Crash farming, health, and OCD.

QFT, man. QFT. Personal responsibility is becoming a thing of the past.

[QUOTE]to advocate moderation to a compulsion is blatent stupidity
right..a compulsive gamer/addict/alcoholic/abuser should do it but in moderation.......ohhh wait........you just said it is almost impossible to contain........so what is your brilliantly moronic solution?

no it is the persons fault completely as NCsoft has no control over a persons deviant obsessive behavior

No one forced us to play this game to start.
They are setting up a fun game for us to play its not there fault if people don't know when to stop.
Most of us actually know when to quit you cant blame them for people being ocd.

Didn't a mod tell you to stop bolding everything, because your opinion is just as important as everyone else's? I think that's the first thing I saw on this site. Anyway. What you are saying can be applied to guns. Is it the gun manufacturer's fault that the kids shot up a school? No. It IS the person's fault for buying a game that is unhealthy for them to play.

Saying that the game is responsible for a person's death is equally stupid to saying that school is responsible for teen suicide, or that it is the fault of the gun seller for selling a gun for all gun related accidents.

It is no way the companies fault or responsibility to deal with these people on a level that puts them in a safe zone. These are people that should be getting help, but that, again, is not the responsibility of the company. The hourly warning is more than enough to tell you that you need a break. If the game says you've been playing 12 hours, you do the math. Who's fault is it?

It is not the company's fault in any situation if a person buys their product and abuses it. End of story. And Loviatar, seriously, stop bolding all your print.



When a person chooses to abuse a product that would not be harmful if it were used in moderation, I personally think it becomes their fault.

Ugh after 2 hours of forging this post and listening my mom ramble *laughs*...

I lol'ed IRL. x].

My experience with this:

I've always been a big gamer, since I'm 4 years old. I'm 22 years old now. I live with another gamer, 23 years old, who's been playing for a similar time. He plays less than I do, but we do spend a lot of times on our respective computers. We talk a lot with each other, and I'd say we have a healthy relation, since we share activities and chores. We have good times, we have less good times (can't say I've had a bad time in 3 years).

I can play up to 3 hours without a decent break, but anything longer than this and you lose me. I NEED a break at some point, because I need food, water, bio breaks, feeding the cats, homework... and for my own mental health. The most I've done was 7 hours ONCE, I had a couple of BRB moments, but it was a helluva straining on me, and I refuse to do it again today. Anything above 3 hours, I'll need a break somewhere in there just to do something else.

Right now (at the VERY moment, my husband couldn't come with me), I'm in an entirely different situation. I'm a university student on a break until... a couple days from now on *groan* with my parents at my grandparents' house, in the middle of nowhere with no place for the young to hang out except the bar (and I hate the bar scene). All my friends are in Montreal except one who's leaving, and had a hard time seeing because she's got a big party large family. Nothing on TV despite the numbers on channels offered, semi-bad weather with no outdoor equipment anyways.

So my mom looks at me, sitting at the computer for most of the day, only leaving it after 2 hours or so.

She thought I was an addict and that my life was going to get ruined over it. She started screaming at me because I had just got back after a 2 hour and a half break break of watching a movie and falling asleep over on it; she thought I had been at the comp for 5 or 6 hours without a break. It took me an hour to calm her down and to reassure her I had gotten back at the comp a short time ago (15, 20 minutes?) and she still yelled at me at the end... after nearly another hour. In total, I might have spend 2 hours telling her how I viewed this.

My father witnessed the whole thing. He never worried about me. All that time he was telling her to cut me some slack, that I was a young man with nothing else to do then spending time with his nephews (5 yr. and 2 yr. olds) or at the computer, and to him it was fairly normal that I was on the computer since I could talk to my husband at the same time as I played a game. He found my ways totally healthy for me, but my mom wouldn't listen a word. Even today she asked me if I was addicted to my "online game". I don't think she understands it's pretty much the only place I can find people in my age range, and that I'm not "alone" so to speak.

My mom doesn't get that the situation here and my situation at my home are very different - I leave home at 8-8:30 in the morning, and barely come back before either 4pm or 6-7pm... then it's food, gaming, homework, gaming, snuggling with husband before bedtime. She's not there to see that (lol). So she sees me here and goes nuts.

=-=-=-=

However, when it comes to people spending 36+ hours in a row on an online game... erm... sorry, but they must have a serious problems. I know I spend a lot of time at times but not THAT much... I believe in responsability. The acts I pose are mine, and I'm not escaping that. If I spend 36 hours online, I won't blame the game for addicting me - I'll blame myself for staying so ****ing long.

o.O And you let your mother yell at you for that long? It seems your mother doesn't quite understand, and yelling the whole time isn't going to do anything except cause tension/anger between the two of you, if anything. Have you explained it to her?

