World of Warcraft – a game or a digital drug?

Five years have passed since the moment when a good friend of mine turned me on to the game World of Warcraft right before the session, thanks to which I almost failed it. Since then I’ve changed a bunch of free servers. And everything was fine, university was successfully completed, it was time to look for a job. But the game was in no hurry to let me go (or I was in no hurry to part with the game), so I spent a year in a sluggish search. As you probably already guessed, they were unsuccessful. It became unbearable for me to live in such a regime, and gathering my will into a fist, I forced myself to remember that first of all I am a programmer, and then a level 85 magician. Saying goodbye to the game was surprisingly painless, but to finally cut off the loose ends, I sold my game account.

It’s no secret that the World of Warcraft audience is about 12 million people around the world, with age range from 14 to 60 (yes, I came across one such grandfather in the guild chat) years. And from the height of my gaming experience, I became interested in what keeps all these people in the game, and I seem to have identified some reasons for myself. Do you want to take Amirdrssil boost? Visit our website for more info!

Causes

Lack of child care

In an age when all parents, guided by good intentions, try to earn more money to provide a good education for their children, and work from morning to night, children are often left alone with themselves. Having turned on the computer, they do not notice how much time has passed, and can sit at their favorite game day and night. Unfortunately, sometimes this leads to very tragic consequences. There was a known case when a very young boy from Sweden played “World of Warcraft” for 20 hours straight, after which he lost consciousness and was hospitalized from nervous exhaustion, after which he spent several days in intensive care.

The desire to refute reality

Not all people in this life have caught luck by the tail; as a rule, there are only a few such lucky ones. Those who did not succeed very often become “victims” of such games, because when they enter the game they have a desire to prove to everyone that in fact you can achieve much more, be the best, albeit in an alternative gaming universe . The game consumes such people, some spend days and nights trying to make themselves into a standard that may be unattainable in real life. The World of Warcraft universe provides an opportunity for some compensation for unsuccessful actions in reality, and this time it all depends on the player.
Except for people who for some reason cannot improve their lives, in Also in potential danger are the so-called “outcasts”, those who in life are the scapegoats of the powerful, those who hear whistles and hooting behind their backs and are bullied by their peers. As studies have shown, such people choose two paths for the development of events:

  • Entering the game, they begin to break and destroy everything and everyone, taking out their anger on everything that comes to hand. In such cases, anger and uncontrolled anger arise in them, which over time can grow into something more, and the person grows into a monster.
  • When entering the game, they try not to stand out from the crowd and play simply for their own pleasure, taking a break from the troubles of reality. But here, according to scientists, there is a hidden threat. If suddenly there is someone in the game who continues to mock and ridicule, this person’s nerves may not stand it. There is a known case where a girl committed suicide because her fellow players laughed at her. And the girl was only fifteen at that time.
Ease of communication

Nowadays, most people, coming home tired, no longer want anything other than rest. But since moving their fingers on the keyboard and clicking the mouse takes virtually no effort, they sit down at a computer or laptop. The longer a person plays, the larger his social circle is, the more people with similar interests are found who are interesting to talk to. In-game “friends” appear, and sometimes people, without noticing it themselves, enter the game just to exchange a few words with these same friends or simply “brothers in arms.” Moreover, you will communicate with them, just as they do with you, regardless of gender, age, religion and other aspects that periodically become a stumbling block in real life. In the game you are the same as everyone else.

Feeling of self-worth

Let’s imagine a situation: a person lives his own life, works, trying his best. But for some personal reasons, or perhaps because of circumstances that practically do not depend on him, or his own weakness, he begins to think that he cannot jump over his head in this life. And when he enters the game, the picture changes dramatically. The player joins groups (the so-called “parties” or “raids”) and conquers territories with high-level monsters (the so-called “instances” or “dungeons”). He is a cog in a well-coordinated mechanism that must work synchronously to achieve set goals. Depending on his role in the group, he is directly or indirectly responsible for all members of this group. Such responsibility, albeit for a short time, raises self-esteem, and he feels significant and needed. Then, when the goal is achieved, the person rejoices like a baby, despite the fact that it is just a game. So it turns out that a person returns to the game again and again in order to get those crumbs of positive emotions that are so lacking in real life.

Let’s sum it up…

Of course, these are just some of the reasons, of which there are actually many more, but this article was not intended as a scientific treatise. Many will not agree with me, they will say that I play, and everything is fine in my life. There is no point in arguing with this; most people are able to distinguish between the game and reality. But, unfortunately, during my long practice of playing WoW, I came across special, almost clinical cases when the game turned into a drug for people. They want to say: guys, have your head on your shoulders, and remember that this is just a game. As they say, “make love, not warcraft”!