The solution is to play a game more friendly to your schedule, such as Guild Wars. Since it's not a race to level as fast as you can, you can easily quit for a day or a week or a year and pick up right back where you left off without now being way behind everyone else. It also helps immensely that you can easily play for half an hour or an hour at a time, rather than having to play for hours at a time to get anywhere.
Ever try any OTHER MMORPG's? WoW... for instance? You're talking basically about addiction, and not one peep about WoW? SRSLY?!? You're an educated person. There are more than ONE MMORPG out there. In order to form an opinion about the whole, you should try others out there. This in turn may help your personal issues, or feed them... but at least help you come to a better conclusion rather than just a biased one based off of one game in particular. But no... seriously... you need to try WoW before you judge MMO's as a whole based off of FFXI.
He said he had 2 level 60 chars in that game. He had a whole paragraph in his post talking about wow. It wasn't even very far into the post...
Ah yeah, now I remember... I had to use some Visine and lost my place.
Yeah I had to re-read the story a few more times. So what I gathered was...
"I played a very difficult MMO, and I have also played a very "casual" MMO, and they about ruined my life"... and presents the question
"If you are one of the people who can balance MMORPG gaming and school, or have found an mmorpg game that is casual enough to let you do both without maxing out your credit card please let me know."
Yes, there are. But the casualness of a MMO is not the problem. It's self control, responsibility, and prioritizing. If OP doubts being able to handle that... then OP shouldn't be asking strangers in a forum what he, a psychologist-in-progress should do. As a psychologist, OP "should" already know the answer to his question, and should seek help outside of forums if he is still having problems sorting out RL responsibilities with addictions of any sort.
Good luck.
"There is only one thing of which I am certain, and that's nothing is certain."
Originally posted by Sinviper Ugh, this whole thread is cliched. I'm in High School, played WoW for 3 years, quit it and now after all that nothing happened to my schoolwork.
Whatever anyone does, don't let those idiots that think games are bad see this thread, it'll be the motherload of evidance.
Games are much like guns: a lot of hoopla over the object and not enough attention paid to the user. Maybe if more people paid attention to the user, it wouldn't be as big an issue.
OP: good story. I'm glad you learned some things early in life instead of spending the next 20 years strung out on whatever thing you become addicted to.
Id just like to point out that near the end of my post I made a clear note stating
"I do not blame mmorpgs for my initial problems, I think they were a very useful learning tool and actually helped me grow up a bit faster than I would have otherwise".
It seems like a lot of people are getting the impression that I am complaining or blaming mmorpg games for my misfortune. Which I clearly state that I don't use them as an excuse, I simply use them as a learning tool, and In a way I believe they helped me grow up faster. Which is not a bad thing.
Second of all A lot of people seem to misunderstand my point. Its not to complain that my life went to the shitter thanks to mmorpg games nothing like that. "Actually if you read carefully" you will see that my life right now is quite good. I am not playing any mmorpg games and I am doing a paid apprenticeship in my college honors program for psychology. Keeping up a 3.0 GPA and a healthy social life. My point is I want to hear what people who did manage to go to college, get a degree, have a healthy social life, and play mmorpg games did to do it. I can manage the high GPA, the honors program, and even the social life, but I can't seem to find a way to put mmorpg gaming into my life at this time. So My main question was. Anyone able to do it under similar circumstances? If so what did you do. If there is a very casual mmorpg game that you can play with 2-3 hours a week I would like to know about it as well. This is all I really asked. A lot of people understood my intentions but I guess I needed to make it more clear for others.
And to the individual who posted Guild wars I already did play Guild wars I just did not include it in my story because it was such a short peroid (roughly 7 weeks). I managed to pass Nightfall and Factions but then I just got bored of it. I thank you for your suggestion.
OP: I have known people who both can and cannot balance MMORPGs with college and remain with a decent GPA. For some reason, I was able to do this in college, but not without first screwing up my grades in high school. First semester of my Junior year in HS I went from a 3.5 to a 2.1 because I was playing around 8+ hours of Ultima Online every night and never got enough sleep. I would ditch school and find any excuse to be in-game rather than working on school. Eventually, I realized I was screwing my life up (as you did) and I pulled myself out.
