In 2004 (the launch year) the original WoW was an amazing time I lost and entire year of professional growth and productivity to. When the first expansion (Burning Crusade) came out, I was equally excited as as the original launch, but after seeing Green gear fall of simple mobs that was better than the epic Purple gear I spent weeks getting in 40 person raids, I could instantly forecast how the entire rest of the game would be forever: and endless grind with your hard won efforts simply trivialized in the first month of the next expansion. I stopped playing WoW about a month after, went back to school instead, and finished the college degree I had started 8 years earlier. Quitting WoW lead to my actions which launched my career to new heights.
I credit WoW with teaching me an incredible life lesson in my 20s to never get drawn into something like that again.
I think a lot of people had this experience. Yahtzee Croshaw had a similar experience, albeit compressed to a month, and it resulted in a book. It’s a really fun book, too.
With your post, I went looking for the book and couldn’t find it. I only found his novels. I’m on the fence about trying to find/read the book. I carry some personal shame from the time when I wasted so much time in WoW. This may be an embarrassing reminder of a mistake of my youth.
Games are just story+art+button timing+math. Mmo’s almost entirely remove button timing, and what is left is extremely formulaic. Given that, number go up isn’t worth anyone’s thousands of hours, and neither is the overall content. I know, as I had the hours and the same epiphany.
And flying? Walking around was a core part of the game, seeing stuff, getting whacked by +10 monsters so you had to sneak around, now you just spend 50% of the game in the skybox.
In 2004 (the launch year) the original WoW was an amazing time I lost and entire year of professional growth and productivity to. When the first expansion (Burning Crusade) came out, I was equally excited as as the original launch, but after seeing Green gear fall of simple mobs that was better than the epic Purple gear I spent weeks getting in 40 person raids, I could instantly forecast how the entire rest of the game would be forever: and endless grind with your hard won efforts simply trivialized in the first month of the next expansion. I stopped playing WoW about a month after, went back to school instead, and finished the college degree I had started 8 years earlier. Quitting WoW lead to my actions which launched my career to new heights.
I credit WoW with teaching me an incredible life lesson in my 20s to never get drawn into something like that again.
I think a lot of people had this experience. Yahtzee Croshaw had a similar experience, albeit compressed to a month, and it resulted in a book. It’s a really fun book, too.
With your post, I went looking for the book and couldn’t find it. I only found his novels. I’m on the fence about trying to find/read the book. I carry some personal shame from the time when I wasted so much time in WoW. This may be an embarrassing reminder of a mistake of my youth.
It’s called Mogworld.
I dropped out of college because of this game. And honestly, it was worth it.
Because you had so much fun in the game or because college was (or would in the future) serving you so poorly?
Games are just story+art+button timing+math. Mmo’s almost entirely remove button timing, and what is left is extremely formulaic. Given that, number go up isn’t worth anyone’s thousands of hours, and neither is the overall content. I know, as I had the hours and the same epiphany.
My reaction exactly to BC!
And flying? Walking around was a core part of the game, seeing stuff, getting whacked by +10 monsters so you had to sneak around, now you just spend 50% of the game in the skybox.
Learned this exact same lesson and quit.
did better than me, took me till legion before i truly gave up on it, and then came back for classic
and even now my brain sometimes randomly is like dude you should play wow again
You know you have a WoW problem when you’re spending an appreciable amount of time on Thottbot looking up in-game items and locations while at work.