MMO GurL

I read an interesting blog recently that I found through Twitter. I’m not going to mention any specific names here because it is not my intention to be menacing towards the person. But I do have some valid concerns with the message they are spreading with the blog.

The theme of the blog was basically stating that you shouldn’t bother with a fake life in an online game such as MMORPGs, but instead should improve your real life. This is a great thought and all, but what does that say to the many people who play games every day? To me, it says, “Hey you’re a loser and you’re not doing what you could be doing with your life because you waste all of your time playing Rift or WoW and that’s not productive!” Sorry! Long winded, I know!

So, the point still stands; is it really that horrible for you to play MMORPGs? In order to answer this question honestly you have to be prepared to answer a few other questions first.

1. Are you neglecting something or someone to play your MMORPG?

This is usually the first sign of abuse. Most good mothers will tell their children that everything is alright in moderation. So as long as you’re not going over-board, there’s not much to worry about. If you start neglecting your hygiene, your spouse, your children, your chores, and responsibilities, than you probably do have a problem and should reevaluate your situation.

2. If you had absolutely nothing to do – No games – what would you do?

This is a big indicator here. I have been playing MMORPGs for a long, long time and don’t think I have never sat down and thought to myself what a waste of time it all was. I have stopped many times for quite long chunks of time and you know what? I never really did anything that amazing with my free time. I watched TV and movies a lot. I will say that I was a lot better with cleaning the house, but I recall after awhile I got sick of the prospect of being some neat-freak housewife that just cleaned all day! So like that mother said, “Everything in moderation,” even productive things.

3. What can you change in your life that you haven’t changed because of your preoccupation with games?

A lot of people play games because they can’t do anything about their current situation in life. Maybe they have a horrible job, maybe they’re stuck in a house that’s worth less than the mortgage out on it; there can be any number of problems in a person’s life that can’t be instantly resolved. Sure that person who has a bad job can put out applications all day, but in this economy they’d be lucky to get a call back for 1 out of every 30 applications they submit.

But what about what CAN be changed? Can you honestly say that you are doing everything that you want to be doing? At least with the things you can do something about? Think about that and it will help you to determine if you’re too focused on gaming.

4. Are you gaining something positive from playing your game?

I gain many things from playing MMORPGs: I get better at writing, I get better at socializing (I’m actually really anti-social in real life) and meeting new people, I make friends that I probably wouldn’t make in real life. I’m also gaining the potential to make some money with my time. Articles do sell and whenever I want to take the step into writing full time I will have more than enough of a resume with my contributions to other sites (like Rift Junkies) as well as my own.

So yes, gaming is not just about self indulgence for me. It is a lot more and I gain a lot from it. This alone outweighs any worries I have about whether or not gaming is productive enough for me. Even if you don’t write, make sure the game is giving you something back besides just the game.

Since I’ve come back to my MMO GurL persona I’ve fought with whether or not it was the right thing to do. I stopped playing for almost a year and tried to get my art career afloat. In the end I found that art was way too consuming a thing for me to do while trying to raise a child and keep my marriage together. Some things just take up FAR too much of your time and it’s not just games that can do it.

I don’t think it’s fair to say that anyone who plays games as a hobby is wasting their time though. I think that the person who’s doing the gaming needs to make the decision for themselves. I have been playing video games since the Atari and so for me, as far as hobbies go, games are far more ME than art is. Why is that such a horrible thing?

I’m not hiding in a fake world; I just like to visit it sometimes. How do we even know that the world we think is real is real (Matrix anyone?)? And I don’t know about you, but I can’t shoot fireballs in the “real” world, so I’m going to go do it in the virtual one!

Obviously if you’re here you have some interest in MMORPGs – so tell me – Do you think that playing such games is an innately bad thing? Why or why not?

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Photo taken from: Make Love, Not Warcraft – South Park Episode

Tags: is gaming that bad, mmorpg, moderation, neglecting life, obsessive gamers

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 22nd, 2011 at 12:01 pm and is filed under MMO Related. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.