Fortunately I have never had that issue again with MMORPGs. Part of the reason is that I have never managed to get addicted to an MMO to the same extent that I was with Ultima Online. The other reason was because I knew what could happen if I allowed myself to fall into the trap, so I managed to avoid it. I was able to play WOW and try every other game that came out during my college years without any effect on my grades. I ended up graduating in Psychology just like you plan to do.
So yes, it is possible to balance the two. Make no mistake though; your grades will always be higher if you don't play an MMORPG. Its just inevitable that some of the time you would otherwise be studying, you will be adventuring instead.
It may be an individual thing though because I have known several individuals who have allowed MMOs to completely ruin their lives. One of them played World of Warcraft so much that he lost his job and his girlfriend, gained 100 lbs, and was forced to move back in with his parents. It took him years to dig himself back out of the mess that game did to his life, but eventually he succeeded. Unfortunately for people like that, I think there is no alternative but to quit the genre (perhaps even video games in general) and move on with their lives...
You might want to be careful about getting a degree in psychology, as there are vastly more people who get that degree than there are jobs suited to it. My parents' business has hired people with psychology degrees to go out and mow lawns, prune shrubs, etc.--stuff that you don't even need a high school diploma for.
More to your real question, though: the key is to avoid games that push you to play for reasons other than that the game is fun in itself. Obviously a game should be fun to play, and you'll want to play a game that you like. But don't play a game for other reasons, in spite of it not being terribly fun. When I put it that way, it probably sounds like a silly thing to do, but a lot of players do exactly that very often.
One common case of this is games built around leveling up or getting better gear over a very long period of time. This can lead to "keeping up with the Joneses", as people think, oh, but I need to play more in order to level up faster, or in order to keep up with so and so, or whatever. Unless your personality is that you can happily mess around in low level areas and not care a bit that other players are much higher level and stronger than you (which most people aren't), you'd best avoid games with a very long leveling curve. Games where you quickly get to max level and perfect gear aren't problematic in this way.
Another common case of this is games that require you to play for long periods of time in a single sitting. This can be to clear a dungeon, where after a while, when you really should log off, you think, oh, but I'm halfway through this dungeon, and if I quit now, I'll lose my progress. So you stay online for another hour or two to finish it, and use free time you didn't have. A lot of games will start off gentle and build up as you get higher level. Before picking up a game, don't just look at the low level stuff and see that you can log out whenever and it's fine. Look at the endgame, and see if there are raids that demand that you be online for hours at a time, or whether you can do everything in small chunks of playtime.
Another variant on the long play sessions problem is games where you have to group to do things, but it takes a long time to get a group. If it takes you half an hour to find a group and then another 15 minutes to get everyone together to start the content, it's easy to think, oh, but I don't want to log off now and lose the group, and have to start over getting a new group next time. It's not that group content is bad. It's that group content where it's hard to get a group is bad. A game built entirely around group content in which you can usually log on and get a group and start on content in under 5 minutes is not problematic in this way.
Perhaps the most insidious problem is games that require prescheduling. Sometimes it can be special in-game events that occur at particular periods of time. Sometimes it can be a case of needing to do things with particular other people, such as in a raiding guild, and this demand that everyone schedule his life around the game to be online at that particular time. For a one-time thing, this isn't so bad, but for a recurring event, it can lead to people thinking, but I have to log on and go raiding now or I'll let my guildies down! You don't know your schedule months in advance, and if this happens on days when you really just don't have time for it, it's a big problem.
The basic principle is that, while computer games aren't bad, other things are a higher priority. In particular, your job, schoolwork, meals, and adequate sleep must take precedence over playing computer games.
Most people have quite a bit of free time, and often a lot more than they realize. Playing sports, hanging out with friends, watching TV, playing computer games, posting on forums like this one, and many other things are all free time. It's a matter of priorities, and which things you choose to do and which you go without. It's not entirely an either/or; you can do several different things in your free time, but simply can't do each of them for a huge amount of time.
Computer games should be a low scheduling priority, as they should fit around whatever other activities you want to do. Obviously, there's nothing wrong with having a social life, but it would be rather unusual for someone to have such an active social life that it consumes every waking moment of free time. Computer games should fit in the gaps left by the other things you want to do, so that you can sit down and say, well, I don't have anything important to do right now, so I'll play a game for a while--and then log off after a while.
If games have various things that make it so that the game can't be played that way, that should be regarded as game-breaking. Find out what the game is like, and if it is going to demand huge amounts of your time, then don't pick up the game in the first place.
The reason I brought up Guild Wars is that it doesn't demand unreasonable amounts of time. Nearly everything in the game can be done in play sessions of under an hour. That's not an hour excluding time to wait in a queue, find a group, get everyone to the dungeon start, etc. That's under an hour from the time clicking the icon to launch the game to the time the game is closed because you're done. Even things that take longer than an hour (mainly vanquishing) tend to take only a little over an hour, as in 70 or 80 minutes, not three hours in one sitting.
You get to max level and perfect gear quickly, so after that, you're not constantly thinking, but I need to do this to level up. You don't have to worry about your guildies leveling faster than you and then being unable to group with them. You can leave the game alone for weeks or months at a time and not be hopelessly behind when you return.
Guild Wars isn't the only game that will fit around your life like that, of course. It's just one that I'm familiar with, so I could cite it as an example.
Well just about the degree. The main reason most people with psychology degrees never get any good jobs is because they get a BA and never bother to go for the masters. You have to be specific in what you want to work with. For example I'm getting a Master's in Social psychology, and I'm going to take a test to become a therapist. Most people who take psychology get it because its a fast degree to get. However in my honors program I am the only student with psychology as my major. There are 42 students I happen to be the only one who is majoring in psychology. It is amazing. Most people who take psych are not really interested in it, they just want a fast way to get a degree. If you really try hard with psychology, get a Masters maybe a PH.D and make a name for yourself with different honors programs, or research exhibitions you can easily make as much as any biology or engineer major.
About the mmorpg games you do have a point. When I look at my days maybe I could play mmorpg games. I would have to give up the hour I play soccer between classes, Id give up my Friday afternoon which I use to relax with friends. I guess mmorpg games just seem to insignificante for me to really devote all of my free time to one. Guess for that Its best if I keep working on my education and focus on less time consuming more productive hobbies. I do enjoy mmorpg games a lot when I do get the chance to play them. Guess I really just want a game a lot like Guild wars in a way. But something new. Hope Monster Hunter 3 comes out soon.
For some reason I agree that mmo are not for college student. Because of course your focus won't be in studying but in MMO. Most of the time we tend to cut schools just o play mmo. But still depends on the person on how they are going balance and manage their time doing stuffs and their real life. For me I also started to play mmo just in college when my boyfriend teach me to play Flyff. It's addicting actually if you can't control yourselves. But still I know when to stop and knows my priority. It was just a game but we should know that this in some reason help us in to grow but to think that it was just a virtual world deffers in real world. We have wour own life in real world so we should know our goals and priority. MMO are just our second world/virtual world other community.
having a tight schedule and planning things Communicating with others, and how to make sure they have the same view as you Responsibillity, if you fail your group, or just don’t show up to often it has consequences, thats a wise lesson for reallife
ANd how about organizing raids, being a guildleader and motivating people?
But it only works if you put your real life first.. and this does not only count for Students but for all nothing wrong with spending your spare time gaming (its actually cheaper then drinking in a bar) as long as you use your time management and priotitizing above the game..
Best MMO experiences : EQ(PvE), DAoC(PvP), WoW(total package) LOTRO (worldfeel) GW2 (Artstyle and animations and worlddesign) SWTOR (Story immersion) TSW (story) ESO (character advancement)
In my experience, the people I was on teams with who played MMOs were more reliable than the peeps talking about their console or mobile games all the damn time...
