Thursday, November 27, 2008

Internet Heroin

I am going to be writing two blog entries tonight because of a unique online phenomenon known as World of Warcraft, the most prominent example of a MMORPG, a Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game. For the last two weeks, ever since the release of the Wrath of the Lich King expansion, I have been sleepwalking through my real life, tired and restless. And thus, for the last two weeks, i have been putting a lot of things off, like writing blogs for my electives, all of which seem to require me to write them. But it's okay really, it's a good excuse to log out my level 80 undead rogue and do something else. But it seems like every second i'm not logged on is a second wasted, a second that could have been spent questing to increase my Ebon Blade rep, or farming Borean leather to get my Leatherworking skill to 440 which, if you think about it, is absolutely essential because it allows me to get three good pre-raid epic items virtually free.

I guess this just goes to show how mesmerized i am by the process of levelling a character then gearing him up. The ego-trip satisfaction of PWNING other people in BG PVP action or topping the DPS charts. So, in the end, i suppose that the appeal of these things is the desire for greater and greater power, which is what, at their core, most RPGs are structured to provide. But the thing is that, since it massively multiplayer, the process becomes a massive rat race, everyone racing to be the first and the strongest which, if i think about it, reminds me uneasily of the real world.

Which is probably also why i got burned out a few months back and stopped playing. But that's a fodder for another blog post i guess.

No comments: