How I Quit World of Warcraft
Hi. I’m a Wow Addict.
Shortly after I met my boyfriend in 2005, I became more and more interested in online gaming. He would spend hours playing CounterStrike, and though I was not a huge fan of the online gaming scene, I was interested. I had heard about World of Warcraft, but had never played. He told me about his experiences playing in the beta and after release, but he had stopped playing some time before. So one day in early 2006, I went to the video game store and purchased a copy so we could both begin playing again.
I was currently enrolled in college at the time, and so I never had much time to absolutely dedicate myself to playing. At that point, I had just gotten a new job and most of my time was spent in class or at work, away from home and my computer. If I recall correctly, it took me the better part of that year to level my character to the higher levels. I’m sure I didn’t hit 60 before I had to cancel my account temporarily in August to finish my final semester at College and graduate in December 2006. During this time, my boyfriend was extremely active in his guild and raided almost every night. Unfortunately, that also meant he stayed up almost every night raiding, and we’d only really “see” each other between the time I got home from work and the time I went to bed. If we did anything, it was pressured for time because MC or BWL was more important. He was playing on the computer which *I brought home from work for him to play on.* It broke, and I fixed it, even though every night I would go to sleep alone hurt more and more. I enabled this, and thus enabled my own downfall into the WoW universe.
After graduation, I reactivated my account and played sparingly until the expansion was released. I finished leveling my character to 70, which was the new highest point. Somewhere between 60 and 70 I changed from my old server, a pvp server called Mal’Ganis (which incidentally is one of the best and most progressed servers out there, housing the ever-so-famous “Elitist Jerks” guild) and moved to the PvE server Undermine. Here I joined a raiding guild, something I had never experienced before. This guild quickly exploded, though. I had moved to the new server at the behest of my boyfriend, who had also moved his character to play on the same server as our upstairs neighbors. They got us into the guild that exploded, and after that expedited our acceptance to another, more progressed guild. This was sometime in May of 2007. My boyfriend was still playing almost every night, and I was getting desperate to do something together with him. We were living in the same house, but it felt like we were never seeing each other.
During the summer, I got a gym membership, began running, and attempted to diet. I was having great success, working every day, but not playing WoW every night or all that much. My boyfriend went to the gym with me, and it was really motivating, at first. In July, I accepted a new job which also came with a 40 minute commute. My boyfriend and I began carpooling from our apartment every morning. In September, I attended my first raid, and the downward spiral began.
It was easy enough, at first, to come home from work and, every other day or so, attend a raid. It meant I had to speed through dinner, or that we picked it up on the way home, but it worked. And it was only a few days a week. As our guild quickly progressed through higher content, we had our ups and downs – attendance became more important as the gear we were fighting for was getting better and better. It didn’t help that I was obsessed with being on time every night and trying to be the best I could be. This meant any delay in getting home shortened the time I had to make food for the two of us, or even eat food my boyfriend had prepared. The stress was mounting.
In October and November, we surmounted some huge hurdles by downing some extremely hard end-game bosses. Everything was looking up. We were still calling raid nights mostly on time, around 11:30 or so every night. Still, this only left me with 6 or 7 hours of sleep before I had to wake up and drive to work. One night I took off in November for my boyfriend’s birthday, I missed a HUGE upgrade for my character. I didn’t get over this. I played harder and more often then ever before.
Christmas and New Years holidays came around and everyone took a break from WoW. Suddenly, I had nothing to do. I moved to a new apartment.
For about 10 days, I came home from work, watched television, read books, and walked – something I hadn’t had time for once I began raiding. I had canceled my gym membership months before as I wasn’t using it. When I had to go back to raiding in January, the sharp contrast in free time was realized.
We continued to progress, and I could’ve played less if I wanted to but I was hooked and obsessed. Trying to be better than others in my class, I convinced myself I had to show up every day or else I would fall behind. For a while, this strategy worked. But then, bad luck and timing made me miss some really amazing upgrades. This made me even more obsessed. This continued, I saw people come and go, but the guild continued to make progress. We advanced into the absolute end game material, finally on the coat-tails of the best guilds on our server. It was absolutely enthralling.
In February we went up against a new boss and the night went sour. Tempers were hot, people were frustrated. It was a bad night. Several other events that week had everyone on edge with everybody else. Then we had some amazing boss-kills and the drama was pretty much just dropped. We’re killing each other then we’re all peachy. But tempers were still high and tolerance was thin.
One of our best and most seasoned raiders suddenly quit. In their farewell post, they listed their grievances – not enough sleep, the game was becoming more of a job then their real job, and they were beginning to feel the impact of it in their day to day life. It wasn’t fun anymore. I read this, and it was like a light came on inside. I realized I felt the exact same way.
It had gotten to a point where I would play until 1 or 2am almost every night. Then I would stay in bed as absolutely late as possible, and still show up to work 5 minutes or so late every morning. I would zone out at work until lunch, and then maybe I’d get some work done. There wasn’t much for me to do, so it wasn’t noticed, but I felt more and more miserable every day. Reading this raider’s post on our forums was like a revelation. I decided I had to make a decision.
