A friend of mine who I met playing World of Warcraft asks me now and then to consider coming back to play WoW. I started WoW back when it first came out in 2005. I played for about 9 months, became the leader of the guild had 2 top level toons plus 1 of each of the other classes…and then it got old and I stopped playing. I tried out other games…but eventually, after a 13 month break and a new WoW expansion coming out soon, I joined again. I found a great guild of people (Centurian Order) to socialize and play with. It became like a family and made you want to log in every night just to say hi, and chat, and do some things together. One of the members, Adondralyn (Jeremy), is the one that wants me to play again. Today, he informed me that his current guild broke apart due to drama that inevitably curses a guild at some point. So he has been given the old website and a bunch of guild bank goodies to form a new guild….which he has done. I spent the afternoon setting up forums for the guild, Burnt Sacrifice.
Not sure how many of you are gamers, but you do get burnt out doing the same things over and over. The thing that keeps you from getting burnt out fast is having a friendly social environment that goes along with the game. You can play the absolute best MMO out there, but if you aren’t in a guild that is talkative, friendly, and active, you will not last in the game for very long. But a game doesn’t have to be perfect if you have a good in-game family to help offset possible boredom.
I’ve learned this from playing EQ2 and City of Heros/Villans. I played City of Heros with my son…and never joined a guild. And I left the game without ever reaching top level or gaining any friends after 2 or 3 months. During my WoW break – I tryed it again when they released the City of Villans expansion. I was invited into a guild called Blood Moon Angels. Many of the member were on nightly, they were talkative, and helpful. I eventually became an officer there and was in charge of events. I quickly made max level with one toon and had many others. The game became fun socially and physically (if you can call the action questing part that).
I did eventually get bored though which happens. After my second leaving of WoW, I tried City of Villans yet again. This time though, most of the old guild members were gone…just a few logged in now and then, leaving me to play alone most of the nights. And after a month or 2, I left…just nothing there to keep me happy. So I thought maybe it was time for a brand new game…So, I turned to Everquest 2. My son and I joined and started having fun. I hunted for a guild and found one that stated they were older members, no kids, mature, and were tradeskillers/questers. Perfect!
Spirited Misfits was the name. Everyone was friendly, they would help if you asked. They got use to me and I got use to them. After 3 months though, I was getting bored…even though the guild was friendly, there wasn’t enough people, not enough bonding by doing events. I am use to there being 20-50 members on at a time from WoW… in EQ2 there were maybe 8 on at the most, and now that it is summer, even less on. I haven’t logged into EQ2 for over 2 weeks now. I don’t have the urge to play. When I play a game – I am totally addicted to it…4+ hours a day every day addicted. So me not wanting to log in at all must mean its over. I did grab one friend from EQ2 though.
It’s funny how you can gain Real Life friends from an Online game. I played Ultima Online for 3 years and left with 4 people I still talk to today, and I havent played that game for 6 or 7 years. They live all over the US…VA, PA, WA, NY…and I have met them all in Real Life. Then I played Anarchy Online and still talk to a few people from that game. Still talk to one from City of Heros, and I have 3 friends from WoW. All my current friends are people I have met in games online. Some people wouldn’t understand this and still look at me funny when I have plans ONLINE as opposed to “Normal Friends” who meet to drink at a bar. To me, going out every Thursday night for a bowling league is the same as me logging in at 8:00 to go raid an instance in a game for a few hours. You have a team of people you are familiar with, that meet every week for the same thing.
ANYWAY….I have to decide whether I want to go back to WoW again or not. Im not currently playing any game. I have been logging into Second Life alot more. WHY?!! Its because I’m meeting new people, all thanks to Jokay and her Jokaydia Island. Helps you stay around when you have things to do, friends to talk to, and people that you can help out, at least thats how my personality works. I’m an introverted helper, and SL lets me be a bit less introverted and allows me to help people learn. Trouble with going back to WoW is that I seem to be an all or nothing gamer. Need to try and see if I can casually play 8-10 hours a week instead of 36-48 hours a week! 😛
