Topic: Damnit, friends dont let friends play World of Warcraft
Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
damnit, I had a game planned to play this morning at 9 am, with several people including KoM but my other friend who was going to be either Byzantium or Timmurids played wow all night, got to sleep at 8 ish and says he cant play, I had to work, got to bed at 3 am and still woke up for the game.
He should've went to sleep at a reasonable time to play with he IRL friends not his virtual ones damnit.
IP: Logged |
posted
Boo! You have to make time for WoW, just like for your spouse or kids. It's an important part of your life man!
You guys might want to have an intervention with your roommate. It sounds like he might be on drugs or possessed by demons. Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
I dont have it but the fact that people spend all day playing it and that they have to pay every month for it keeps me away from it.
Posts: 1158 | Registered: Feb 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
My roommates do nothing but play WOW. I can't even remember the last time I saw either of them doing something away from the computer. I wish I was exaggerting. As such, I have no desire to play it ever.
Posts: 1947 | Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged |
Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
don't get me wrong, the title is a bit misleading I myself like(d) to play WoW but unlike the vast majority of gamers I don't get addicted, I may seem like I'm addicted to my computer but in reality its a boredom thing, I play on the computer the same way the older generation reads books! Tis' true, a couple of years ago when I havent read all my books yet the time spent reading vs computer time was about 90 : 10 % !!
Now its reversed because there are almost either A) no new books out or B) I cant afford to buy new books.
So I geuss I'm really not addicted to my computer after all, just addicted to passing the time away.
IP: Logged |
posted
I know a lot of guys at work that play WoW. The amount of time they put into it turns me off to it completely. I play games on my computer, yes. However, I time myself. 1 hour of play, and then get out of the house. Now days, this only happens about once a week. Between work and the wife-to-be I just don't have the time that I used too.
It freaks me out when the guys at work talk about the game too. The characters and other associated stuff. They practically live by it. I find more important things to do. Things like discussing which washer and dryer she wants when we move into the house, or her getting a new job, or even what kind of puppy we are going to get (and the fact if her rottwieler will get along with it).
Posts: 2208 | Registered: Feb 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
It's a very fun game, but it certainly has addictive qualities. It's not easy to play for a short period of time, there's always more to do.
I played it for about a year, and it was fun, but it wasted a HUGE amount of time. Sure, I wasn't really doing anything else important, but it was a crutch to keep from doing anything important.
It's mindless entertainment and a quick fix. Any time you're the least bit bored, you can always find something to do in the game, so it becomes the standard answer to boredom.
Why go to the trouble of going out and doing something in real life (RL), when you can log in and know you'll "accomplish" something?
Fun, but bad news if you have anything better to do. And if you don't have anything better to do, you might work on that.
Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
I have a friend that plays, I think Final Fantasy to a degree that she's lost most of her friends, including me to a degree, because she just won't make time for them (us). She spends all her damned time playing that stupid escape from reality and talking to her online friends. Eventually my other friends and I just gave up, we stopped calling her and asking her to do stuff.
She's been off the games recently, and everyone has been trying to hang out with her a lot more, but we're all basically waiting for her to go back to the games and ignore us again.
False realities have a tendency to ruin real life.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
True. When your life on the Internet becomes more fun, more exciting, and easier to relate to than your life in the real world, you've got problems.
I think part of the addictive nature is in the denial and self punishment. Once you realize that you're messing up your real life in exchange for a false one, it's scary and painful. You have to tell yourself that it's fine, and that the video game world is real and meaningful too, to justify the time you've wasted.
Either that, or you can fall into a cycle of depression, where you can't think of anything to do, or nobody wants to hang out, so you'll just play the game a little more.
Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
I also don't like WoW because of what it does to people. Their relationships in "real life" suffer so they can waste time on what? A bigger sword? A better looking hat? More "virtual gold?"
quote:Now its reversed because there are almost either A) no new books out or B) I cant afford to buy new books.
You can't afford to buy new games, either. You steal them, IIRC. So why not download books that are no longer under copyright, which is both legal and satisfying? Lots of sites -- most notably Project Gutenberg -- facilitate this.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
There's this kid at my school who only talks about that game. Thats all he does. Hes a freakin nerd except for the being smart part. He doesnt do any homework, he dozes off in class, and when you try to talk to him its like hes somewhere else. I keep expecting him to fall to the ground and have a seizure.
Posts: 1158 | Registered: Feb 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
Yeah, no WoW for me. Why pay per month when I can play a much much better game minus the graphics for free?