Had a peep once who knew the whole pokedex but didn't know what a system call was and used nested loops for things easily accomplished with a for or while loop... The peep is probably a developer for some Kickstarter MMO by now.
Thank you adbot for bringing this thread back. It is 2009 and a guy who wants to play a MMORPG is pondering how he can do that and put the necessary work into his college degree.
Fast forward to 2021 and you can play a MMO for 15 minutes a day and have "meaningful gameplay". They are so easy "your mum could play them" and filled to the nines with short dailies and other such content for butterfly gamers. Not sure the OP would think they are worth playing now but hey that's gaming progress for you.
My advice, if you are getting top scores for your college work don't worry about your gaming, but if not cut back on your gaming until you get to the best standard you think you can get.
Nothing new. I remember when I ran a games store that some University students failed because they spent too much time playing D&D. Some people have no self-control and they have to learn the hard way. That's life though.
Yeah, man. I've fallen into those holes with MMOs. Definitely would blow off friends on raid nights, but I didn't want to get ragged on, so I'd never tell them I was playing WoW or LoTRO. Fortunately for me, I have gotten to the point where I play too much and burn out fast if I try to play at a high level.
Now, I just like to poke around and set small goals. Mostly I play like the majority of people did in early EQ. I just mess around and socialize with guildies in chat or whatever. I might pop in a few times a year to raid with the guild if the gf is out of town, but I never indulge in any appointment gaming and I don't neglect friends, family, or other hobbies I find more beneficial.
It's not mmorpg's it's the person and whatever they get addicted to. I remember in college this guy, we're in an open lab doing work and yeah he's there too, go to class and half way through i notice he's not there? Huh weird af.
Lecture ends, walking down the corridor walking past the lab and notice he is still there glued to his monitor, curious i head in to the lab and walk past his monitor and he's in chat aol or icq or wherever chat program the guy i heard later after he failed out was completely addicted to chat. For other's it's drugs, booze, gambling or whatever, and for some yes even mmorpg's, and or any game really.
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Gaming is bad for kids period,parents should be encouraging their kids to be outside and playing sports,being healthy,exercising. From what i have been able to witness over 60 years is that kids who game are more often going to be introverts and be unhealthy and have a persona similar to for example a chess player,off in their own zone,often not well around others. I feel absolutely blessed that my early life influences were sports and outdours but of course i was also lucky in that gaming didn't exist outside of board games. Gaming will ALWAYS be there so there is no need to influence kids into gaming at an early age,imo keep them away from games and cell phones.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Gaming is bad for kids period,parents should be encouraging their kids to be outside and playing sports,being healthy,exercising. From what i have been able to witness over 60 years is that kids who game are more often going to be introverts and be unhealthy and have a persona similar to for example a chess player,off in their own zone,often not well around others. I feel absolutely blessed that my early life influences were sports and outdours but of course i was also lucky in that gaming didn't exist outside of board games. Gaming will ALWAYS be there so there is no need to influence kids into gaming at an early age,imo keep them away from games and cell phones.
If playing video games is bad for children then it's equally bad for adults.
Adults should also be "being health and exercising."
I would say even moreso as one gets older a sedentary lifestyle can have greater repercussions on the body.
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
You are correct but not EQUALLY because MOST of your learning and body growing is done by the time your 18.Edcuation can continue but now becomes more specified and targeted but still very important for the next 3-5 years.
Also kids are easily brainwashed so that it affects their way of thinking for the rest of their lives.So they will never exprience anything other than gaming because that is all they did was run home and game.
Later in life you should at that point have the inteliigence level to make wiser decisions,hence why they consider you an adult at 18 because you are NOT yet ready to make adult decisions.
Also as an adult like was the case for me,i still played sports and my job far exceeded the physical workout i needed everyday.So i was influenced by the OUTSIDE world,team work,real life scenarios so when i started to game it was not an influence on my life or how i would think.
