Gaming WoW, is it worth the money, and is it "fun"?

[Salamantis]

In fact, stay away from all MMORPGs in general. They're nothing but a waste of time, and it's not even fun to level grind all the time.

I can't agree more. Just stay away from them.

 

[TaMs]

Well some like and some hate it. I personally don't like it. Played 1-2 months and then ditched it. I didn't find out why would I want to play it for years like some hc wow players. I didn't find it addictive at all. Just takes too much time to get max lvl etc. then it's not fun anymore since you're just forced to play it "ARRGGH I NEED THAT LVL NEED TO GRIND MILLION GOBLINS CANT DO IT F*CK THIS GAME"

 

[Minox]

I personally feel that there's almost no skill involved in MMORPG's. That's why I prefer Mta, Unreal Tournament III and similar games.

 

[SkankyYankee]

Emphatically no. They didn't call the first popular MMO "Evercrack" for nothing. Frankly i got better player interaction on text based bbs games back in the day.

 

[Prophet]

It all boils down to enjoyment and discretion, I like the game and I don't devote hours to it; to me it's still worth the 15 dollars. I do often cancel the subscription when I've got something else I'd rather play or it just isn't holding my interest and I advise you to do the same.

Don't let the whole WoW-Crack argument be the thing that makes up your mind. It's possible to play the game casually and still have fun, you don't have to sign your soul over. Let me also point out that this is coming from the child of two addicts with long lists of various vices and also I myself (younger self) have had stints with other games where I have admittedly became obsessed. Even with my disposition for addiction and my previous history, I have found it easy enough to play reasonably. None the less if addiction is a serious fear put limits on your usage. Before sitting down clock out how long you'll be playing and never deviate from it. I love my 5 Max level characters, but I love my 3.8 GPA even more. Just becuase a small fraction of wow players can't keep their priorities straight doesn't mean you can't.

WoW is exactly like drugs. It costs much, it's addicting, it damages your personal life and is hard to stop playing.

Right...

On a side note, the "WoW is drug" comments are a bit offensive, unless you've seen someone leaning from crack or held a baby born with drugs in it's system; I think you should really abstain from comparing anything to "drugs". It's like comparing a packed train to Auschwitz -- It's baseless and offensive to those who know the true extent of suffering wrought upon those effected by genuine experiences.

 

[Relys]

No it's not. It's a complete waste of your life.

If you want to play an engrossing RPG with a decent length go play an Elder Scrolls game or something.

 

[Goloki]

Uhh... by your logic, If you get addicted to drugs, it ain't the drug's fault, it is yours. It is the truth, which is why I am advising him to not to start an addiction to begin with. Playing WoW won't really benefit you at the end of the day. It ain't worth it.

I'm sorry, but you're reducing my argumentation to an absurd. A drug is a drug, a game is a game. Drugs are designed to get the user addicted to them, a game is not, even if many people tell you so. The thing is, you can say "I'll play some WoW now, about half an hour" and do so. On the other hand, you can't say "I'll get some crack now, about a dose or two". Why is that? Because you can actually control how much time you spend on WoW, but if you start consuming drugs, it is inevitable that you will get addicted to them, even if they are "light" drugs like cannabis. The nature of WoW's easiness to addiction lies in how sensitive the person is to that kind of games. When you are told that "WoW is a drug", the one who's telling you so is only focusing his attention in a small (really small) portion of the WoW community. I'm pretty sure that not everyone who plays WoW is an addict... but you can't say the same for those that consume drugs, can you?

As for its worth "at the end of the day", there are just a few things in this life that will be suitable for your case. And, trust me, not even posting this message in this board is one of those. If someone wants to spend some minutes/hours each day playing WoW or whatever he wants to play, that's perfectly fine, as long that hobby doesn't interfere with his life. Or will you argue that going to the movies with a friend will "benefit you at the end of the day"? As I see it, both are recreational activities which are aimed to relax the individual, not to be productive and enriching. Well, better if they are, of course, but they don't need to be. The thing is, everything is fine in its right amount

 

[Minox]

Uhh... by your logic, If you get addicted to drugs, it ain't the drug's fault, it is yours. It is the truth, which is why I am advising him to not to start an addiction to begin with. Playing WoW won't really benefit you at the end of the day. It ain't worth it.