Posts: 3295 | Registered: Jun 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
The whole WoW thing makes me uncomfortable. I saw a lot of people I know get sucked into a little Warcraft clique and now that's all they talk about and the only people they associate with. It's just creepy that a virtual world can have so much influence on people.
It’s similar to the little groups that form with people who play various sports, the football kids, the basketball kids, etc. but at least those are real flesh and blood people and not a 40 year old computer engineer masquerading as a level 47 night elf in his parent’s basement.
Posts: 959 | Registered: Oct 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
Yeah i always thought video games were funner if they involved strategy or at least were fun. I can't see how WoW falls into any of those two categorys. Blizzard made a new illicit drug when that game came out.
Posts: 1158 | Registered: Feb 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
Fortunately I never had the experience of playing WoW with online friends. The friends I played it with were, almost entirely, real-life friends. Quite frequently we were in the same room together, but not all the time. Much more fun than the alternative (for me it was Everquest with only VR friends), and not just because WoW was a better game.
Posts: 17164 | Registered: Jun 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
I actually found WoW to be quite boring. I bought it 3 weeks ago, and haven't logged in for about a week and a half. Subscription's canceled and expires on Thursday.
Anyone want a WoW account?
In case anyone wonders, my marriage broke up due to Star Wars Galaxies. My ex played it 16-20 hours a day, met a guy online, and her real life couldn't match the fantasy world she made with him. She announced she was moving out 3 weeks after she met him, and was gone less than 2 weeks after that.
Thing is. . she never actually met the guy. Ever. Her entire relationship with him was in that game, on chat, e-mail, and the phone.
That said, I know of 2 married couples that met on online games. But I have heard of many more break-ups than I have of people getting together.
Posts: 1323 | Registered: Aug 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
I just about lost a friend to that game. The man (actually turned 25 before discovering online games) never had much of a social life to begin with. Now he won't make any weekend plans to do anything but play WoW. He has actually talked about how it might be a good thing if he lost his job, because then he could play more.
Posts: 3134 | Registered: Mar 2005
| IP: Logged |
Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
tom tom tom, haven't we already had a thread closed because of that topic?
IP: Logged |
posted
Its strange to me to see so many angry posts by former WOWers and their former friends. I play WOW adamently but I also know that there need to be prioritites in peoples lives. Is WOW really the first thing to come along and take up peoples free time?
The problem with WOW is it so completely provides an alternative for what might be lacking in your life. There is the sociality (and I am sorry this is how it is, but nerds are so much more accepting and friendly then most groups of people). There is the very fun and addicting gameplay. There are new additions to it on a almost bimonthly basis thus keeping the world fresh and interesting.
People want friends, WOW provides them with a medium (knock it all you wan't but if your friend prefers to spend time in a game then with you, perhaps you ought to evaluate what your friendship is bringing to the table if he/she prefers the game). Its a fun social activity. I have never heard of anyone playing so many hours in WOW just by themselves, people are always in groups or guilds doing things as a team.
But WOW like anything else has to be kept in check. How many people just watch TV all day long and never do anything else? Its a much older problem then WOW. But TV does not provide any sort of social interaction, but video games do. Lots of VERY interesting people play WOW, and WOW provides a common basis for discussion right off the bat. There is no first glance rejections. You don't say "oh man that guy is ugly I don't want to talk to him," because you cannot see what the person really looks like.
Is it a problem when people do not want to leave WOW in order to hang out with real people, well it might be. I know a girl who met a guy on WOW and they are getting married. I also know a man who spent so much time on WOW that he sacrificed so many other things that use to be important. The 2nd guy was (yours truely) but I figured things out (at least I think so) and I started schedueling my WOW time so that I have more free time to do other things.
I work full time now, and I am getting married in July. She lets me play wow 2 evenings a week and if something comes up on one of my WOW nights, I am perfectly willing to drop a raid that night. IMHO WOW is a landmark game, and it has been one the most fun I have ever played. If people are ruining their lives through excess playing, thats not a problem with WOW, its a problem with the person. If your solution to them playing WOW is to go watch a movie, that might be one of the less effective solutions.
I dunno I am rambling and Ill probably look back on this post and think its retarded, but these are just some words from a current WOW player, who has seen both sides of the coin.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:You can't afford to buy new games, either. You steal them, IIRC. So why not download books that are no longer under copyright, which is both legal and satisfying? Lots of sites -- most notably Project Gutenberg -- facilitate this.
There are lots of good books to be gotten from Gutenberg.
