Addicted to WoW!

[Kaiden]

Oh God, I can't believe there are people like this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K8hfK3RQ ... f_warcraft

I play the game ye, but seriously. It was talking about a 13 year old chinese boy who commited suicide, leaving a note saying "I want to join the heroes from Warcraft" or something random.

It kind of annoys me, cause the mum there is like "I can't live like this". I just don't think she is prepared to do anything about it.

WoW has parental controls, example shot:



Even a lot of parents PAY for their children, and are complaining about them playing it 24/7, why pay for it if you don't want them to play?

Anyway just my opinion.

Blah, discuss! Why do people get addicted to Video games, and what can parents do about it?

[Mastakilla]

dunno why people get addicted, parents can take away ze pc tho, or internets.

[Bezza]

dunno why people get addicted, parents can take away ze pc tho, or internets.

But because the kids are addicted then their parents are probably scared that their son/daughter might go on destructive rampages around the house, like you.

[Allan]

dunno why people get addicted, parents can take away ze pc tho, or internets.

But because the kids are addicted then their parents are probably scared that their son/daughter might go on destructive rampages around the house, like you.

Or they could just 'forget to pay the internet bill'.

[Kaiden]

Hehe, in the cases of like a 16 year old, they may (should) pay for it themselves. If so they would feel it's their "Right" to play whenever they like I suppose. I know if my parents said "No playing it after 21:00" Then I'd kind of ignore it, and they couldn't really do a lot about it as they don't use computers, but my dad knows enough that he can smash the router on the ground if he likes, generally just tears the lead out the wall though.

[Baleout]

Heh, I sent that to you.

It is down to the parents to stop their children from playing a game for a huge amount of time. Don't go blaming the game if you can't control your kids. If you see that they are becoming dangerously obsessed with the game, all you have to do is set restrictions for play time.
Like Kaiden said, why pay monthly for a child to play a game and then moan and cry about how much they play it? Ridiculous? I think so.

[Survive.]

When I get my new computer, Deus Ex will be my game

But that is a bit extreme

[Siva]

Alot of Parents these days suck, and don't teach their kids the meaning of balance.

[Gaz]

Nobody's parents suck, just like you guys said blaming the game would be stupid, blaming the parents is just as dumb. Do you think your grandparents had these kind of problems with their kids? or the generation before them? This is a rare problem and unless any of you have kids addicted to the game, I'm not so sure anybody would have some good suggestions to avoid that.

There's never been a game like WoW before that could suck up so much of your time if you let it... in my opinion it's already out of control, but I guess it could take a little longer for a lot of people to notice this kind of thing and actually acknowledge it as a problem. I guess your first thought is to cut down their playing time.. I don't see this as a viable solution because you're still keeping them intrested in the game... (for example parents that don't know a great deal about computers and can't lock the computer or set the parental controls on the game are gonna have their kids find a way of sneaking on the computer to play or something stupid) stopping them playing all together could be a mistake because what a kid can't have, a kid wants right? I'm just pointing out, I wouldn't really have a good solution. Although I think with a few handfuls of kids if you stuck out the 'don't get to play at all' card long enough it would work.



I guess that guys mum in the video could be happy he isn't out drinking every day and getting into drugs/crime etc.

[Kaiden]

True, but WoW has a 12+ age rating, when there are plenty of people aged below 12 on it. The parents are paying for it unless they are over 16, let's not forget that. They have said "Ok I'll pay £120 a year for you".

[Siva]

Nobody's parents suck, just like you guys said blaming the game would be stupid, blaming the parents is just as dumb.

And kids teach themselves do they? The suck part was exaggerating but in some cases it is true.

Do you think your grandparents had these kind of problems with their kids? or the generation before them? This is a rare problem and unless any of you have kids addicted to the game, I'm not so sure anybody would have some good suggestions to avoid that.

It's not hard to see how a kid can be addicted to a game. Parents have no idea what this "WoW" thing is, kid lies about his grades and how school is going, Parents are kept in the dark until the shit hits the fan.

There's never been a game like WoW before that could suck up so much of your time if you let it... in my opinion it's already out of control, but I guess it could take a little longer for a lot of people to notice this kind of thing and actually acknowledge it as a problem.

It doesn't have to be a video game for it to suck up your time, it could be a certain activity even, we only REALLY know about these widespread problems because of the birth of the internet.

I guess your first thought is to cut down their playing time.. I don't see this as a viable solution because you're still keeping them intrested in the game...

Back to my point on Parental failures.

