If you’ve visited this site before, you’ll notice that a good majority of the posts revolve around the MMPORG, World of Warcraft (WoW). At first, I didn’t get the hype. I was more of the PS2/Gamecube kind of girl. I liked games that had an end to them. I was drawn in by the more cartoony kind games like Mario Sunshine, Conker’s Bad Fur Day, Ratchet and Clank. So when my friend tried to convince me to get a WoW account, I scoffed. I have a small Mac, and it’s not that great for gaming. And truth be told, I don’t really enjoy PC games all that much. I hate playing on a keyboard, and I have a serious jumping disability that has caused me much pain, humiliation, and frustration. But he promised me he’d watch some basketball games with me (which he STILL hasn’t done!!!!), so I said I’d try it out.
That was a year and a half ago…. And I’m still playing WoW. Not just every once in a while, I mean I play most nights of the week. I’ve found that WoW is probably more addictive than crack. Soon there are going to be support groups for people who just can’t break away. Friends will start holding interventions.
“I think it’s time we had a talk about how much you play that game.”
“Can’t talk right now. I’m in an instance. I’ll be a few hours. What? No!! Don’t open that!!!! Awww, crap!! Now we’re gonna wipe and my armor is already yellow. No… yellow does not mean it affects the stats on the armor yet….,” as the support group finally gives up and walks away shaking their heads.
This is my first experience with an MMPORG, and I’ve found it to be fascinating. I’m not a hard core gamer where I absolutely have to have the best gear, go to every single instance, or spend hours in the battlegrounds. I play for fun and for the social aspect. And if I could remember anything I learned while getting my Psych minor, I might be even more fascinated.
What I’ve noticed most is that people’s personalities really tend to come out. Not the personality you use with your friends, co-workers, or family, but the personality you WISH you could use with your friends, co-workers, or family, for good or bad. I’ve seen friendships nearly dissolve because of disagreements over fictional gold/items, and I’ve seen relationships form from nothing more than helping someone kill a monster. There are the prepubescent boys trying to prove themselves by running around and ganking every character they can find, and the lonelier people who want nothing more than for someone to talk to them.
When people feel there are no real life consequences, people can be who they want. Some people strive for validation by trying to be as nice as possible in the hopes that they’ll be liked, some need to be strumpets, and some need to be the unconscionable asshole who wants nothing more than to piss you off and then laugh about it for the next few days (also known as the small penis syndrome). Of course, these personalities are evident in their day to day lives as well, but somehow the rules change when your face isn’t attached to the behavior.
I look at my friends who play and wonder what motivates them. What does this game satisfy for them that has kept them consistently playing for the last year? In my case, I just want the rest of the world to go away. I need an escape. My friends are often on-line, but I can always go to another server if I want to just be alone…. Which I find funny. Alone with millions of others. Standing in a town with races of all kinds running by me, without noticing me. Sometimes this is good. Sometimes it feels too much like my life. Either way, I can just exist there as someone other than who I am.
A secondary reason is that I don’t get to spend much time with my friends outside of work, and this provides a substitute. There’s always a billion and one reasons why people can’t do anything, and while I try not to take offense, but, truth be told, I feel a small stab at every rejection. I don’t get that kind of rejection in game, and it makes me feel a bit better.
I don’t know what motivates my friends. Maybe it’s a similar need. Maybe it’s the need to control something, to lead, to escape, or to simply watch a tiny little man do the butt-slappy dance for an hour straight. I just sit back and watch as we all struggle with the differences that the game brings out. Differences that cause us to fight or to whisper behind someone’s back. Differences that bring out that nasty little side in all of us.
And then there are those moments where we all come together, it all works, and we spend the next few days basking in how we succeeded…together, and I can’t help but smile to myself. Maybe it’s not the ideal way to spend time with my friends, and maybe it seems pointless and silly to others, but I catch glimpses of them I rarely see at work. So, I don’t care that it’s a time sucker. I don’t care that people think it’s a waste of time. I wouldn’t trade those small moments for anything.
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The bloody irony here is that Aelel has since declared her consideration for dropping her WoW account, on account of in-game guild drama.
The bigger irony is that I considered WyldKard to be one of those people I played the game for.