At what stage does gaming become an addiction?

[Blackmoor]

I stumbled across a really interesting site on the internet, all about getting over your addiction to World of Warcraft.

http://www.wowdetox.com/

People leave their stories on here about how they're addicted to WOW and how they managed to give up. Even though I've never played WOW (or any online games), I still managed to read loads of these stories - I was enthralled and fearful at what people were saying, I could feel their addiction, even sometimes the one's who had been "free" for a while.

I play games on my PS3 and although I go through periods of playing quite a few games, I also go months and months without playing anything at all, but I can still imagine being addicted.

When a game I really love comes out, I will sometimes spend 10 hours in one day on it, possibly even longer. But with console games, if you do that they're over after a few days and that's that.

But with WOW's reputation, and after reading that site - where people describe being compelled to play the game 10 - 16 hours a day for anywhere from 2 - 5 years.... It seems to be a game that's a bit like crack - something I probably should never, ever try just in case.

But anyway, it got me wondering about loads of different questions around gaming and addiction -

• At what stage does playing games (ordinary single player console games as well as MMO games) become classified as an addiction?
• How often do you have to be playing do you think before it is a problem?
• And is anyone here a recovering WOW addict? That game scares me!
• Should the medical profession provide treatment for gaming addiction? Or, do you think there's no such thing as addiction to a game and people should just "pull themselves together"?
• Should somebody do something about World of Warcraft, because that game seems to be "the" most problematic addicting game?

What do you think?

[pEhouse]

I don't think the game is to blame; some people simply are more prone to addictions than others. It's similar to alcohol - it's legal for anyone above a certain age to get, but if you can't handle it or treat it with responsibility, it becomes a problem.

I've been playing wow for 3 1/2 years now so automatically I know many other players, none of which ever had an addiction to the game. Sure, it can be time-consuming, and there are periods where I can play for hours a day. But then there are other periods where I don't play at all (haven't played in more than two months because I got bored as of late). It's important to have your priorities straight, put school, work, family matters first. Wow should come last. If you neglect your responsibilites and rather stay at home to play than go out with your friends and socialize in the real world, then I think one can speak of an addiction.
This is not wow specific, so I don't think anything "should be done about it" (my ex was/might still be addicted to Call of Duty). But the media of video games is only gonna get bigger, so it sure wouldn't hurt to have special treatment for it. If you heavily rely on virtual worlds for escapism, then something must be going wrong in your life, and it's always good to get help.

[Draco]

Like any addiction, you know you are addicted when you have an irrational need to play that demands life style changes.

[Drone]

When you do the nth Baal run for no apparent reason

[!Lara Croft!]

Anything can be an addiction.

[tomekkobialka]

I think gaming becomes an addiction when it becomes one of the most, if not the most, important thing in your life, and when you're life starts to revolve around gaming. Gaming is only meant for entertainment, to relax the human mind and play with friends, but when it starts to make up a large part of your life, that's when you become addicted!

I think time-wise, if you find yourself playing for more than 3 hours a day, you should start seeing gaming as a problem.

There is definitely such a thing as 'addiction to gaming', and therefore I think medical treatment is not a bad idea. Gaming addiction is just as bad as smoking or drug addiction, from my point of view.

About WoW...I don't think anybody could do something about its addiction as peoples' addiction to the game is what makes the market move. The team behind WoW are almost hoping that people become addicted to the game as this gives them more of a chance to sell expansion packs, new weapons etc.... Getting over WoW addiction is up to the gamer, I'm afraid.

On December 27, 2004, Xioyi left a suicide note saying he wanted “to join the heroes of the game he worshiped.” The thirteen-year-old then jumped off a tall building after playing World of Warcraft for 36 hours straight. His parents are now suing the Chinese distributors of the game for $12,500.

- Source

It is especially difficult to get rid of MMORPG addiction as these types of games are set in a whole new, different, fantasy world, for which it is difficult for the player to rid off their minds. They start confusing the virtual world with the real world, and eventually if this confusion becomes too great, then you see stories like ^ this in the news. This confusion is of course the result of gaming addiction.