I'm sorry, but you're reducing my argumentation to an absurd. A drug is a drug, a game is a game. Drugs are designed to get the user addicted to them, a game is not, even if many people tell you so. The thing is, you can say "I'll play some WoW now, about half an hour" and do so. On the other hand, you can't say "I'll get some crack now, about a dose or two". Why is that? Because you can actually control how much time you spend on WoW, but if you start consuming drugs, it is inevitable that you will get addicted to them, even if they are "light" drugs like cannabis. The nature of WoW's easiness to addiction lies in how sensitive the person is to that kind of games. When you are told that "WoW is a drug", the one who's telling you so is only focusing his attention in a small (really small) portion of the WoW community. I'm pretty sure that not everyone who plays WoW is an addict... but you can't say the same for those that consume drugs, can you?

As for its worth "at the end of the day", there are just a few things in this life that will be suitable for your case. And, trust me, not even posting this message in this board is one of those. If someone wants to spend some minutes/hours each day playing WoW or whatever he wants to play, that's perfectly fine, as long that hobby doesn't interfere with his life. Or will you argue that going to the movies with a friend will "benefit you at the end of the day"? As I see it, both are recreational activities which are aimed to relax the individual, not to be productive and enriching. Well, better if they are, of course, but they don't need to be. The thing is, everything is fine in its right portion

Then explain why a few WoW players has died when playing WoW.

Spoiler

Most likely they were so addicted that they forgot to satisfy their own needs (food, water etc...)

 

[Westside]

Uhh... by your logic, If you get addicted to drugs, it ain't the drug's fault, it is yours. It is the truth, which is why I am advising him to not to start an addiction to begin with. Playing WoW won't really benefit you at the end of the day. It ain't worth it.

I'm sorry, but you're reducing my argumentation to an absurd. A drug is a drug, a game is a game. Drugs are designed to get the user addicted to them, a game is not, even if many people tell you so. The thing is, you can say "I'll play some WoW now, about half an hour" and do so. On the other hand, you can't say "I'll get some crack now, about a dose or two". Why is that? Because you can actually control how much time you spend on WoW, but if you start consuming drugs, it is inevitable that you will get addicted to them, even if they are "light" drugs like cannabis. The nature of WoW's easiness to addiction lies in how sensitive the person is to that kind of games. When you are told that "WoW is a drug", the one who's telling you so is only focusing his attention in a small (really small) portion of the WoW community. I'm pretty sure that not everyone who plays WoW is an addict... but you can't say the same for those that consume drugs, can you?

As for its worth "at the end of the day", there are just a few things in this life that will be suitable for your case. And, trust me, not even posting this message in this board is one of those. If someone wants to spend some minutes/hours each day playing WoW or whatever he wants to play, that's perfectly fine, as long that hobby doesn't interfere with his life. Or will you argue that going to the movies with a friend will "benefit you at the end of the day"? As I see it, both are recreational activities which are aimed to relax the individual, not to be productive and enriching. Well, better if they are, of course, but they don't need to be. The thing is, everything is fine in its right amount :yayds:

crack cocaine is fine in its right amount

 

[kevenka]

WoW is like a drug. Games are intended to get you addicted and waste time. That is there purpose. If you haven't notice but the only games you really are into are quite addicting. Just FYI to your previous statement.

 

[Prophet]

crack cocaine is fine in its right amount

WoW is like a drug. Games are intended to get you addicted and waste time. That is there purpose. If you haven't notice but the only games you really are into are quite addicting. Just FYI to your previous statement.

QUOTE(Prophet @ Jun 2 2008, 10:56 PM)

On a side note, the "WoW is drug" comments are a bit offensive, unless you've seen someone leaning from crack or held a baby born with drugs in it's system; I think you should really abstain from comparing anything to "drugs". It's like comparing a packed train to Auschwitz -- It's baseless and offensive to those who know the true extent of suffering wrought upon those effected by genuine experiences.

 

[kevenka]

I am not going to abstain from saying that b/c its very true. A simile to compare the danger of creating games such as these. Later in the future..maybe...you'll see the dangers of MMOs. They never end and cause so much problems. You can't always control addiction and WoW fits within that category. You got to keep leveling up, got to keep getting better, hunt for the rarest item which takes 6 or more hours, or you'll have to start the mission over...This game is not good for people. It actually destroys society because people come to accept a virtual world in place of reality. They give up social gathering in the real world b/c they can find the same satisfaction in a game.(Not good) Requires to much dedication. Even if you have the time, it is going to more harm than good.

 

[Giga_Gaia]

Also, if you get addicted to a drug, it's entirely your fault, you started to take it.

 

[xcalibur]

I am not going to abstain from saying that b/c its very true. A simile to compare the danger of creating games such as these. Later in the future..maybe...you'll see the dangers of MMOs. They never end and cause so much problems. You can't always control addiction and WoW fits within that category. You got to keep leveling up, got to keep getting better, hunt for the rarest item which takes 6 or more hours, or you'll have to start the mission over...This game is not good for people. It actually destroys society because people come to accept a virtual world in place of reality. They give up social gathering in the real world b/c they can find the same satisfaction in a game.(Not good) Requires to much dedication. Even if you have the time, it is going to more harm than good.