I played for a week more, and on Tuesday I told my boyfriend what I planned to do. I couldn’t believe it had gotten to this point. For a time, I played only for the sake of doing something with him, since all his time was absorbed with raiding MC and BWL. But now I felt as if I had no time to myself and even less time to spend with him. I was a slave to my computer, sitting in front of one all day at work, only to come home, scramble for some form of food and spend the rest of the evening sitting in front of my computer at home. I played out the week’s raids. I didn’t get any new gear; I tried to see the fun in it. We did well that week. No new accomplishments, but we breezed through most of the stuff we knew. But on Friday, I said “Alright guys, see ya” and I haven’t logged on since.
I can’t say I haven’t been bored at times, but I’ve finished a few books, walked more than I have in a year and actually enjoyed being alone and playing with my cat, who I had been mostly ignoring when at home because I was busy with the computer. My cat is acting more normal and loving, and I’m hoping to lose some weight by walking more often. If anything it gives me time to evaluate my day and listen to some audio books on my ipod.
Was playing WoW a bad decision? No. I met some really cool and interesting people. I don’t think I’ll ever forget some of the fun nights we had killing virtual monsters. The fun comes from the social aspect of the game, and it was something I will never forget. But when it got to be too much and when it began affecting my real life, my job, I’m glad I made the decision to quit. I’m a Wow Addict and I haven’t logged on in 19 days.
I have experienced similiar stuff. Especially the bad eating habits.
Here is a tale I wrote.
This is a tale of a wow addict.
The beginning of March I lost my grandmother and father-in-law and that led to some self introspection at not being there for them as I should have been lately.
About a week ago, I looked at my life and said “What have I accomplished in the last 3 years? I have 2 level 70’s, 2 epic flyers, and a great guild.
I would wake up, take a shower and log on to see what the dailies were. When I got to work, I would surf the wow sites I could get to. When I went to lunch, we would all be talking about WOW. Sometimes I would go home for lunch to get some dailies done.
When I got home that meant I could get to the WOW sites I could not see at work. WowInsider and my ladies of wow website. My afternoons were my favorite time to play. Not too many people on and I justified playing by “I will just unwind a few minutes before dinner”. Well sometimes dinner was eaten at the keyboard and sometimes dinner was after the raid.
Weekends, I woke up early and justified playing with “Well, he is sleeping and I don’t want to wake him up”. Then he would start playing since I was and that could be the whole day. Possibly the entire weekend. Or so it seemed.
OK, so last week. I told myself I would take this week off to take the energy that I put into the game back into my life. And WOW what a difference. DETOX is something else. Refreshing but at first it was stressful. Especially with another addict in the house.
OK so the positives:
More energy. I have been back to getting to work at 6:30. The day is so much nicer.
More motivation at work.
More time for family and friends.
I am eating healthier.
I am walking more.
I read a book on the weekend mornings vs. the game.
Without me saying anything, things that have been neglected around the house for years are getting done and he has said “He will be doing more.” With no prodding from me.
Bottom line is I have not quit the game. I have reentered life.
Comment by Gloria — May 14, 2008 @ 10:25 am
It finallly got to the point where I was living my life just to get it out of the way.
If I was at work, I just wanted to get home.
If I was hanging out with friends, I would be antsy and checking the clock, wondering when they would leave so I could start playing.
If I tried another game, I just couldn’t enjoy it anymore. Doing anything recreational that didn’t benefit my characters seemed like a waste of time.
If I was playing I would lose all track of time, which would often affect my sleep. I’d stay up late and then wake up early, excited to play.
I started to feel like I preffered WoW to real life, 99% of the time.
For me I think what got me was two-fold. Firstly I am a big fan of role playing games. Customizing and collecting are two things I find addictive and fun in almost any game. Also, and this was ultimately what helped me get out, I loved the social aspect of the game. I would spend a large portion of my time online chatting in 2 or 3 channels or whispers with a large number of people.
I started feeling sick about it when I realized I had become one of “those guys”… the one who seems to be online EVERYTIME you log in and still on EVERYTIME you log out. I’d start getting messages (tells) from people saying “Wow, how do you level so fast?”, and sadly that made me feel proud.
When one of my best online friends (I don’t play with a single person I know in real life) lost his wife, who took the kids and divorced him. He played a lot more than I did, and in fact managed to catch up to my account, which had existed four years, in just six months.
I google’d wow addiction and found what was for me a very useful question: If you could go back to the day you bought the game, knowing what you know now, would you still buy it?”
For me this was an emphatic “No.” I will never again play a game without an end, a game which favors investment of time over all other things.
Please don’t let anyone you care about start playing if you think they might be anything like me.