This confusion can also be found here:

A three-year-old South Korean girl died of neglect when her parents spent more time raising a virtual girl than her. The game they had been playing was Prius Online, a game similar to Second Life where players work virtual jobs and well… live a second, virtual, life. The couple had left for a 12-hour gaming session at an internet café, leaving their daughter unattended. Upon returning home, they found her dead.

To be honest, I don't think WoW itself is so unusually addictive, but any MMORPG has the potential to become so addictive, it's just that WoW has always been the most popular and has had the largest fanbase.

[Blackmoor]

Originally Posted by pEhouse

I don't think the game is to blame; some people simply are more prone to addictions than others. It's similar to alcohol - it's legal for anyone above a certain age to get, but if you can't handle it or treat it with responsibility, it becomes a problem.

Hmm, this is an interesting one isn't it? I think there is a person component definitely, otherwise everyone who ever tasted alcohol would become an alcoholic. Some people are obviously more "prone" to these things than others. But at the same time, I think there is an "thing" element too. Some things are more likely to cause addiction than others, otherwise we wouldn't see clustering of addictions around particular things - smoking, alcohol, certain kinds of drugs, etc.

I think WOW is particularly addictive and I think it is designed deliberately to be that way. I don't think that the designers necessarily talk about addiction, but that is what they must be aspiring to do (on some level). They need to keep their players hooked so that they keep on receiving their monthly subscription fees. Whether they are consciously aware of it, and talking openly about it in development meetings, the designers must be looking at ways of creating a feeling of compulsive need to keep playing and playing and playing.

And since they are not consistently supplying new content every day, they must structure the game itself so that it inherently creates an addictive feedback mechanism.

Other games I don't think are necessarily designed in this way. With most other games (non-MMO) there is a definite end point, and even though there is dlc to buy, it doesn't require the designers to keep the players playing continuously day in day out.

With games like WOW, who would pay a monthly subscription if they only played a couple of times a month? Not many people, I would guess.

Who would pay a monthly subscription if they only played 7 days out of a month? A significant amount more, but still not masses.

The only thing that will keep people constantly (month in, month out) paying monthly subscriptions is if they "need" to play this game, and play it a lot.

I think that if everyone was made to smoke daily for a month, then 95% of them would afterwards be addicted to cigarettes. That's how addictive nicotine is. I have a feeling that a lot of people after being exposed to WOW for a reasonable amount of time would also become addicted, because it too is highly addictive. I don't think it would be anywhere near 95%, but still a reasonable number - possibly 30+%.

(sorry for such a long post, lol )


Edit:

Originally Posted by tomekkobialka

I think time-wise, if you find yourself playing for more than 3 hours a day, you should start seeing gaming as a problem.

There is definitely such a thing as 'addiction to gaming', and therefore I think medical treatment is not a bad idea. Gaming addiction is just as bad as smoking or drug addiction, from my point of view.

About WoW...I don't think anybody could do something about its addiction as peoples' addiction to the game is what makes the market move. The team behind WoW are almost hoping that people become addicted to the game as this gives them more of a chance to sell expansion packs, new weapons etc.... Getting over WoW addiction is up to the gamer, I'm afraid.

You edited your post whilst I was writing mine!

As you can see from my post, I agree with you about the team behind WOW almost hoping that people will become addicted to the game. However, I wonder if they ought to have an obligation to the addicted player too... I don't know what that would look like, perhaps canceling people's accounts when they say they have an addiction problem and never letting them sign up again.

About the 3 hours a day... That's an interesting point - on the one hand, 3 hours a day sounds a bit low for a gaming addiction to me, especially when most people sit and watch TV for longer than that a day - and I don't see much difference between the two. But then on the other hand I think, well if someone did play computer games for 3 hours a day, every day for 2 years, then yes - it probably is a bit much. So I don't know how to reconcile this.... I suppose it depends on what happens whilst you're gaming. If you lock yourself away and cut yourself off from everything else - don't talk to your family, refuse to get up and make yourself a meal, etc, then it's a problem. But if you treat it like you do TV - something you do, but you're not tied to it, it probably doesn't matter that you play 3 hours a day.

Does that make sense?

BTW:

On December 27, 2004, Xioyi left a suicide note saying he wanted “to join the heroes of the game he worshiped.” The thirteen-year-old then jumped off a tall building after playing World of Warcraft for 36 hours straight. His parents are now suing the Chinese distributors of the game for $12,500.