When i see kids now a days bury their face in cell phones to the point you can't even talk to them because they become zombies,puppets to their phones you know there is a serious problem going on within the kids minds.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
I feel this way more about work now. Not necessarily during my high school/college years. I mean, I got good grades fairly easy. I don't remember ever needing to do actual homework. Even when I was in college I did pretty decent, but then again, I didn't put much effort into my college projects either... I did "pretty decent" in both phases of my life. If you're satisfied with just being "pretty decent", then yeah, it's not so bad. Do I regret spending more of my time doing "useless" things like gaming, instead of becoming an Einstein or something? Nah. My fondest memories were formed out of my gaming experiences, I wouldn't want to have missed them for the world. Not even if that meant I would earn a high-paying salary right now or have a better status in society, but I honestly don't care about things like that. I just wanna have fun and enjoy live as it comes. J-Just don't tell my parents, okay?
College, work and gaming are easy enough to balance, just plan to attend in the summer. Take 2 courses then, and relax on one course in the regular quarters.
This worked for me (quarter system), taking 2 classes in the fall/spring, with 3 in winter and 2 more in summer. I managed to put in a lot of time at work, and managed to some serious game time. (Granted, this was before personal computers were a thing, but role playing sessions were flourishing, 3 campaigns a week plus 2x general gaming groups a week). If you really want to do something, you can usually find a way to make time for it.
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.
Comments
Ugh, this whole thread is cliched. I'm in High School, played WoW for 3 years, quit it and now after all that nothing happened to my schoolwork.
Whatever anyone does, don't let those idiots that think games are bad see this thread, it'll be the motherload of evidance.
Originally posted by --Name edited out--
EX-PRO PLAYER IN WOW HERE.THIS GAME IS GOOD! TRUST ME IM USED TO BE THE BEST IN WOW BUT JUST A N00B IN AION. ITS CHALLENGEING , TRY IT!
[Sigh, watch out guys, this dude's pro.]
priorities..
EDIT: I was gonna type up a long winded response.. but I'm too busy playing MMOs.
"Good? Bad? I'm the guy with the gun."
it would be more accurate to say mmorpgs aren't for ppl who can't get priorities straight. same goes for a lot of other things though.
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The solution is to play a game more friendly to your schedule, such as Guild Wars. Since it's not a race to level as fast as you can, you can easily quit for a day or a week or a year and pick up right back where you left off without now being way behind everyone else. It also helps immensely that you can easily play for half an hour or an hour at a time, rather than having to play for hours at a time to get anywhere.
He said he had 2 level 60 chars in that game. He had a whole paragraph in his post talking about wow. It wasn't even very far into the post...
Ah yeah, now I remember... I had to use some Visine and lost my place.
Yeah I had to re-read the story a few more times. So what I gathered was...
"I played a very difficult MMO, and I have also played a very "casual" MMO, and they about ruined my life"... and presents the question
"If you are one of the people who can balance MMORPG gaming and school, or have found an mmorpg game that is casual enough to let you do both without maxing out your credit card please let me know."
Yes, there are. But the casualness of a MMO is not the problem. It's self control, responsibility, and prioritizing. If OP doubts being able to handle that... then OP shouldn't be asking strangers in a forum what he, a psychologist-in-progress should do. As a psychologist, OP "should" already know the answer to his question, and should seek help outside of forums if he is still having problems sorting out RL responsibilities with addictions of any sort.
Good luck.
"There is only one thing of which I am certain, and that's nothing is certain."
Games are much like guns: a lot of hoopla over the object and not enough attention paid to the user. Maybe if more people paid attention to the user, it wouldn't be as big an issue.
OP: good story. I'm glad you learned some things early in life instead of spending the next 20 years strung out on whatever thing you become addicted to.
Id just like to point out that near the end of my post I made a clear note stating
"I do not blame mmorpgs for my initial problems, I think they were a very useful learning tool and actually helped me grow up a bit faster than I would have otherwise".
