beez said:
After 6 years, I'm leaving. Can't say that I won't miss my pretty phoenix, all that cooperation and drama but... I mean, what they are doing to the game... well, I do not support it.
Here's my reasons:
I've been paying my subscription fee for years, and since Cata, a lot of the content we were getting was rehashed, remade, et cetera.
I've been paying my subscription fee for years and they kept holding back more or less awesome content for money. A lot of times I've saved up money on buying food (I did not starve, but I bought less, or worse quality food for example), just to be with my friends
now they announce that they are slowly implementing microtransactions on top of the subscription model, further locking people, like me out of content that should be part of the game (and cosmetic armor for money? srsly)
the new things they implement seldom work, so patch by patch we see classes struggle just to keep up, or get a complete redesigen in an even more ridiculous way.
I'm not having fun anymore, and all the stuff they publish convinces me that they lost their soul as a company. I don't think it's a coincidence that they are losing subscribers, I've lost all of my IRL friends. Also, I've found that all these things, plus, looking back at it, the time I've wasted that I could've used more productively, have made me regret playing at all in the first place. So, I think I'm not touching an MMO ever again in my life.
What do you think? I'm not planning to start a flame-war, hate-thread, or anything, I'm just interested in your opinions or similar stories.
Couple things...
1. Blizzard hauled most of the lead design staff off WoW a long time ago to work on Titan...everyone that didn't leave and subsequently get hired by Arena Net and Carbine, that is. So what you're seeing is the result of years of cumulative brain drain. The foundation is still strong, but the iteration on that foundation has been progressively more erratic.
2. I'm not sure how on earth $15 a month translated into you buying "poorer quality food". I don't know where you live, or what your monthly food bill is, but $15 is like...maybe ONE dinner a month for my girlfriend and I. If you're that close to the poverty line, you might want to reconsider gaming as a hobby entirely. It's relatively cheap as hobbies go, but it's not THAT cheap. If $15 is making or breaking your food budget and throwing your health into peril, you should probably be focusing all your time and energy on improving your quality of life.
3. Post MMO regret is not an uncommon phenomenon, as some people tend to play them compulsively long past the point where they stop having fun. If you feel this was not an instructive experience, or mistrust your ability to determine whether or not you are playing habitually instead of for enjoyment, then perhaps you are best off avoiding the genre...and any games that mimic an MMO's effort/reward cycle...entirely. If you DO feel you've learned from the experience, as I learned from my first bout of MMO over-indulgence, then there is no reason you cannot continue to dip your toes in from time to time to see if you like the feel of the water. You may find that WITHOUT that obsessive compulsive desire to chase the mechanical rabbit that your enthusiasm for the genre has faded. Or, you may find yourself able to enjoy big worlds and complex combat systems free of the pressure to treat your recreational hobby as a second job.
4. No matter what your hobby, there is always something you could have done that would be "more productive". Playing video games? You could've been learning guitar. Learning guitar? You could've been studying medicine. Studying medicine? You could've been overseas helping starving children in Africa, you selfish jerk! And so on, and so on. There is never a need to beat yourself up because you indulged in play. It's pretty essential, actually, to your long term physical and psychological health.
5. You say you "lost all your IRL friends". Are you sure this isn't a case of post hoc ergo propter hoc? How old are you? Moving into your mid twenties? This is a normal period of time for you to be rapidly drifting apart from old friends. That process can be remedied via circumstance or herculean effort to stay in touch, but it is not at all uncommon for people to find themselves with an entirely different group of friends at 25 than they had at 15, for example. And then again in their thirties if they get into a long term relationship and/or have children.
That's not to say WoW can't have played a role...perhaps you played 18 hours a day, shunning all human contact, ignoring plaintive requests for outings by friends so you could wail on raid mobs. If that's the case, then lesson learned my friend! Just please...PLEASE...do not pull a James Portnow and A) over-dramatize the fact you stood some friends up for a movie one time, or B) blame it on the GAME, as opposed to a period of questionable decision making/reclusiveness. I had a girlfriend who got so into reading she'd ignore the world for weeks on end. Never occurred to anyone to suggest she had a BOOK addiction. From the sounds of it, you went through a period of time where you prioritized your hobby over being social. Now, you're feeling an urge to prioritize other things. That
should reflect in your behavior.
If you find it does not, and you are compulsively drawn into an MMO and unable to make sensible life decisions like "buy food" or "do laundry" or "wash taint", then by all means...either forbid yourself the games, or use this forum as your AA sponsor. There is no shortage of people here who will happily tell you that MMOs are de debil, and castigate you roundly for ever thinking they were worth playing in the first place. Should serve as a nice cup of cold water to the face.
