#7

[Patricia Andrews]

I've spent way too many years in MMOs learning to know the people as real. It's not much of a step from there to an instant messenger program to meeting them at a cafe' somewhere. and yeah, the games an be an escape. Before surgeries and treatments for my spine I spent way too much time playing MMOs, even when my arms hurt too much to move, I'd just sit in ventrilo.

It's like everything else. If at first you don't succeed, try again. (edit) Set up another raid. Everyone one knows its mroe fun to pound them into the dirt the second third and fourth time. You need the whole armor set! >.>

Reminds me of when a player in a game I frequented. She made some odd comment, went AFK, DC'ed, and never came back. Her house caught on fire, and in the course of making sure her children and family made it out, she did not survive.

(Yeah. People DID stop using a certain acronym for a long time on that server.)

There have been a lot of 'online deaths' in the world, from games to forums, etc. In the end it boils down to just not being aware of how many people another person truly touches the hearts of until they're gone.

(another edit) Wow. I'm going to blame my grammar errors on being moved. I had to go back and look over the other Dr. Mark articles. My friend and I were discussing putting a bunch of work together about 'living online' at one point, and how the 'stereotypes' don't really seem to fit as most all of the people we met were pretty normally adjusted, had jobs/degrees/careers etc. We're pretty much convinced (both of us are oddly biologists) that there is the need for a paradigm shift in the viewpoints on gamers and online folks in general away from the stereotypes that still exist. (I admit being a BBS girl from the 1980s I know where the stereotypes came from, Aieee )

 

[Gray Mouser]

Great post, Doc.

As we struggle with the idea of video games and MMORPGs, situations like these help us to yoyo back towards the idea that there is some good in gaming. Many of us already believe this idea. Dr. Mark's post before this one, in which someone questions why parents unilaterally condemn gaming, is a tug in the opposite direction.

One can die from drinking too much water, but I doubt many of us would argue that water is inherently bad. My hands are used for a lot of good...but I've broken a nose in my time, and I doubt anyone could argue that my hands did good, then. I guess the difference is that most people don't have either water habit, or a breaking-noses habit, but many have a gaming habit. It's always refreshing to have reminders like this article that there can be some good in gaming.

By the same token, though I liked the movie "Hangover," there's no way in bloody hell that my 5 year-old will see it...yet. A little framing, a little guidance, a little reason behind how you play the game, seem to be what's necessary, and bringing the WoW burners and the WoW players who play 24/7 (and urinate in their cups rather than leave the game) closer to the middle is probably what's necessary. Right after we do that, let's get the Reps and Dems in the middle and sing Kumbaya.

 

[Flying Dagger]

Wow. Tough one.

Not a problem to take to a normal psychiatrist, it's good to have Mr Kilne around.

 

[S_K]

I didn't know you still wrote articles here Mr Kline! Clearly I'm not paying enough attention, in any case a good read, I can't think of any other psychiatrists with the kind of understanding of videogames you have.