RIP

People say, "what someone does in the last days of his life reflects a lot about what is important to him".

On the last days before I finally allowed my World of Warcraft subscription to expire, I took some pictures which are telling of my motivation when I do play games.

Guess it right? I'm an achievement-oriented gamer. Some people play to lose themselves in the virtual world and the storyline. Yet others play for social reasons. But I play to win. :)

Which is why the memories I bring away from the game (beyond all the fun and the knowledge gained about this pretty incredible virtual world), are the rare equipment I amassed in my game profession as an Engineer.

I did not have much time to get all the top gear like others do, so I simply focused on getting the unique gear for my profession. The functional value of these machines are not high, but they are pretty rare and hard to get.

So a last look at my alter-ego in WoW - here goes...

Till the next time I have to study games again...RIP.

I thought it may be helpful to many of you non-gamers to read some of the literature that inspired me in the past 3 years in cyber-wellness related work. In particular, Nick Yee's Daedalus Project taught me much about how to understand gamers and why they play games. Some of Yee's work helped the folks at TOUCH to jump into helping pathological gamers. For all the recognition we've received concerning our work, we have to give credit to the guy who taught us from his work.

"Full-time WoW Gamer, Part-time Student"

Biodata:

Nat, 20 years old
Serving National Service

Gaming Profile

• Gaming since secondary school days and enjoys games of all genres.
  
• Hit the LAN shops immediately after school and he stayed there till midnight, just before the last bus home.
  
• On weekends, almost all available time was spent at LAN shops, including overnight stays.

"Full-time WoW Gamer, Part-time Student"

• At the peak of his gaming lifestyle, Nat was playing WoW 14 hours a day -- 7 hours of dedicated raiding per day, 6 days per week with his guild, for a full year.
  
• Completed the end-game content in the Burning Crusade, World of Warcraft
• Had four level 70 (highest level in WoW-BC) characters.
• Used 2 adjacent PCs at a single time in order to accelerate levelling up process.
• HOWEVER... he was performing below his academics potential, as he was devoting all of his attention and resources to playing the game.
  

Nat's motivation of playing games..

• Captivated by completing end-game content (Achievement) with his in-game Guild (Social Interaction).
  
• Enjoys helping guild members "level-up" and "gear-up".

How Nat's life turned around...

• Close game-friends left their games for other priorities in life
• Recognized that gaming cannot be his main preoccupation in life and had to move on as well.
  
• Switched to other game genres that were less time consuming, such as Real-Time Strategy (RTS) and First Person Shooter (FPS) games.
• Worked with TOUCH as a volunteer to mentor young gamers in healthy gaming groups at our cyber wellness centre.
  
• With his extensive knowledge and high gaming proficiency, he was able to command the respect of the young gamers there. As the staff and mentors explained the pathological effects of gaming to the youths, he was able to contribute to authenticate and substantiate the explanations.
  

Concurrently this helped him to take stock of his own life and put in a fresh and determined effort to make concrete changes.

How is Nat doing now?

• Today Nat balances his gaming with other priorities in life. He is actively pursuing his degree at a university and has found time for volunteering among other activities.
• One of the key advice he gives to young people is to make the right friends that will positively impact one’s life.
  

In his own words, “Then I lived my life for purpose of gaming but now I live life (with purpose) and game for recreation.”

My Virtual Harley (Well, for a minute)

(Originally written 15 Feb 2009)

Last night, someone paid me 16,000 gold (World of Warcraft currency) to craft this "Mekgineer's Chopper" for him.

Or for his girlfriend to be exact - a little late for Valentine's Day, but it was close enough. This gentleman spent the last 2 months to earn this amount of WoW gold.

Honestly this bike (even though it's just a bunch of 1s and 0s in some computer somewhere) is pretty cool and quite rare and always draws envious glances when it appears. I would be pretty happy if someone gave it to me as a gift.

But it's too expensive for me to even make it for myself. I gave up after I knew the cost (when I learnt how to make it). No hope. 14k gold (the actual cost to make this) is way too much. I cannot spend 180hrs (3hrs x 60 days) of my life playing WoW to get this amount of gold.

But that gentleman from Canada did it!

What baffled me:

"Why would people place so much value in a virtual toy"

I like it but I will not put so much time into this

What impressed me:

"...that a guy would go so far to try to win a girl's heart"

It's a mixed feeling, of admiration for what this guy will put in...and yet wonder, what better returns he may have gotten if he spent that 200hrs on something else

Whatever it is, I walked away 2000G richer :) and I spent 20min doing it :D

And I think Blizzard Entertainment will be even happier that 11.5million people are paying 15USD per month because of such things.

Upgrading of virtual possessions is one of the many compelling reasons why people keep on investing their life into MMORPGs. There is an endless supply of new desirable items introduced by the game operators (call them game "gods") to keep people playing.

Take a look at this webpage to see the amazing variety introduced every few months. This was a recent "patch" after the launch of World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King. Many millions of players have reached the peak of the virtual achievements and it was time for Blizzard to introduce new items.

"Why I Quit WoW"

Admin Executive by day, WoW player by night.

4x High Level Characters:
1) Level 80 Paladin
2) Level 71 Hunter
3) Level 65 Warlock
4) Level 65 Death Knight

Play Time
Weekday: 2 to 4 hours daily after work
Weekend: 12 to 16 hours daily
Average Weekly Time = 35hrs/week

Play History

• Started playing for 4 months
• Stopped for 9 months
• Restarted for 1 year
• Stopped 2 months because of work
• Returned for 3 months
• Quit

Question: "On a scale of 1 to 10, how would you rate your motivation level in each of the following aspects of gameplay?"

1) SOCIAL - 9 out of 10

• "WoW was a great way for me to spend time with friends whom I cannot meet often in real life. Even after our work (late into the night), we can just log on and do things together."
• "I like being able to do quests and level up together, help each other."