There are many solutions. But to get to the solution the Parent has to actually understand the problem, did you just miss a few hugs with your child? How is he\she doing at school, does he have friends? Loss in the family of someone close to him who was almost HIS\HER actual parent?

Most of the Parents that PAY for their kids subscription and let them get addicted are not doing their job properly.

My mother before every 18+ game I purchase either already knows or finds out about the games content and asks me to justify me being allowed to play it as entertainment. If I can justify it I can play it.

[Kaiden]

My parents are generally lax on over-age rated games, except for things like ManHunt, Vice City etc.

I don't play that many games over +15 anyway - Metroid, MGS, FF, DeusEx, WoW, GW, Link.

[Baleout]

I read this news article somewhere about parents complaining about the Wii Zapper and how it encourages gun crime and gangs with children. (WTF, by the way? Have they even seen it? (see bottom of page) Haven't they noticed that there have been far more realistic toy versions of guns for years?)
One particular quote was "What sort of example am I setting for my children when I am buying these games for them."
Other parents have complained about their 8-10 year old children becoming more violent when they bought Grand Theft Auto for them (PEGI rated 16 or 18, i'm not sure).

. . . There is an obvious solution to these problems; DONT BUY THE GAME.


Why do some parents find it so hard to just say no to their children?


The Wii Zapper

[C:Enter:£££]

Why do some parents find it so hard to just say no to their children?

Because this happens.

Like many middle-class, suburban American parents, Shannan and Joey Troiano worried about their son’s behaviour and his bad grades at high school. And like many wayward teenagers, Cory Ryder was grounded for weeks at a time, had a PlayStation confiscated and was banned from watching TV.

Less typically, this 16-year-old was plotting to murder his parents by hiring a hitman, while his mother was organising a sting operation involving a police officer posing as a contract killer.

Cory’s trial is scheduled to begin today at the circuit court in St Mary’s County, Maryland. His mother is expected to testify as a witness for the prosecution.

At an earlier court hearing Mrs Troiano, 35, explained how her emotions were torn between being an agonised mother and a murder victim. “I miss him being at home,” she said, “and I miss us joking around and kidding around. And then in the very same breath – I don’t know what this kid will do, because it’s not my son. That can’t be my little boy sitting there.”

Mrs Troiano remembers the night on June 2 when she discovered that the vague threats her son had made were serious. A woman Cory trusted, the mother of one of his friends, took him to a hotel room where he met an undercover police officer pretending to be a hitman.

At home in southern Maryland, Mrs Troiano told her husband that Cory would never go through with it and began frantically tidying the house, according to an account in The Washington Post yesterday.

After a few hours’ waiting, the policeman called: Cory was in custody and would be charged with attempted murder. Mrs Troiano fell to her knees in the bathroom she was cleaning and burst into tears.

Police say that Cory offered the undercover officer his stepfather’s new pickup truck as payment for killing his parents. “Two bullets is all it takes,” he is alleged to have said.

His mother, a financial manager at Patuxent River naval station, and stepfather, a computer specialist, had lived an ordinary life with Cory and his two stepsisters. Mrs Troiano had left his father when Cory was little more than a year old but, by the time she remarried, her son’s behaviour was getting steadily worse.

He walked out of lessons at Spring Ridge Middle School in Lexington Park, smashed a fire extinguisher case and then broke into the county fairgrounds, where he vandalised property. A judge sentenced him to supervised probation and his parents attended no less than 36 meetings with the authorities about him.

But Cory dropped out of school and then, after stealing $45 (£22) from his sister’s piggy bank, had a fight with his mother, which led to him being kicked out of home. He has since told officials that he was upset about being thrown out of the house and that he felt pressured to talk to the man in the hotel.

Cory insists that he never intended to have his parents killed and that he wanted to call the police that night in the hotel room. A judge has ruled that he should be tried in the juvenile system, which means that he cannot be held beyond his 21st birthday.

He has also been writing to his mother, saying: “You know I love you with all my heart mom!” Mrs Troiano fears that he is being manipulative. She wanted him tried in an adult court where he would have faced a much longer sentence. “He needs to understand what he did was wrong,” she told the court in September. “I’m scared to death that if this kid is serious, and they put him in a three-month programme, they’re going to release him to the street.”

[Baleout]

One thing happened once, that wasn't even proven to be linked to them confiscating his PlayStation or whatever? Great reason for not trying to keep your children under control.

[Kaiden]

Lol. Suddenly taking away a kids playstation when he's like 16 WON'T get any results except violence and crappy behaviour. If they haven't been disaplined since birth, introducing such drastic controls on their lives won't help. They should have limited it etc, instead.