But if Blayne knows enough to download games (assuming he downloads them himself and doesn't just get them from friends), he knows enough to download copyrighted books as well.
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:I am sorry this is how it is, but nerds are so much more accepting and friendly then most groups of people
Although this is widely believed, I'm not sure I believe it. Its pretty easy to be accepting of others when you only have to deal with them through the filter of a game or a forum and it's so easy to ignore them.
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:The problem with WOW is it so completely provides an alternative for what might be lacking in your life. There is the sociality (and I am sorry this is how it is, but nerds are so much more accepting and friendly then most groups of people).
Did we play the same game? I've never met a more unrelentingly unfriendly, immature, STUPID playerbase than the one I encountered playing WoW. It had the least friendly community of any MMO I'd ever played. The only online community I've seen get worse is Counterstrike's.
MMORPGs are relatively new, so it makes sense that people are focusing on them as a new target for their problems when really, the problems lie with the people, not the game.
Posts: 4313 | Registered: Sep 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
I will admit that the problem is not necesarrily with WoW. I've seen relationships end due to an obsessive golfer. I just don't know how to respond when my best friend won't even go to a baseball game (used to be a favorite thing to do) because he would miss something on WoW.
Posts: 3134 | Registered: Mar 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:Did we play the same game? I've never met a more unrelentingly unfriendly, immature, STUPID playerbase than the one I encountered playing WoW.
This varies a huge amount from server to server. For instance, the average person on an RP server is older and more mature than the average person on a PVP server, by a HUGE margin. Plus, people tend to be less like you described on the Horde side. So in effect, yes, he wasn't playing the same game as you (unless you happen to play on the same server and same faction as he does).
Posts: 5656 | Registered: Oct 1999
| IP: Logged |
quote:Their relationships in "real life" suffer so they can waste time on what? A bigger sword? A better looking hat? More "virtual gold?"
That reminds of the Li vs Arctic Ice case where Li charged his online game provider with failure to protect his "possession of biological weapons." One view is that "The player has spent time, money and energy in gaining these tokens. They carry value and can be exchanged or traded between players. It is a form of virtual property, much like intellectual property."
The fact that these virtual items are being sold for very real cash shows the value that they have. One estimate calculated the EverQuest virtual world to be valued as the 77th richest country based on its real world value.
It's almost scary how much real value these virtual things have, and the fact that there is a very large number of very real people that feel this way.
Posts: 1256 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
i'm a nich reader, DragonLance, Forgotten Realms, Tolkien, HP, Asimov and whatever odd books I can get at flea markets that have a nice looking cover.
IP: Logged |
quote:This varies a huge amount from server to server. For instance, the average person on an RP server is older and more mature than the average person on a PVP server, by a HUGE margin. Plus, people tend to be less like you described on the Horde side. So in effect, yes, he wasn't playing the same game as you (unless you happen to play on the same server and same faction as he does).
Ordinarily I'd be inclined to agree, but having played on six different servers (two PvP, three regular, one RP) and on both horde and alliance (two horde, one alliance), I have to disagree about the huge margin. There will obviously be variance from server to server, but I honestly saw little to no significant variance on the six I played on.
Posts: 4313 | Registered: Sep 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
I'm playing on a carebear server so I've been on both Horde and Alliance side.. and aside from the typical teenage homophobia I haven't seen anything too awful or out of the ordinary.
It's a game.. Teens will be there. Teens have dirty minds and potty mouths. *shrug*
posted
I've played with a couple end game guilds, which means that I had to interact with a large number of the players.
In Voice over IP programs like Ventrilo and Teamspeak I was rather amazed to find that virtually all the other players were as old or older than I. Im 26. Yeah, there will be teenagers and potty mouths, but blizzard seems to do a good job of addressing the overly offensive individuals and you've always got the /mute function.
One other thing I do to eliminate the immature stupid players is as soon as I get to the barrens (im sure there is a corelary for the alliance) I type /leave 1 Which makes you leave the general chat. Thats where i've found 90% of the inane comments come from.
Posts: 375 | Registered: Mar 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:I've played with a couple end game guilds, which means that I had to interact with a large number of the players.