Jack Thompson has a GBAtemp account!

Just joking. Anyway, if you're going to play wow, there are only 2 ways you can go.
The first would be the addicted way that everyone says you shouldn't but to be honest, you're never going to get anywhere in WoW or any mmorpg if you don't play that way. Unless you dedicate yourself to that game, the higher items and levels will almost never be atainable. Then you could also just play casually but watch everyone around you pass you and like I said, you're not going to get a lot of progress that way. You'll almost always be doing the same stuff over and over because you don't level up fast enough. Then there's also keeping up with your friends....

I do think the drug comparison is a bit unfair because anyone who can't stop WoW is just spoilt. Its just a game and not a chemical which your body craves every certain amount of time.
I haven't seen anyone getting cold shivers by going cold turkey from WoW.

If you want a nicer and cheaper MMO, try Guild Wars. Its still as bad as WoW but it has a special PvP mode where you just get given a high level character so you can get a quick fix.

 

[Saylient_Dreams]

I do think the drug comparison is a bit unfair because anyone who can't stop WoW is just spoilt. Its just a game and not a chemical which your body craves every certain amount of time.
I haven't seen anyone getting cold shivers by going cold turkey from WoW.

I just wanted to add my own opinion about the comparison of drugs to games, this isn't directed at anyone, nor do I mean to offend anyone with this. If I do I'm sorry, this is more of a scientific observation and comparison between the two and how both may act on one's body and psychology. I just wanted to point out that drugs usually do something to your body to control the chemicals released in your body; suppressing, inhibiting, etc etc. So in a sense, your body isn't craving for the chemical, but for the chemical that caused the chemical levels in your body to change. Experiences can also excel certain chemicals in your body. I have heard that the initial "buzz" from alcohol is comparable to doing some physical exercise, as their mechanisms are similar with neurotransmitters. That's just one example. Also if your brain finds something pleasurable, perhaps the subconscious will always want to find this pleasure, such as sex. Because of the way neurons fire in your brain, pleasurable things for your brain will want to be triggered as often to experience this. This can all lead to doing anything you find pleasurable (eg sex, sky diving, something you like to do a lot), can essentially make your body somewhat dependent on it. Using cold sweats as an example of how drugs can't be compared to games is a bit extreme in itself. Because of the way drugs directly influence the way your body handles its own chemicals would also cause major side effects such as cold sweats. I would rather compare how it would mess up a persons train of thought rather than physical dependence. If you're constantly thinking about the game, just like a druggy would constantly think about doing drugs, then you're pretty much addicted. The similarities of a drug and a game lay in their mechanisms, not much in their design of use. Drugs at first were designed to help symptoms that people didn't want to experience, and just of course found things pleasurable, and started doing it more for the pleasure, which the body will seek out if it isn't satisified, just like a game you'll be thinking about it till you satisfy that gaming desire. Of course I have no concrete evidence on me to support any of this(too lazy to go through books right now to explain these things in detail), just what I learned in biology, chemistry, and psychology classes, so please choose to ignore my opinion if you feel need be, not trying to flame or anything, just wanted to add my opinion to that topic that was brought up. In the end I hope I'm not saying games are drugs, or mmos are drugs. Drugs are drugs, and they can have severe consequences that only those who experience these things find very personal. I'm trying to get more at how anything can be essentially a "drug" because of how our body handles chemical mechanisms.

Anyways, back to WoW. For me any mmos that require some payment is just wrong, any online service is almost wrong for me as well. Making it optional to buy equipment in game is fine, offering internet is fine. To me, you paid already to play the game, and that should be enough. Either give the game away for free, and just pay for the accounts, that's fine, but pay for the game, then pay for subscription? That just seems ridiculous for me for an mmorpg experience. So imo, I do not think WoW is worth the money. Sure it can be fun, but you can do other things that are fun with that money, in real or digital life (buy another game with those monthly payments). I'd rather play a free mmorpg to get the "fix" then move on to other things. Right now I play PSOBB on a private server, and I play it rather casually, rather than how it was before playing it almost all day and night and wasting my life. Right now even playing casually I feel like I can be doing other things more productive or fun. Sure mmos are fun for a bit, but its all the same, grinding and leveling, and hunting for new gear to do what? Just to pwn in style in a sense. Once you hit the level cap, and get the gear you want, then what? Make another character and do it all over again. That sounds all great... if it were free. The biggest argument you can argue against that I would think is the relations you make with other people of the community, after all it is an mmo, and that's the point to have a community, and clan/team that you can talk to about the game, and enjoy the game with. To me you can't really put a price on it, but neither should companies have to charge excessively for it (buy the game and pay to play..... just give the game away for free and charge the price of the game on the account >.> like how AOL did with their software, make it free, but charge the use, of course just give away a 30 hours for free first, lol). The problem with the community, is you'll always have greifers, and they usually mess up the game. So if you're going to choose to play WoW, I suggest find some friends in real life that will play the game, so you can start setting up your clan, and through that, meet new people to add to the friends you have in real life to further the experience. For me the entire experience of an mmo lay in its community, that's the point of an mmo after all really, not for the grind, leet gear, or the pwnage, but the community itself.
Sorry for the long post/rant just wanted to share my experience with mmos

