General Discussion

Originally posted by garbonzo

 

Fair enough.  But, you respond as if there are only two extremes to choose from - total government control or total individual responsibility.  I get your point, but there are many subtle shades in between the extremes.  And, not everyone has family, friends or parents who can or want to look after them.  It may hold some water in middle class American suburbia, but the vast majority of the world lives in a very different reality.  And doctors?  They're generally not much different than lawyers and bankers these days imo - show me the cash or/and get out.  We're pretty much on our own these days.  If you've got money and friends that's fine.  If not, well...

 

My comments are definitely going beyond the topic of game companies, but all this discussion raises the bigger issue of a society's responsibility for its people.

Those with power corrupt absolutely its why we have human rights its why we have thigns in place (atleast here) so that no one government or organization can have complete power.   After 911 we stupidly let the president have more power and we see where that took us.   Every day citizens getting spied on, sent off to camps, interrogiated, library records requested (thank god librarians stood their ground).   If you give them an inch they take a mile.   No one has the right to tell me what to do with my Saturday afternoons.  If i want to spend 10 hours gaming I'm going to game.   I still take breaks to eat, use the bathroom, feed my cat, and even to watch the news.

There is no middle ground when you give an organization power to control you.  

Other countries may do what they please and their people let them but that doesn't mean I agree with the way those people are treated by their country.   It certaintly didn't do the USSR any good when it was around and it certaintly didn't help China much either back in the day. 

Society's people...we ARE society.  Society IS the People not the government.  The Government is NOT ever society.   I do not want to take responsiblity or force some other third party to take responsiblity for some jackass who decides not to eat because it'll interrupt his game time.

Originally posted by graill

They do not care, except for your paid monthly sub or constant trips to their item malls. Social responsibility? game designers and their bosses do not understand the concept, they understand money, they understand folks are attracked by colorful shiny things with lots of numbers or buzzwords on them, real or imagined. They build their business model to suit.

  Some countries do take social responsibility to far and their governments limit the time most of their population can play "games". they go so far as to make them part of their laws. Glad i dont live there.

Yeh right social responsibillity:P

Originally posted by candygirl6

 

 

"They do not target people with problems."

They sell their games to people with problems.  The people that do have problems are coincidently their biggest money makers. A warning lable, EVEN THAT isn't even in place, won't solve the problem.

 

"They don't force you to play."

Weak argument, noone forces you to smoke or drink, but it doesn't mean it can't cause health problems.

 

Anyway, there's 10 million people playing WoW, how many of those are doing 8+ hour sessions? How many of those are creating problems for themselves. How many deaths by now? Lot of ignorant answers that don't want to see the problem.

 

The words in yellow are irrelevant.  Alcoholics cannot sue a liquor company.  Smokers only get away with suing tobacco companies because they falisified studies and hid information.  The opposite is true for games, as there have been studies proving games are NOT addictive to the general populace.

The words in green are pointless.  Only 8% of all players play for more than 40 hours per week.  This hardly supports your argument that gaming addiction is an epidemic.

http://www.nickyee.com/daedalus/archives/000758.php

How many deaths?  Maybe a handful, out of the millions and millions of people who have ever played online games.  That's not trivial to the families and friends of those people, but it is not sufficient grounds to start a witch hunt.  In fact, the low number of deaths actually supports the theory that the problem lies with the individuals, not the games.

Originally posted by candygirl6

Proove me it's not addiction. Tell me why someone plays themself to death for 24+ hours if it's not addiction. Give me a better explanation elvenangel.

Good grief candy...you keep stating these deaths like they're some serious issue.  If you add up all the "MMORPG related deaths" last year, including a guy who beat a guy to death over the game, you end up with 4 deaths.

Just for a frame of reference

Hippos kill more than 500 people a year...

Remarkably, having an addiction to the online version of Hungry Hungry Hippos killed more people than cancer...

i have feeling more and more of these moralist comming to these boards try convince gamers or condem games, games are bad for you.

Its up to you FOLKS to see there not:)

Originally posted by elvenangel

 

Originally posted by garbonzo

 

Fair enough.  But, you respond as if there are only two extremes to choose from - total government control or total individual responsibility.  I get your point, but there are many subtle shades in between the extremes.  And, not everyone has family, friends or parents who can or want to look after them.  It may hold some water in middle class American suburbia, but the vast majority of the world lives in a very different reality.  And doctors?  They're generally not much different than lawyers and bankers these days imo - show me the cash or/and get out.  We're pretty much on our own these days.  If you've got money and friends that's fine.  If not, well...

 

My comments are definitely going beyond the topic of game companies, but all this discussion raises the bigger issue of a society's responsibility for its people.