Can't blame anyone doing 10-30 hours straight in the hopes of getting one of these though really.

People have been offering 1500+ Ectos to get one...let me see...that's around 7 MILLION gold.

Without a drop like that, how long would you have to farm to get that much? A lifetime maybe! 30 hours seems like a good deal to me.

Incidentally, at current rates, to buy that much gold from a Bot farmer would be around £450...about 10 hours work at my current charge rate (in the real world).

All you need to do is translate the time that you've spent "crash farming" into the amount of real life money you can convert that gold into...and you'll realize that you're time is better spent doing something else.

Now don't get me wrong - some people really like the repetition, so crash farming may be enjoyable to them. To everyone else that is trying to get an intangible ingame reward...you may want to rethink what you're doing.

its like a crack addict, yes it is their fault normally that they exposed themselves to the situation, but without outside help they will continue on their course til they become ill.

Is it Anet/NCsofts fault? thats up for debate, i dont see a temp ban for people playing more than 24 hours. and who actually reads that break msg anymore? i'v seen it hundreds of times, i normally just ignore it.

and saying someone deserves to die is beyond ignorant. you have no idea what is going on in that persons life to compel them into such an action.

some of you people seem to be souless. sounds like you have been over exposed to the internet and need to step back and rejoin the civil human race. the generation of online moraless people is growing out of hand.

Ultimate Solution:

Microsoft can code a mandatory logoff into the OS. No more problem.




They seem to want to control everything else, why not this too?











Please understand, the "Sarcasm" button was on.

Not a joke.



Yes I slept, but the PC was on so I could get started again the moment I woke up.

i thought the game disconnected after 24 hours. wow. amazing. i tip my hat to you good sir/mam.

So true, so sad.

If it wasn't polar bears it could be ectos, titles, HA, 55hp'ing etc.

If it wasn't guild wars it could be pong...

Anet are not there to be a parent figure or your therapist.

Huh? What's so awesome about leaving GW running for a week?

Unless you were being sarcastic...

Anywho, my two cents: People should be praising Anet for their game design. With map travel and heroes/henchies there really is no reason to keep playing the game at any time...

unlike other MMORPGS... cough cough.

Of course, this does tend to support the idea of making the Polar Bear mini available year round.

The games are designed to be addictive. Sort of like how soap operas are designed to be addictive (keep em coming back for more). I recall reading one study that specifically discussed PVP elements and how addictive they were.

There are many studies debating video game addiction and whether or not it is a disorder.

Good thread here:
http://www.soberrecovery.com/forums/...addiction.html

and on international game developer's assoc.
http://www.igda.org/articles/austin_addiction.php

and many many many others out there.

I think the warning GW put in (you have been playing for x hours) is good. It would be more interesting to see them put in a clock (local time is XX), but they likely won't do that because that would shorten playing time.

actually, there is no reason Anet wants you to play Guild Wars continuously. No monthly fee.

Best Guild Wars customer = someone who buys all the Chapters and never plays.

Other games may be designed to be addictive, that is up for debate, but I think GW is designed to do exactly the oppisite, just to be a fun diversion.

If you are the type of person who could get addicted to GW, you could get addicted to anything.

People need to be aware of themselves and their real life needs. People also need to take responsiblity for their actions. But with people like Jack Thompson running around this is becoming a foreign concept.

I think this whole issue is part of a much larger problem. Now that we live in the age of being "connected" 24/7, it seems that a lot of people have actually become disconnected. With reality. With humanity.

Just look at some of the responses we see on these forums. There is a disconnect. I would wager that most people flaming wouldn't say those things to a person's face if they could see the reaction they're causing.

Remember, there is a real live PERSON at the other end of the 'net...

just my $0.02

I'd like to share some thoughts on this one.

Before I got involved in the GW game and community I was playing other games and some for long hours.
However, the most time I spend straight was probably not on games, but on computer programming.
Trying to get that little thing working, seeing it work but causing a problem somewhere else, fix it, new problem, rinse and repeat.

Pull the plug out the computer when I was programming and I would start making flowcharts or think up possible solutions to try when I could get back at the computer again.
Just let the possibilities pass the mind and evaluate them without actually coding.

The whole problem is related to a person and not to the game.

I don't think it's the responsibility for a company like A-net to even try solving this.
It's the responsibility of the adult player or his/her parents in case of a minor.
The warning is ok, but only a reminder to those that are aware of the problem.

I know know what problems I might encounter and how to solve them.

Given that many people with a real addiction most likely don't have a huge social life there is not much outside control and correction.
Like with all problem, you have to solve them yourself, but help from someone else could be usefull.
But in these cases, that someone else should be someone you have a social connection with and not some provider of an online game.

Quoted because it's the quality of the game that'll keep you addicted the most.

And to add: I've heard of someone who's died in Korea playing Unreal Tournament.