MMO Addiction; Fact of Fiction? Scott M. Girouard Charter Oak State College
A relatively new phenomenon in the entertainment industry is the creation of multiplayer online role playing games or MMOs. Massive multiplayer online role playing games are designed to allow a large number of people to interact within a virtual world and work together to accomplish goals and tasks within the game. This format draws in an audience by catering to the many different desires of people. A question has arisen because of the popularity of these games – should people be concerned with the addictive nature of these designs? In an MMO, a person plays a character or avatar of their own design, within the limits of the game, and logs into a server where hundreds or thousands of other people are logged in at the same time. Sometimes people work together and sometimes they work against each other, but it’s always a social environment. MMOs have moved gaming from a pastime to a lifestyle. Many players dedicate their lives and all of their spare time to playing. Unfortunately there have been many negative repercussions because of how much time people dedicate to these games. There’s a history of problems commonly associated with other addictions, from families falling apart all the way to the deaths of players of MMOs. There is a real concern of how playing MMOs can impact people’s lives. To understand this problem, you have to look at what allures gamers to this style of video game. Many people look for ways to escape the monotony of their day to day lives, whether it’s losing oneself in a book, getting lost in the drama of a hit television show or logging into their favorite online game. MMOs are based on the entire premise of reinventing yourself as someone or something completely different than what you are in real life. The player becomes something