In Voice over IP programs like Ventrilo and Teamspeak I was rather amazed to find that virtually all the other players were as old or older than I. Im 26. Yeah, there will be teenagers and potty mouths, but blizzard seems to do a good job of addressing the overly offensive individuals and you've always got the /mute function
Guilds that are good enough to consistently organize and pull off good raids tend to have players that are more mature, sensible and are typically older.
posted
I used to play WoW, though now my wife and I play Oblivion. What I hate about MMORPGs is that you have to pay a monthly subscription. I'm not arguing with the reason they charge on a monthly basis, since I know WoW requires a huge amount of Blizzard's attention. However, since I paid for the game on a monthly basis, I almost felt guilty if I didn't playa lot, because I was wasting money. I had to get my money's worth. Of course, people who have no problem with the payment may not feel this way, but since I am a college student, it didn't help.
I went back to regular RPGs, like Oblivion, because I can play whenever I feel like it. I don't have to time it so I am online at the same time as fellow guildies, or wait for hours to get the right group to quest. I am not stuck online in the middle of a quest, because leaving in the middle of a dungeon would be rude (and I hate being rude). So, if something in my family came up (and it does with a 2-yr-old), I felt guilty just dropping out of the group.
Plus, I played with other friends, but I wasn't able to put as much time into it as them. Therefore, they were all leveling faster than me and I started getting behind. Pretty soon, when I would quest with them, I was pretty much worthless during fights. This was frustrating and made me only want to play more to catch up. However, to keep up would have required sacrificing needed family and school time. I eventually had to make a priority decision and cancelled the subscription. Yes, I could have scheduled times to play, but I couldn't keep up with my friends, and that was most important to me on an online game.
So I play individual RPGs, with my wife, and there is NO pressure to play at certain times. I can just save and quit whenever I want, and no one in-game is leveling while I am offline. None of the NPC's come up to me after I log-in and say, "Hey Marlo, where have you been the past 3 days? You missed that awesome raid the other night!" (though that would make for some interesting Oblivion AI )
I also agree that WoW is fun and engaging, but not being able to stop playing is the person's problem, not the game's.
Posts: 684 | Registered: Aug 2001
| IP: Logged |
quote:I am sorry this is how it is, but nerds are so much more accepting and friendly then most groups of people
Although this is widely believed, I'm not sure I believe it. Its pretty easy to be accepting of others when you only have to deal with them through the filter of a game or a forum and it's so easy to ignore them.
I noticed the accepting nature of nerds much sooner than when I started playing WOW. They were the nicest bunch of guys in elementary school all the way into college. My best friend started hanging out with nerds in 6th grade because all his friends became popular and started acting like jerks. I am not saying all nerds are nice, and all popular kids are jerks, but based on my own experience, nerds are the most friendly and pleasent people. I can typically hang out with many groups of people,
you can very easily just sit down with a group of nerds and usually its YOU who decides to leave rather than them pressuring you into going away or being something you are not. Losers they may be, but friendly they remain.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
I've found that just like popular kids or jocks, nerds are much more accepting of those like them (other nerds), and not so accepting of people that aren't like them.
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by mr_porteiro_head: I've found that just like popular kids or jocks, nerds are much more accepting of those like them (other nerds), and not so accepting of people that aren't like them.
Well said. I had individual friends all over the sprectrum in high school, rather then having a group. I've seen them all.
Posts: 3134 | Registered: Mar 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:I've found that just like popular kids or jocks, nerds are much more accepting of those like them (other nerds), and not so accepting of people that aren't like them.
This is true, in my experience, but only up to a point.
At my high school, the "jocks" and "preps" would not let anyone sit at their tables who did not belong in their cliques. You'd get a lot of crossover between those two groups, but that's about it.
The "nerds" (and forgive my horrible labels, as I'm simply choosing the best ones which fit), while perhaps not being inherently any nicer, would not mind if anyone not classified as such sat at their tables, because their social situation was not hurt by it. They were already as low as they could go on the totem pole.
But it was a big deal for the "cool" kids to only associate with cool kids. If they let "uncool" kids associate with them in a social situation, it would hurt their social status, so they were usually quite careful about it. It would even go so far as to get up and find another table if an undesirable sat down at the table they were eating at.
I experienced it once myself. It was not a situation like in the movies where the whole group gets up at once, but it was only slightly more subtle. I sat at a table in high school, and the kids there were clearly unpleased. One got up and sat somewhere else on the pretense of noticing another friend they wanted to sit near. Then another got up to sit by that friend, and others followed until I was the only one left at the table.
(I ended up sitting at the "smart girl" table for the rest of that semester, and that certainly wasn't a bad thing. They, of course, welcomed me. Was strange to go ask if I could sit with them though, and then being the only guy at the table.)