It seems like a lot of people are getting the impression that I am complaining or blaming mmorpg games for my misfortune. Which I clearly state that I don't use them as an excuse, I simply use them as a learning tool, and In a way I believe they helped me grow up faster. Which is not a bad thing.
Second of all A lot of people seem to misunderstand my point. Its not to complain that my life went to the shitter thanks to mmorpg games nothing like that. "Actually if you read carefully" you will see that my life right now is quite good. I am not playing any mmorpg games and I am doing a paid apprenticeship in my college honors program for psychology. Keeping up a 3.0 GPA and a healthy social life. My point is I want to hear what people who did manage to go to college, get a degree, have a healthy social life, and play mmorpg games did to do it. I can manage the high GPA, the honors program, and even the social life, but I can't seem to find a way to put mmorpg gaming into my life at this time. So My main question was. Anyone able to do it under similar circumstances? If so what did you do. If there is a very casual mmorpg game that you can play with 2-3 hours a week I would like to know about it as well. This is all I really asked. A lot of people understood my intentions but I guess I needed to make it more clear for others.
And to the individual who posted Guild wars I already did play Guild wars I just did not include it in my story because it was such a short peroid (roughly 7 weeks). I managed to pass Nightfall and Factions but then I just got bored of it. I thank you for your suggestion.
OP: I have known people who both can and cannot balance MMORPGs with college and remain with a decent GPA. For some reason, I was able to do this in college, but not without first screwing up my grades in high school. First semester of my Junior year in HS I went from a 3.5 to a 2.1 because I was playing around 8+ hours of Ultima Online every night and never got enough sleep. I would ditch school and find any excuse to be in-game rather than working on school. Eventually, I realized I was screwing my life up (as you did) and I pulled myself out.
Fortunately I have never had that issue again with MMORPGs. Part of the reason is that I have never managed to get addicted to an MMO to the same extent that I was with Ultima Online. The other reason was because I knew what could happen if I allowed myself to fall into the trap, so I managed to avoid it. I was able to play WOW and try every other game that came out during my college years without any effect on my grades. I ended up graduating in Psychology just like you plan to do.
So yes, it is possible to balance the two. Make no mistake though; your grades will always be higher if you don't play an MMORPG. Its just inevitable that some of the time you would otherwise be studying, you will be adventuring instead.
It may be an individual thing though because I have known several individuals who have allowed MMOs to completely ruin their lives. One of them played World of Warcraft so much that he lost his job and his girlfriend, gained 100 lbs, and was forced to move back in with his parents. It took him years to dig himself back out of the mess that game did to his life, but eventually he succeeded. Unfortunately for people like that, I think there is no alternative but to quit the genre (perhaps even video games in general) and move on with their lives...
You might want to be careful about getting a degree in psychology, as there are vastly more people who get that degree than there are jobs suited to it. My parents' business has hired people with psychology degrees to go out and mow lawns, prune shrubs, etc.--stuff that you don't even need a high school diploma for.
More to your real question, though: the key is to avoid games that push you to play for reasons other than that the game is fun in itself. Obviously a game should be fun to play, and you'll want to play a game that you like. But don't play a game for other reasons, in spite of it not being terribly fun. When I put it that way, it probably sounds like a silly thing to do, but a lot of players do exactly that very often.
One common case of this is games built around leveling up or getting better gear over a very long period of time. This can lead to "keeping up with the Joneses", as people think, oh, but I need to play more in order to level up faster, or in order to keep up with so and so, or whatever. Unless your personality is that you can happily mess around in low level areas and not care a bit that other players are much higher level and stronger than you (which most people aren't), you'd best avoid games with a very long leveling curve. Games where you quickly get to max level and perfect gear aren't problematic in this way.
Another common case of this is games that require you to play for long periods of time in a single sitting. This can be to clear a dungeon, where after a while, when you really should log off, you think, oh, but I'm halfway through this dungeon, and if I quit now, I'll lose my progress. So you stay online for another hour or two to finish it, and use free time you didn't have. A lot of games will start off gentle and build up as you get higher level. Before picking up a game, don't just look at the low level stuff and see that you can log out whenever and it's fine. Look at the endgame, and see if there are raids that demand that you be online for hours at a time, or whether you can do everything in small chunks of playtime.