 

Those with power corrupt absolutely its why we have human rights its why we have thigns in place (atleast here) so that no one government or organization can have complete power.   After 911 we stupidly let the president have more power and we see where that took us.   Every day citizens getting spied on, sent off to camps, interrogiated, library records requested (thank god librarians stood their ground).   If you give them an inch they take a mile.   No one has the right to tell me what to do with my Saturday afternoons.  If i want to spend 10 hours gaming I'm going to game.   I still take breaks to eat, use the bathroom, feed my cat, and even to watch the news.

There is no middle ground when you give an organization power to control you.  

Other countries may do what they please and their people let them but that doesn't mean I agree with the way those people are treated by their country.   It certaintly didn't do the USSR any good when it was around and it certaintly didn't help China much either back in the day. 

Society's people...we ARE society.  Society IS the People not the government.  The Government is NOT ever society.   I do not want to take responsiblity or force some other third party to take responsiblity for some jackass who decides not to eat because it'll interrupt his game time.

If you believe that the US has the democracy it professes to have (I don't), then actually the government is the people (We the people...)  If elections work, then the government should actually be carrying out the will of the people.  (But why am I laughing to myself?)  We'll save that for another day..

To bring this back to the OP, I much much prefer the game designers to deal with these issues themselves through design.  An example is that pre-BC purple tiger mount in WoW that took months of repetitive grinding on the same quest to get.  They should know someone will "work" to get it by melting their brain with months of mind-numbing repetition.   But let's be real - that's not fun at all. It's arguably taking advantage of someone with a compulsive personality to squeeze a few months of sub fees out of them so they can get a temporary "high" of riding through IF on a different color mount (Blizzard got $30 for only changing a color, not even a new skin?)  That's just lazy (or smart?) on their part.  Make it fun and mentally stimulating.  Maybe even *gasp* teach someone something in the process (a new language? some physics concepts? anything).  But, like we all know, it's all about profit.  And I seriously doubt we'll see any significant government regulation when the gaming profits are topping the film industry.  $$$

I still fail to see how cutting the chunks of time necessary to complete a specific goal in an MMO will change anything. The people that will spend 6-8 hours a day online will still play 6-8 hours online. They will just accomplish more in the same time frame.

Then again, anyone that plays 8 or more hours a day will have a hard time working enough to pay rent, utilities, etc to keep on playing. I would think you would make more money catering to those that play less often but for longer. Those that play for marathon sessions and then quit 3 months later, don't seem like the real money makers to me.

Unless you are going to build in a timer into the game that automatically logs you out after a specified time deemed 'healthiest', there's no real way to stop people from playing however long they want to play. I can't imagine a mandatory time limit imposed would be a very popular thing. Can you imagine being near the end of killing a raid boss, only to be logged out for excessive gameplay?

Originally posted by Hexxeity

 

Originally posted by candygirl6

 

 

"They do not target people with problems."

They sell their games to people with problems.  The people that do have problems are coincidently their biggest money makers. A warning lable, EVEN THAT isn't even in place, won't solve the problem.

 

"They don't force you to play."

Weak argument, noone forces you to smoke or drink, but it doesn't mean it can't cause health problems.

 

Anyway, there's 10 million people playing WoW, how many of those are doing 8+ hour sessions? How many of those are creating problems for themselves. How many deaths by now? Lot of ignorant answers that don't want to see the problem.

 

The words in pink are a complete fabrication.  You have absolutely no idea whether that is true or not.

 

The words in yellow are irrelevant.  Alcoholics cannot sue a liquor company.  Smokers only get away with suing tobacco companies because they falisified studies and hid information.  The opposite is true for games, as there have been studies proving games are NOT addictive to the general populace.

The words in green are pointless.  Only 8% of all players play for more than 40 hours per week.  This hardly supports your argument that gaming addiction is an epidemic.

http://www.nickyee.com/daedalus/archives/000758.php

How many deaths?  Maybe a handful, out of the millions and millions of people who have ever played online games.  That's not trivial to the families and friends of those people, but it is not sufficient grounds to start a witch hunt.  In fact, the low number of deaths actually supports the theory that the problem lies with the individuals, not the games.

And  Dr. Maressa Orzack claims more than 40% of WoW players are addicted.

http://www.tomsgames.com/us/2006/08/08/world_of_warcraft_players_addicted/

Is it time this is investigated and companies take their responsability? Yes.

When a death happens, NOT ONE company comes forward and takes any blame at all. It's disgusting how companies can do whatever they want under the banner of human ignorance.

China is finally taking steps and limiting player time because MMO companies refuse to do it, they are forced now after more and more deaths. But this problem seems to be sweeped under the rugg in the west.