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Does WoW make people less social?
Arcticblue
Member Posts: 270
Let me first clearify that this is not a bashing at WoW, games like Lineage and Everquest do the same trick honestly.
Here where I live I know some people that play WoW alot, and others that play EvE-Online, and one who play Everquest.
Now those who play WoW, almost all do one thing, they sit in playing WoW all the time, they hardly have time to come out and do other stuff, one even have problems at school or attending at school as far as I know.
One girl I knew from before she started to play WoW and after she started to play WoW, what happend ??? a total loss of social life okey before WoW she was a partygirl, liked to go out and be with friends, after WoW she became less and less social and her friends noticed a change, she even found her love in the game (a real person she later met and moved in with) now that is not nessesary bad ofcourse.
EvE-Online and I can say me I love playing eve, however my job does not let me sit all day long with the game and I often go out to visit friends and so on...
That apply for my friends who play that game too, it might have something to do with the skill system ofcourse.
Everquest, I only know one guy who play it and aparently he sort of lost his family because of that game (wife and kid)...
So have anyone other noticed such change in their friends when they started to play WoW ??? it can't be healthy, most of the guys I know playing WoW are schoolkids (yes I work as a youthclub leader and I hardly ever see them at the club unless they have lost connection, mother taken internet away or parents sent them out because of too much time infront of the computer)
Comments
Artic? Are you talking to us?
It is not the game, it is the individuals. Now if they would be bored an unhappy they would prolly be more social, boredom make folks socials...but that is NOT something we desire. Boredom is the worst thing in life. It create an artificial social desire that is not even healthy.
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
All games that require you to be online to gain exp, skills etc kills your real life social life if you get hooked on it. Its seen countless of times since the first MMORPG's hit the markets and lots of people have lost friends and families because of it. You can compare it to what happens when people gets addicted to alcohol, drugs, gaming etc. Of course the addicts will say that they still are social individuals but that their social lifes now takes place ingame instead. But yes I would say that these games makes people less social if they get hooked on them, which is quite easy.
Its only because EVE has that unique feature where you can set yourself up to train and then log of while your "character" still trains that you havent experienced it yourself.
Well don't laugh about it, I am dead serious as most of these "wow addicts" are youngsters who within a year will have to move away from this place and go school, will they make it ? I don't know... one I am really really worried about as he is hardly ever outside and even some of these hard core wow players have reacted to that !!!.
Ofcourse their parents should activly take part of this and get their kids up and out of the chair infront of the computer but still... should the makers of the games have some responsibilities ??? here in Norway for example we tax alcohol and tobacco (quite heavy too) because of health hazzard... does addiction to games (like WoW, Everquest and games that "force" you to be online alot to go up in level) qualify to such responsibility from the makers of the game ?
See that China is already demanding changes to how much you can gain in level each day to "force" people not to play so long sessions.
I guess to some people it would be an issue. I can see were you would be concerned but in my opinion that isnt the case with Wow its very casual, but eq and other games i dunno. I understand that its a game and not to take priority over life i can only hope that others see that to. For some people games like that are a good thing , we never think about the guy that studders and cant talk to people because he feels that hinders his communication once i had a girl in my guild that was mute and i never knew for a long time. For some people i guess it can be a good thing cause they cant get that kind of human interaction somewere else. I think in the begining of ffonline they give some sort of warning i cant remember what it says but its a good thought even though not everyone reads it.
I think of the time i spend on games as a momentary reward somthing im getting for short term. So with that in mind its not that high on my priority list. The whole idea of this gets out of hand when we begin to say we "have to". I dont think we should limit people on what they play just make sure they understand that in doing this they dont gain anything in real life other then satisfation. For us this is a hobby some ppl build models some and some play warhammer4000 (or whatever the name is) we just happen to play games just like anyone that can get lost in a hobby for a couple of days it happens to us to.
Demoku: Anarchy Online (Rimor)
WOW is very time consuming and this game is not deigned for casual gamers as the dev claimed they are. It is designed for kids who have a lot of damn time. This is what every level 60 wants in the game... JOIN AN UBER GUILD. GET UBER EPIC GEAR or GET PVP GEAR. GET to HIGH WARLORD/GRAND MARSHAL RANK.
In order to get all the things I mentioned above, you basically need to spend up to 15 hours a day to get them. I am not joking... you literally need to spend your whole life to keep up your status in the game. If you don't believe me, buy this game and you'll know what I mean... see it for yourself. Again, HARDCORE GAMERS ONLY.
It's the same old "guns" argument. Do guns kill people, or do people kill people?
Dungeons and Dragons blamed for suicides. Beavis and Butthead blamed for kids playing with fire. Rap music blamed for black crime. Cigarettes blamed for killing people who haven't read the label on the package after smoking them for 20-30+ years, instead of blaming the people who did it.
For example, a vendor sells some really tasty cookies. These are awesome cookies, so good that once you have one you want another one right away. His wife makes the cookies from a recipe she got from her mother, and is very proud of them and how good everyone says they are. Millions of people buy and eat the cookies from them, as they are very popular.
A man, who loves those cookies, buys a dozen from the vendor. He tried the cookies a few months ago and now doesn't eat much else; he's grown morbidly obese in the past few months from eating the cookies, and just can't stop himself from getting more.
Who or what is at fault for that action? Is it street vendor's fault for selling the awesome cookies? His wife's for making them, knowing that everyone loves them?
Or is it the man's fault who keeps eating the cookies constantly, knowing that cookies are fattening and ignoring other problems that rise as a result of his abuse of them?
It's not the game, it's the behavior of the person playing it. For every person who does what you're describing, there's how many others that don't? Should they be punished by restrictions on the game because of the people who abuse it, even though most who do have no problem?
Its not the game/s although it obviously is a factor, but it is more the person. Some people do not have the willpower or common sense to monitor or administer their time wisely so as to avoid excessive amounts of time in front of their computer.
I myself have no problem (playing EQ2 at the moment) watching how much time im online. Sometimes i don't even log on if i cant be bothered while there are others who feel they must log on regardless.
So to sum up the main root cause of the problem is that people make people less social.
Play today.
Die tomorrow.