This wasn't true for everyone in the particular groups, as I am speaking of the general trends I experienced. There were, of course, select people in all groups who couldn't care less about their social status, and were all the "cooler" in my eyes because of it .
Posts: 5656 | Registered: Oct 1999
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by mr_porteiro_head: I've found that just like popular kids or jocks, nerds are much more accepting of those like them (other nerds), and not so accepting of people that aren't like them.
I just did not get that from "my nerds" I did not hang out with the nerds as a general habit though my best friend did. Not to talk up myself but I was perfectly comfortable socializing with people from literally every group in my high school. I was not popular, but I could hang out with them, and they, as far as I can tell, were fine with me being there. But I wasn't down with alot of the stupid things the popular kids were often involved with so I often spent my time hanging out with the study owls/bookworms, art junkies, band geeks, god squad (christian activists), even the punks/metal. Based on my own experience even as an adult, nerds are very accepting even to those who are not nerds, as long as these non nerds are not there to make fun of them, but who likes that anyway?
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I've played with a couple end game guilds, which means that I had to interact with a large number of the players.
In Voice over IP programs like Ventrilo and Teamspeak I was rather amazed to find that virtually all the other players were as old or older than I. Im 26. Yeah, there will be teenagers and potty mouths, but blizzard seems to do a good job of addressing the overly offensive individuals and you've always got the /mute function --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Guilds that are good enough to consistently organize and pull off good raids tend to have players that are more mature, sensible and are typically older.
quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: i'm a nich reader, DragonLance, Forgotten Realms, Tolkien, HP, Asimov and whatever odd books I can get at flea markets that have a nice looking cover.
quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: i'm a nich reader, DragonLance, Forgotten Realms, Tolkien, HP, Asimov and whatever odd books I can get at flea markets that have a nice looking cover.
Tsk tsk Blayne.
I don't know. I read a lot of Dragonlance and Forgotten Realms books in my time, and while some were pretty entertaining, there were plenty where you'd do just as well grabbing a random book with a good cover illustration Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
Magson: I played EQ2 when it came out till I hit max level (though I hear they'ved upped max level)
It was a good game, but the classes weren't balanced (which of course, is a huge and difficult problem for all MMOs) and both of my classes were the weakest ones. Being a 50/50 Enchantress/Alchemist was veeeery depressing.
Now I play WoW and I have to say I like it better. It's not as hard core which is bad, but there's PVP.. lots of PVP.. and THAT is lots of fun.
EQ2 is also better about forcing you to group so the game is more social. But WoW has PVP.
EQ2 has a crafting system that makes you really feel like you've accomplished something when you get there. You have to pay attention to what you're doing. WoW, if you have a few stacks of ingrediants you can click the "create all" button and go get some coffee. When you come back, "Hey! I've gained 50 points in Cooking." But then, WoW also has PVP.
posted
I was really interested in EQ2 until they decided they were going to completely revamp the crafting system (this is back within the first 5-6 months of release), removing most of the interdependencies. At that point, I completely lost interest. EQ2 had absolutely nothing special aside from the crafting: it was cookie cutter MMO from start to finish.
Posts: 4313 | Registered: Sep 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
The degree to which playing an MMORPG alone with only virtual friends differed from playing one with real-life friends belies, to me, the idea that such things are truly 'social' when played with only virtual friends.
They're social if you're using a sliding scale and including talking to a beach ball on a deserted island on one end, to hobnobbing at a crowded party at the other end.
Pigeonholing 'nerds' as though they were some sort of subrace where one group of nerds speaks and acts for another group of nerds is just foolish, in my opinion. Here's another spin on how friendly nerds are, based on anecdotal evidence: nerds can sometimes be even more cruel than other so-called groups, because their individuals frequently get crapped on a lot...and so crap on the socially weakest member of their own group to vent, who takes it, because they've got to belong SOMEwhere.
Posts: 17164 | Registered: Jun 2001
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Frown]](frown.gif)
![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
.
![[Cool]](cool.gif)
I did not hang out with the nerds as a general habit though my best friend did. Not to talk up myself but I was perfectly comfortable socializing with people from literally every group in my high school. I was not popular, but I could hang out with them, and they, as far as I can tell, were fine with me being there. But I wasn't down with alot of the stupid things the popular kids were often involved with so I often spent my time hanging out with the study owls/bookworms, art junkies, band geeks, god squad (christian activists), even the punks/metal. Based on my own experience even as an adult, nerds are very accepting even to those who are not nerds, as long as these non nerds are not there to make fun of them, but who likes that anyway?