$12,500 isn't much for someone's life is it? My first thought is - obviously they should pay, but that'd probably set a precedent for other payouts in larger amounts elsewhere. Although, this has got to be unusual hasn't it? I hope.

[Amiyo]

I think that gaming becomes an addiction and definitely a problem when it prevents an individual from living a normal life. This includes daily routines (eating, sleeping etc.), social life, school and/or work and so on. Of course the "amount" of social life depends on the person: some like to hang out a lot, others don't like it that much. If all of ones thoughts are about a game (or games) and nothing else, then this person has definitely a problem.

But is there a ceratin amount of playing that indicates when someone has a problem with playing games? Personally I'm not so sure about that. For example if there's a person who never really plays games that much decides to play a game for a couple of hours, even this might cause some trouble to the person's life, but maybe just temporarily.

If one has to form his/her daily life around gaming, like what to do and when so that he/she could play as much as possible with the minimum amount of disturbance/interruptions there's (again) a problem.

I haven't played WOW, and I really don't get MMO games so I can't say much about those. I wonder what exactly is the thing in especially WOW that makes it so addicting. I'm not sure whether something should be done with it or not... Wouldn't it be easier if people who tend to become addicted easily stayed away from it? Or would pay special attention to their playing habits? I really don't know...

But I do think that there indeed is an addiction to games. I'd call it a phenomenon of the gaming generation. There should be support groups and treatment for addicts. I'm not sure about developing a pill that'd remove the urge to play as a solution, but professionals should start to develop official suggestions on game addicts' treatment if there aren't ones already.

[Sir Croft]

WoW is designed to be ridiculously fun. People like to have fun. Fun is addictive. That's it. I don't think there's anything beyond that.
It's also ridiculous to say that some games prevent people from living "a normal life", because "a normal life" is nothing but your standards. People might see "a normal life" in a completely different way. And if you mean that people dedicate themselves way too much to video games, that's not the game's fault but the person's. Does anyone here blame the alcohol industry for car crashes or other alcohol issues? No, because it's not their fault that the consumer makes bad use of their product.

[pEhouse]

Originally Posted by Blackmoor

I think WOW is particularly addictive and I think it is designed deliberately to be that way. I don't think that the designers necessarily talk about addiction, but that is what they must be aspiring to do (on some level). They need to keep their players hooked so that they keep on receiving their monthly subscription fees. Whether they are consciously aware of it, and talking openly about it in development meetings, the designers must be looking at ways of creating a feeling of compulsive need to keep playing and playing and playing.

And since they are not consistently supplying new content, they must structure the game itself so that it inherently creates an addictive feedback mechanism.

This is true; the game provides a fair amount of daily chores that have to be done to achieve certain goals. For lots of people (as the decrease in subscriptions lately shows) those repetitions get boring fast though. So again I would say there's an individual factor as to how susceptible you are to such things.

Other games I don't think are necessarily designed in this way. With most other games (non-MMO) there is a definite end point, and even though there is dlc to buy, it doesn't require the designers to keep the players playing continuously day in day out.

With games like WOW, who would pay a monthly subscription if they only played a couple of times a month? Not many people, I would guess.

Who would pay a monthly subscription if they only played 7 days out of a month? A significant amount more, but still not masses.

The only thing that will keep people constantly (month in, month out) paying monthly subscriptions is if they "need" to play this game, and play it a lot.

I think that if everyone was made to smoke daily for a month, then 95% of them would afterwards be addicted to cigarettes. That's how addictive nicotine is. I have a feeling that a lot of people after being exposed to WOW for a reasonable amount of time would also become addicted, because it too is highly addictive. I don't think it would be anywhere near 95%, but still a reasonable number - possibly 30+%.

(sorry for such a long post, lol )

Wow doesn't require players to play every day all day. You can still achieve everything there is to achieve by playing casually. No one is forcing you to do anything, that's not in Blizzard's hands - it's up to each player to be responsible about their time spend in the game. There are mechanics implemented that enable players or parents to limit the time they/their children get to be on Wow each day, I'd advise (especially) parents and everyone who is prone to addictions to use it.