Monday, September 18, 2006

Bad fun on Plasticbag

Alan sent me an interesting link to an article with long discussion on Plasticbag.org. The author is a casual player, much more casual than me even, and he asks himself why he feels compelled to continue playing World of Warcraft while resenting it.

Of course in a way World of Warcraft is designed to keep us playing, no matter what. The mechanisms of that are simple: social contacts and character development. Not playing would mean losing contact and status with your online friends. *And* it would invalidate the hundreds of hours you spent getting you character where he is. There is a "barrier to exit" a game like WoW.

My personal solution is to keep playing as long as I still have fun things ahead of me (and I'm looking forward very much to the expansion), but not obsessing too much on one single character. Variety is the spice of life, and if you are bored after hitting level 60 with one character, just start the next one.

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