 

[Jdbye]

Completely not worth the money. I don't think any pay to play game is worth the money. When you have to pay for time (not neccessarily even game time), you'll be forced to play to not waste your money.
If you could pay for 60 days, but only the days where you actually PLAYED the game counted, it would be worth the money. Then you could decide yourself when to play.

 

[kevenka]

Ah. Dreams explained it way better than me. The point is, addiction is not physical but mental. Even if you are not playing, you are thinking about it, you lose focus in real life. That causes other problems such as remembering and sleeping and etc. Play at your own expense but you have been warned

 

[xcalibur]

Ah. Dreams explained it way better than me. The point is, addiction is not physical but mental. Even if you are not playing, you are thinking about it, you lose focus in real life. That causes other problems such as remembering and sleeping and etc. Play at your own expense but you have been warned

I'd read his post if it wasn't a wall of text.
You need to break it up into smaller paragraphs.

 

[jeronz]

I played it preexpansion. I found it really fun and definitely worth the money. But when I got to level 60 after about 6 weeks it became very boring. Its the same thing now with level 70. Once you get to the max level you have to invest a huge amount of time to get those rare items to make your character stronger. Guilds tend to do one raid a day and that sounds fine but to do one raid you have to: earn the money to buy the pots etc (~1Hr), get a group going (~45mins-1hr), kill trashmobs (~1-2hrs) then finally kill the boss. But to even get to a point where people will WANT to raid with you, you have to spend ages doing 'lesser' level 70 or whatever dungeons to get crap items but good enough to raid. And even if you successfully complete a dungeon it doesn't mean that the hours you spent will make your character stronger in any way as items drop rarely and you have to roll for them.

Also, once you finally spent 100's hours to get your tier 6 (is that what they're up to now?) equipment, along comes the next expansion effectively making your equipment obsolete.

Unless of course you like the social aspect of the game then my point is irrelevant.

 

[Prophet]

In light of the responses, I still maintain what I said. There might very well be fair comparisons that can be made between games and drugs but that's true of any two addictions that you compare. A better comparison would be games to gambling. Both hinge on a rush that is not worth the physical and emotional drain it takes to reach. The rush of winning and the rush of leveling up are very comparable.

But no one is saying that, why? To be blunt, you all think that it's some how cute or witty. "Oh WoW, yeah that's like a drug Hehe."

Who here is a "baby cuddler"? anyone? does anyone even know what a "baby cuddler" is? How about the term "boarder baby"? No? Didn't think so, so maybe if you can step back a second from the notion that the fragmented logic you possess is somehow cute or witty or even relevant, maybe I can impart some actually experiences to you. Experiences? Oh that's a little thing that people who do more living and less theorizing often amass.

A boarder baby is a child born to an addict and then taken away. With no place to send infants of their size, hospitals often find little option but to keep them. Many of them die and those who don't are in need special attention. Which brings us to “baby cuddling”, you see when a child isn't held and socialized at a young age their chances of mental retardation increase when compared to children who have parents around to hold them. Many hospitals enlist baby cuddlers to hold these children in the hopes that they might one day lead normal lives. Of course not all boarder babies are taken from drug addict parents but the majority are.

Now I wonder how many game addicts leave WoW pulsing through the veins of their children? How many of their babies call a hospital their home? How many of their babies would be considered lucky, to know the warmth of human touch?

It could be argued that WoW is addictive. That's a fair argument, but comparing WoW to drugs is deplorable. Whether you are simply misinformed or attempting to be sensational I implore you to stop and think carefully about the words you choose to express yourself.

Think for a moment of the monumental toll drugs have taken on the entire world, think of all those who have died from or due to drugs. Think of that and then compare it to the handful of highly publicized stories of WoW addiction at its most extreme. Now truthfully, is that a comparison that should be made lightly?