Another variant on the long play sessions problem is games where you have to group to do things, but it takes a long time to get a group. If it takes you half an hour to find a group and then another 15 minutes to get everyone together to start the content, it's easy to think, oh, but I don't want to log off now and lose the group, and have to start over getting a new group next time. It's not that group content is bad. It's that group content where it's hard to get a group is bad. A game built entirely around group content in which you can usually log on and get a group and start on content in under 5 minutes is not problematic in this way.
Perhaps the most insidious problem is games that require prescheduling. Sometimes it can be special in-game events that occur at particular periods of time. Sometimes it can be a case of needing to do things with particular other people, such as in a raiding guild, and this demand that everyone schedule his life around the game to be online at that particular time. For a one-time thing, this isn't so bad, but for a recurring event, it can lead to people thinking, but I have to log on and go raiding now or I'll let my guildies down! You don't know your schedule months in advance, and if this happens on days when you really just don't have time for it, it's a big problem.
The basic principle is that, while computer games aren't bad, other things are a higher priority. In particular, your job, schoolwork, meals, and adequate sleep must take precedence over playing computer games.
Most people have quite a bit of free time, and often a lot more than they realize. Playing sports, hanging out with friends, watching TV, playing computer games, posting on forums like this one, and many other things are all free time. It's a matter of priorities, and which things you choose to do and which you go without. It's not entirely an either/or; you can do several different things in your free time, but simply can't do each of them for a huge amount of time.
Computer games should be a low scheduling priority, as they should fit around whatever other activities you want to do. Obviously, there's nothing wrong with having a social life, but it would be rather unusual for someone to have such an active social life that it consumes every waking moment of free time. Computer games should fit in the gaps left by the other things you want to do, so that you can sit down and say, well, I don't have anything important to do right now, so I'll play a game for a while--and then log off after a while.
If games have various things that make it so that the game can't be played that way, that should be regarded as game-breaking. Find out what the game is like, and if it is going to demand huge amounts of your time, then don't pick up the game in the first place.
The reason I brought up Guild Wars is that it doesn't demand unreasonable amounts of time. Nearly everything in the game can be done in play sessions of under an hour. That's not an hour excluding time to wait in a queue, find a group, get everyone to the dungeon start, etc. That's under an hour from the time clicking the icon to launch the game to the time the game is closed because you're done. Even things that take longer than an hour (mainly vanquishing) tend to take only a little over an hour, as in 70 or 80 minutes, not three hours in one sitting.
You get to max level and perfect gear quickly, so after that, you're not constantly thinking, but I need to do this to level up. You don't have to worry about your guildies leveling faster than you and then being unable to group with them. You can leave the game alone for weeks or months at a time and not be hopelessly behind when you return.
Guild Wars isn't the only game that will fit around your life like that, of course. It's just one that I'm familiar with, so I could cite it as an example.
Well just about the degree. The main reason most people with psychology degrees never get any good jobs is because they get a BA and never bother to go for the masters. You have to be specific in what you want to work with. For example I'm getting a Master's in Social psychology, and I'm going to take a test to become a therapist. Most people who take psychology get it because its a fast degree to get. However in my honors program I am the only student with psychology as my major. There are 42 students I happen to be the only one who is majoring in psychology. It is amazing. Most people who take psych are not really interested in it, they just want a fast way to get a degree. If you really try hard with psychology, get a Masters maybe a PH.D and make a name for yourself with different honors programs, or research exhibitions you can easily make as much as any biology or engineer major.
About the mmorpg games you do have a point. When I look at my days maybe I could play mmorpg games. I would have to give up the hour I play soccer between classes, Id give up my Friday afternoon which I use to relax with friends. I guess mmorpg games just seem to insignificante for me to really devote all of my free time to one. Guess for that Its best if I keep working on my education and focus on less time consuming more productive hobbies. I do enjoy mmorpg games a lot when I do get the chance to play them. Guess I really just want a game a lot like Guild wars in a way. But something new. Hope Monster Hunter 3 comes out soon.
