Why do people get addicted to WoW?

Recommended Videos

XoXoButterflyXoXo

New member
Apr 14, 2010
174
0
0
I've played WoW before, it was okay I guess... But I'm wondering why so much people get addicted to it, and why this game?
 

chozo_hybrid

What is a man? A miserable little pile of secrets.
Jul 15, 2009
3,479
14
43
Why do people get addicted to anything, they happen to like it and it slowly becomes a more focused part of their lives.

I assume when you say addicted to it, you mean the people who barely leave home and all they do is play it?
 

Space Spoons

New member
Aug 21, 2008
3,335
0
0
If you have the right kind of mindset for it, it can be very satisfying. Completing quests, filling up the experience bar, stacking everything in your bag, training skills... It's a lot of repetition, but the fun kind of repetition, if that makes any sense.

Again, it takes a very specific mindset to enjoy.
 

Dragon_of_red

New member
Dec 30, 2008
6,771
0
0
Yeah, I have no idea why, but ive never played it, so i cant talk, about half of my friends keep trying to get me to play it, i keep saying no...
 

Guitarmasterx7

Day Pig
Mar 16, 2009
3,872
0
0
that's how it's designed. It keeps you in a constant mindset that you're improving your character and growing stronger, and it keeps getting slightly harder and harder to improve until eventually you're spending 50 hours trying to get the flaming dildo of camelot because it gives you 2 more attack points than your current weapon.
 

Kragg

New member
Mar 30, 2010
730
0
0
Guitarmasterx7 said:
that's how it's designed. It keeps you in a constant mindset that you're improving your character and growing stronger, and it keeps getting slightly harder and harder to improve until eventually you're spending 50 hours trying to get the flaming dildo of camelot because it gives you 2 more attack points than your current weapon.
yep, like that, same with facebook games and (pretty much) all MMOs though, nothing is special about wow, just more people play it
 

Darkenwrath

New member
Apr 12, 2010
230
0
0
Oh look another WoW what's great about it? thread, in all honest its because it rewards obsessive compulsive behaviour, something that alot of people do without realizing it.
 

w@rew0lf

Banned User
Jan 11, 2009
358
0
0
Because they lack a sense of moderation and game industries purposely put addictive pieces into their games. Because it equals more $$$.

Source: http://www.cracked.com/article_18461_5-creepy-ways-video-games-are-trying-to-get-you-addicted.html
 

PDizzle418

New member
Mar 6, 2008
230
0
0
a lot of it is the people. If you can't get into a guild and play with people it can get very boring.

When you get to the higher levels you begin to dedicate mroe time to make your character better and you do it with a lot of people who become your friends. The social element is something that bring people together because it's accomplishing things as a team and working with people you like and know. You'll actually find a lot of women playing thsi game because it is such a social game if you play it right. After a while of being with these peopel you start to feel obligated to play, even if it's just sitting around waiting for people to do something or ask for your help or whatever. you have responsibility and accountability.

Like others have said the game is very rewarding while you play, leveling up your character and making them better is a very satisfying thing, and if you don't want to deal with people. You can go quest and make it very much a single player game if you so desire. However ti is fun to make your character better and design them they way you want. Also it's always fun to work for a specific piece of gear and once you get it you feel like you've acomplished your goal. Thus you get to set a new one and accomplish that until you hit max. Then the gear hunting really begins.

Another point is that there are lots of little things to do, fishing and all the trade skills in particular. If you're bored you can always find something to do while you wait for something to happen. Go run a quest quick, go pick some herbs or what not. Check the auction house for a couple things. Along with this is taht all of these things take small amounts of time to do. So it's very easy to nickel and dime yourself into spending a lot of time in the game. Sure Raids take a long time (3+ hours usually), but when your about to get off you have a laundry list of "small" tasks to do. Go run here, pick this up, get your stuff repaired, go check this auction, transfer somethign to your banker toon and get it sorted. Suddenly your and hour later because of allt he little things you were going to do and your just say fuck it I might as well just keep going. This also ties into the social aspect of peopel pressuring you to help them do something "real quick", because they are your friends.

I used to play wow but I stopped once I started to schedule my time around wow, not I just don't have the time to play anymore
 

StarofAzura

Lady Nerevarine
Mar 22, 2010
171
0
0
Wow is moderately fun. I hate MMOs, but I had several friends who played WoW and dragged me into it for a bit, and I will admit I found myself becoming amused without really realizing it. For me the fun thing about it was exploration - the other dorks online didn't interest me at all, except for my friend-dorks who gave me money and good stuff because I was a newbie.

I didn't play much and I don't miss it - and I oftentimes find myself wondering why people are so addicted to it as well.
 

old account

New member
Jul 11, 2009
209
0
0
More fun the real life.
But trust me, if there were real dragons, I would totally be out searching for them xD lol
 

Crops

Probably more bored than you
Aug 16, 2009
92
0
0
At first the thing that captures you is a huge world to explore, levels to gain, secrets to unfold etc etc. It's pretty big, you want to see more.

After that you become eager to get to the level cap, because you've been having fun all the time and people say the game doesn't get REAL fun until the cap.

Once you reach the level cap there are stats/specs/professions and gear to improve, which will keep you occupied for ages, farming items, money, bosses etc.
Apart from raiding/pvp, the endgame consists of daily quests, which can be done once a day. Some actions can also be performed once a day. These quests and actions reward or have the possibility to reward you with valuable items such as materials to craft better gear, emblems to buy better gear or simply exclusive mounts and vanity pets.
Then there's heroic dungeons. They reward gear or emblems to purchase gear, you're limited in how often you can do these each day.

So for optimal results, you're going to be playing every single day, for several hours in order to farm everything you're needing/wanting to have.

In the end, the addiction just creeps in like that. You want to have the best/rarest stuff available as fast as possible, and with such goals in mind, you don't really realize how repetitive your gaming experience has really become.

You're not experiencing it as "doing the most annoying dungeon over and over" or "Doing the same 25 quests that require to kill the same 20 mobs over and over", you're just working hard on getting what you want, and skipping it all for a day would only delay you obtaining desired items by another day.
 

The Singularity

New member
Jun 3, 2008
222
0
0
Rewards rewards rewards. Also what made me addicted is constantly arguing with people is side chat, until my entire clan fell apart from this...
But that was also 3 years ago so I've gone through rehab.
 

Rauten

Capitalism ho!
Apr 4, 2010
452
0
0
At first it's the fun, but eventually, for most people, it's the community. Be it random people you've befriended, or the guild you joined, or IRL friends you play with. It's the people you meet that can keep you going.