bed writing up a post to complete strangers who don't care about what I have to say anyway. That's it, time for some fresh air... *opens window and goes back to reading*.

Unless the GF gets addicted too

[Moraelin]

Actually, you may be surprised to learn that women get addicted to gaming just as easily.

A pretty surrealistic attempt at a relationship in late high school went nowhere fast after I showed her a computer game. Her parents didn't have or want a computer, for whatever reason. (Presumably also because back then they cost a lot more and did a lot less, so it wasn't really mainstream yet.) I figure it didn't take more than an hour or two for her to become interested in the computer instead of me. She only wanted to come over, play a game all afternoon, then go back home.

(Cue wisecracks about the computer having a nicer personality than me;)

Plus, probably the best example of a MMO addict I know is... mom. Last I heard, she's sleeping about 4 hours a night 'cause any more and she can't do all her daily quests for that day. So, you know, you would have thought she'd get dad off it, but she actually got more addicted.

Re:It's Called S.E.X

[MMC Monster]

I'm not sure why others here haven't admitted that they are addicted to /.. I check the site a couple dozen times a day, and my work doesn't even put me in front of a computer.

At home it's even worse.

I know I have a problem, but I opt to believe that it's not serious since I do my job and have a decent relationship with my wife and kids. But I think I would be a better person if I read /. just a half hour a day, instead of the 2-3 hours (aggregate) I put in now.

LSD therapy

[pbaer]

This will be controversial but hear me through. Assuming he doesn't have any medical conditions that make it dangerous for him to take LSD, get him some. The basic idea behind this is the psychedilic helps him hit rock bottom, so he wants to change his life. It worked pretty well for treating alcoholism before LSD was banned.

Handbook for the Therapeutic Use of LSD-25