For some reason I agree that mmo are not for college student. Because of course your focus won't be in studying but in MMO. Most of the time we tend to cut schools just o play mmo. But still depends on the person on how they are going balance and manage their time doing stuffs and their real life. For me I also started to play mmo just in college when my boyfriend teach me to play Flyff. It's addicting actually if you can't control yourselves. But still I know when to stop and knows my priority. It was just a game but we should know that this in some reason help us in to grow but to think that it was just a virtual world deffers in real world. We have wour own life in real world so we should know our goals and priority. MMO are just our second world/virtual world other community.
having a tight schedule and planning things
Communicating with others, and how to make sure they have the same view as you
Responsibillity, if you fail your group, or just don’t show up to often it has consequences, thats a wise lesson for reallife
ANd how about organizing raids, being a guildleader and motivating people?
But it only works if you put your real life first..
and this does not only count for Students but for all
nothing wrong with spending your spare time gaming (its actually cheaper then drinking in a bar)
as long as you use your time management and priotitizing above the game..
Best MMO experiences : EQ(PvE), DAoC(PvP), WoW(total package) LOTRO (worldfeel) GW2 (Artstyle and animations and worlddesign) SWTOR (Story immersion) TSW (story) ESO (character advancement)
In my experience, the people I was on teams with who played MMOs were more reliable than the peeps talking about their console or mobile games all the damn time...
Had a peep once who knew the whole pokedex but didn't know what a system call was and used nested loops for things easily accomplished with a for or while loop... The peep is probably a developer for some Kickstarter MMO by now.
At the end of the day, they're just pixels meant to entertain us, and not keep us shackled.
Some friends have it reversed and won't do shit around WoW patches, and I'm like for real dude?
If a person can't keep their priorities straight without video games, they sure won't help the situation.
Gut Out!
What, me worry?
Fast forward to 2021 and you can play a MMO for 15 minutes a day and have "meaningful gameplay". They are so easy "your mum could play them" and filled to the nines with short dailies and other such content for butterfly gamers. Not sure the OP would think they are worth playing now but hey that's gaming progress for you.
My advice, if you are getting top scores for your college work don't worry about your gaming, but if not cut back on your gaming until you get to the best standard you think you can get.
What does it mean?!?
I want a mmorpg where people have gone through misery, have gone through school stuff and actually have had sex even. -sagil
Now, I just like to poke around and set small goals. Mostly I play like the majority of people did in early EQ. I just mess around and socialize with guildies in chat or whatever. I might pop in a few times a year to raid with the guild if the gf is out of town, but I never indulge in any appointment gaming and I don't neglect friends, family, or other hobbies I find more beneficial.
From what i have been able to witness over 60 years is that kids who game are more often going to be introverts and be unhealthy and have a persona similar to for example a chess player,off in their own zone,often not well around others.
I feel absolutely blessed that my early life influences were sports and outdours but of course i was also lucky in that gaming didn't exist outside of board games.
Gaming will ALWAYS be there so there is no need to influence kids into gaming at an early age,imo keep them away from games and cell phones.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Adults should also be "being health and exercising."
I would say even moreso as one gets older a sedentary lifestyle can have greater repercussions on the body.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
Also kids are easily brainwashed so that it affects their way of thinking for the rest of their lives.So they will never exprience anything other than gaming because that is all they did was run home and game.
Later in life you should at that point have the inteliigence level to make wiser decisions,hence why they consider you an adult at 18 because you are NOT yet ready to make adult decisions.
Also as an adult like was the case for me,i still played sports and my job far exceeded the physical workout i needed everyday.So i was influenced by the OUTSIDE world,team work,real life scenarios so when i started to game it was not an influence on my life or how i would think.
When i see kids now a days bury their face in cell phones to the point you can't even talk to them because they become zombies,puppets to their phones you know there is a serious problem going on within the kids minds.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.