2) ACHIEVEMENT - 5 out of 10

• "If you want to play with friends and to help them, you must be powerful enough. You cannot do quests together if you are too far below them."
• "It is the same reason for trade skills and achievements, I do it so that I can be in a position to help friends."

3) IMMERSION - 3 out of 10

• "I like to try out different playing styles and experience the different aspects of the game. However, I am not obsessed with the storyline or virtual environment."

Question: "So Why Did You Quit?"

"My friend (of 15 years) decided to gradually move on to Final Fantasy 11 and I was left with very few real friends in the game. During the implementation of Patch 3.1, a hacker took over my friends (FF11 player) and stole all our gold (game currency) and I had even less ability to help my remaining friends. That was the tipping point and I decided to quit WoW altogether."





Question: "Isn't It Possible to Make New Friends in the Game?"

"Sure, but I prefer to be able to put a face to my online friends. My timings for playing made it very difficult to look for new friends."

Question: "Was it Difficult to Quit?"

• "Not at all. I've never had difficulties with stopping play even at the peak of my WoW-gaming. My play never overtook my real-world priorities like work, rest or church. I could always stop immediately whenever those clashed."
• "In the same way, once my friends left, there was really no compelling motivation for me to keep playing."

Question: "After Investing So Much Time and Effort Into the Game, Do You Regret It?"

• "No regrets. I always took it as recreation and never compromised my real-life priorities even at the peak of gaming. I enjoyed every single hour I spent so I have no regrets."
• "I think it will be harder for people with achievement-orientation to give up the game because they will not want to give up the virtual status they've attained."

Question: "What Will You Do Now With All the Time You Have?"

• I'll spend it on other recreational means - pick up a sport, walk around town, find a girlfriend, read comics and play other games that are not so time-consuming.
• I'll also volunteer to help other gamers.

Dan (not his real name) is a unique case because he was not a pathological gamer even with the amount of time he was spending on games. Games were his primary means of meeting friends.

Given that he was single, do not have many other interests and had a lot of recreational time on his hands, he went into WoW. However his other priorities in life were not compromised.

In a gaming questionairre done on him, he was deemed as an "engaged gamer" (score 5 out of 7). His playing patterns were neither "problematic" (score 1 out of 13) or "pathological" (score 0.5 out of 10).

8) Exploring a new territory

After one and a half weeks, playing an average of 2 hours daily, I am currently at Level 12, and have complete majority of the quests on this main island. Now it was time to venture further, explore new grounds and fight more challenging monsters!

Interesting parallelism with reality:

- When we begin to grow up, we want to travel out and see new places and environment. Similarly in the game, I yearn and crave to explore new grounds because I am getting bored in my 'hometown'.

- When we travel overseas, we have the option to take a plane or take a ferry/boat/ship. Similarly in WoW, I get the choice of travelling either by flight or by ferry too. And guess which one I chose?


Tada! Definitely not as high class as a Boeing A380, but this must be the first class seats in the game. Soaring sky high, this is a new experience which I have never felt even when I played MapleStory!

Just when I feel bored of the old territory I was in, now with this exciting flight adventure, I am perked up again and eagerly anticipating what lies ahead in the new grounds of Darkshores!

Thinker Thoughts

Game structure are crafted carefully to lured the gamers continuously. Just when one thinks that the kick/drive to play is running low, new virtual environments, quests, territories draw them back into the game again.

7) Sense of Belonging - Being part of a Guild

While venturing into one of the caves to complete a particular quest, I saw another virtual character being chased and attacked by three monsters simultaneously! Looking at the situation, there was no way she was going to survive and relentless onslaught. Being a hero to save the 'damsel' in distress, I jumped into action and fought off two of these monsters.

She thanked me a couple of times and subsequently invited me to quest together with her. Back in reality, I looked at my watch and had about an hour to spare before my next appointment, so I agreed to quest with her.

We fought side by side and after 30 minutes, finally completed the quest! (Sense of Achievement)

At that point, I received an invitation from this character to be part of her guild! I was tremendously honor and immediately accepted the invitation without much hesitation. I mean... I have only been playing WoW for less than a week and here's someone whom appreciates my work and invites me to be into her guild! Cool! (Sense of Immersion, Achievement)


How do I feel then?

1. Sense of pride and belonging
2. Appreciated for helping out in the game
3. Acceptance to be part of a bigger 'family' (guild)
4. Great opportunity to know more friend in the guild (whom are from all over Asia and Oceania)

Immersing myself into the shoes of a gamer, this is how I genuinely feel. Things that I can get/feel in the real world seems easily obtainable/acheivable in the virtual world.

I can now understand a bit more now why youths are stuck in game and refused to stop playing.

6) Collaborating & Making Friends

One stark difference between MapleStory and WoW would definitely has to be to how WoW has been structured such that you are compelled to play in a minimum of two person together! Now's here is my own experience:

I leveled up with ease from Level 1 till 7. And that took me almost 8 hours spanned across two days. Subsequently, in order to progress the game further, it would require me to fight higher level monsters which were much tougher and would be almost impossible for me to handle by myself, espacially when they come in a mob towards me!

While working on one of the quest, I died 5 times even before reaching the main boss which I was supposed to strike down. One my final attempt, I met two character whom were also working on the same quest and we collaborated.

The beauty of WoW game structure was that it allow game characters working on the same quest to "share quest" , such that the characters involved could collaborate, complete the quest together and share the loot! On one hand, you get to complete the difficult quest and on other hand, you get to make new friends from around the globe. Isn't that killing two birds with one stone?

Now that's a redefinition to TEAM WORK isn't it?

Interesting if we could extract such learning points out to teach the youths whom are absorbed into the game.