Comment by Nate — August 4, 2008 @ 9:41 pm
I just quit 2 nights ago… it is TOUGH
Comment by Zzzz — September 3, 2008 @ 3:20 pm
I feel the exact same way as you except i cannot find the willpower to quit. I try to convince myself i can play less but i simply cant, im on every night. What can i do
Comment by Anon — September 30, 2008 @ 3:17 am
Anon: Here is an idea. Every day when you want to play WoW, set a two minute timer and do something else for two minutes before you start to play. If you can keep this up, you can gradually increase the time to three, four, five minutes, and gradually reclaim your life. If you can’t keep it up, try a one minute timer.
Comment by John — November 22, 2008 @ 2:09 pm
I had this same problem, literally EXACTLY what you are describing. I am a college student and I bought this game 1 year ago. At first it was fine, I casually leveled my toon. After 60 it became even more fun once I got to Outland and I started leveling hardcore and playing even more.
For the first 6 months I just leveled different classes (3 70s eventually), PvP’d and ran a few 5-man dungeons here and there, I was obsessed BUT having fun. Then an in-game friend invited me to his raid guild, which consisted of a bunch of people he knew in real life.
We started raiding, at first I hated it because I could see how it was eating my time, but eventually they got to Black Temple and end-game content, and I joined all of their raids and got T6 gear. I had the same problems you did of feeling bad for missing runs and drops for my character. I scheduled my REAL LIFE around this game; even hanging out with my friends. I also ignored my cat when I was home for the summer, and even my own family. My grades also suffered (my GPA went from 4.0 to 3.25, I had never even made a B in my life and here I made my first C)
This Thanksgiving I unplugged my computer for a whole week and LOVED it. I am never going back to WoW. I had so much fun with my sister and her husband, and all of my family. We made nachos, watched movies, etc., I even played some old single-player video games like Final Fantasy (this game even taking away from other video games I once loved). WoW turned from being fun into feeling like a STRESSFUL JOB that I’m not getting payed for.
It will be hard to say good-bye to some of the friends I made in that game, they are good people (though obsessed…) but it’s worth it.
Comment by Andrew — December 2, 2008 @ 7:46 pm
Interesting read. I’m not sure I find having an addiction bad. But I probably am not addicted.
I’ve gone through cycles where I date a girl for awhile, maybe 6 months, and I don’t play at all, I just cancel my account. I’m not married yet, and since every relationship you’ve been in previously ends somehow, after they’ve ended I eventually start playing again. I really enjoy the game. The reason why I found this site is because I like to look at how Blizzard (Vivendia) works as a company, and how their business plans might look. So I just typed in “why I quit WoW” to see what people under what circumstances would quit.
But I don’t really have any problems in my life, I have a good job, and I do good work. Although yes, sometimes I do stay up late playing and don’t get much done the next day, but I don’t live for work, nor should you. And I honestly can say I love my job (software engineer).
I’m slowly getting to know a girl now, she just got out of a serious relationship with a guy who always partied (addiction?), and the instant I know we are going to do something , /leaveparty. I have no problems offending people, even if they take offense at all. RL comes first.
I’ve tried very hard to find a great girl, one that likes going for hikes, mountain biking, art galleries, everything, they are very hard to find. There is simply not much to do, and WoW is entertaining. I tried a lot of ways of meeting someone at the point of becoming psychotic as in movie style romance kinda guy. It’s simply not realistic, you need hobbies and need to enjoy life, if your single don’t freak out. If your ignoring your BF and always playing WoW, maybe you don’t like him that much? I would love to find a girl that had the same interests as me, and yes, play WoW now and again. I would be annoyed however if I was tryin to be affectionate to her while she was playing and completely ignore me, but I would understand if she was on the last boss
Every friday night, I goto my best friends house and we have some beers, watch a movie, and play some WoW. It’s interspersed with me going out with my friend so he can have a smoke, playing with his cat, and talking to his girlfriend.
The people I’ve met through playing WoW have always been there for me, yes, some of them are RL friends, and the game has brought us closer. I look at WoW with intellectual interest, not just to get gear, so I’m not so focused on getting gear, I enjoy watching how raid leaders conduct raids, where the people in our guild are from and what they do for a living. I also try to be a friend and give advice to younger people if they ask, help them with their math or computer science courses.
I can’t really give advice on why/or why not to play WoW, or any other game, activity that takes up a lot of your time. It’s nice to have RL friends that play, and play on a laptop so you can goto your friends house and play.
-_-
Comment by Finster — December 17, 2008 @ 11:52 am
Still addicted i currently am over 200 days played. The latest expansion has me entertained although it has a bad effect on my life. Don’t play this game!
Comment by Tyson — January 5, 2009 @ 10:37 pm
Just about to quit… actually looking forward to it. =)
Comment by Julie-Anna — May 23, 2009 @ 9:03 pm
I quit WoW 3 months ago. Best thing I could have done. I can absolutely relate to your story. I am looking forward to having my time and life back. I hope you are still not playing the game.
Comment by Ken — November 9, 2009 @ 8:24 am
Thanks for your comment, and good luck. Nope, I haven’t looked back! Enjoying my job and my life
Comment by Elanor — November 9, 2009 @ 8:27 am