EDIT: Also that is just one screwed up American boy.

[Snakey]

Why do some parents find it so hard to just say no to their children?

Because this happens.

Like many middle-class, suburban American parents, Shannan and Joey Troiano worried about their son’s behaviour and his bad grades at high school. And like many wayward teenagers, Cory Ryder was grounded for weeks at a time, had a PlayStation confiscated and was banned from watching TV.

Less typically, this 16-year-old was plotting to murder his parents by hiring a hitman, while his mother was organising a sting operation involving a police officer posing as a contract killer.

Cory’s trial is scheduled to begin today at the circuit court in St Mary’s County, Maryland. His mother is expected to testify as a witness for the prosecution.

At an earlier court hearing Mrs Troiano, 35, explained how her emotions were torn between being an agonised mother and a murder victim. “I miss him being at home,” she said, “and I miss us joking around and kidding around. And then in the very same breath – I don’t know what this kid will do, because it’s not my son. That can’t be my little boy sitting there.”

Mrs Troiano remembers the night on June 2 when she discovered that the vague threats her son had made were serious. A woman Cory trusted, the mother of one of his friends, took him to a hotel room where he met an undercover police officer pretending to be a hitman.

At home in southern Maryland, Mrs Troiano told her husband that Cory would never go through with it and began frantically tidying the house, according to an account in The Washington Post yesterday.

After a few hours’ waiting, the policeman called: Cory was in custody and would be charged with attempted murder. Mrs Troiano fell to her knees in the bathroom she was cleaning and burst into tears.

Police say that Cory offered the undercover officer his stepfather’s new pickup truck as payment for killing his parents. “Two bullets is all it takes,” he is alleged to have said.

His mother, a financial manager at Patuxent River naval station, and stepfather, a computer specialist, had lived an ordinary life with Cory and his two stepsisters. Mrs Troiano had left his father when Cory was little more than a year old but, by the time she remarried, her son’s behaviour was getting steadily worse.

He walked out of lessons at Spring Ridge Middle School in Lexington Park, smashed a fire extinguisher case and then broke into the county fairgrounds, where he vandalised property. A judge sentenced him to supervised probation and his parents attended no less than 36 meetings with the authorities about him.

But Cory dropped out of school and then, after stealing $45 (£22) from his sister’s piggy bank, had a fight with his mother, which led to him being kicked out of home. He has since told officials that he was upset about being thrown out of the house and that he felt pressured to talk to the man in the hotel.

Cory insists that he never intended to have his parents killed and that he wanted to call the police that night in the hotel room. A judge has ruled that he should be tried in the juvenile system, which means that he cannot be held beyond his 21st birthday.

He has also been writing to his mother, saying: “You know I love you with all my heart mom!” Mrs Troiano fears that he is being manipulative. She wanted him tried in an adult court where he would have faced a much longer sentence. “He needs to understand what he did was wrong,” she told the court in September. “I’m scared to death that if this kid is serious, and they put him in a three-month programme, they’re going to release him to the street.”

I heard about that the other day.

[Baleout]

Lol. Suddenly taking away a kids playstation when he's like 16 WON'T get any results except violence and crappy behaviour. If they haven't been disaplined since birth, introducing such drastic controls on their lives won't help. They should have limited it etc, instead.

That too.

EDIT: Also that is just one screwed up American boy.

And that.

[Kaiden]

Also damn look how releastic the Wii Zapper is! It's a replica to the P90 ffs! If I use it I will want one for real.

[Baleout]

Good news, it comes free with a weapons license and free month of training!

[Survive.]

Lol. Suddenly taking away a kids playstation when he's like 16 WON'T get any results except violence and crappy behaviour. If they haven't been disaplined since birth, introducing such drastic controls on their lives won't help. They should have limited it etc, instead.

EDIT: Also that is just one screwed up American boy.

I have read two topics of you today talking about Americans

[Not in a good way]

You love them right?

[Kaiden]

Well he is American and screwed up lol, so that makes him that!

[Gaz]

Just don't really give a shit enough to quote everything and reply back... I just think it's a pretty general thing to discuss and everyone's allowed their opinion without having it turn into an argument, when I posted the first time it wasn't my intention to cause arguments at all.. I mean... what did you want me to do, because he has a different opinion to me, tell him my opinion is better?

[Tonnochi]

Pinkle joined WoW on Saturday. Uninstalled DX for it. WHEN WILL THIS REIGN END?!

[Gaz]

congratulations on picking a dumb argument and losing. Fucking stiff assed english people these days huh.