Kang the Decapitator

All I have to say is, "Where's a good place to farm wool?"

The idea of you with Kang the Decapitator on your back was too much fun for me to ruin the image by clicking through to its pixelated reification. And I thought role-playing with characters from The Jungle Book was kinky.

And you need to overcome this insecurity about playing Warcraft. It's perfectly normal for young men to spend hours in a fantasy world using assumed names and killing each other. Why do you think the KKK was so popular back before the internet era?

Julian, are you comparing WoW to the KKK? This is fascinating to me, please expound.

Actually, it wasn't a serious sociological comparison, though it could be argued that interest in both "activities" draws on some of the same motivations: both groups were/are predominantly composed of disgruntled white males who felt/feel that they're talents are not adequately recognized by society and appreciate the opportunity to retreat from the ambiguities and frustrations of real life into a world where the rules of success - whether achieved through violence or collecting points/rewards - are clearly defined and easily mastered.

But that's taking a flippant, frivolous association far further than I'd intended. In actuality I think Kang the Decapitator completely benign, and in any case WoW keeps a lot of kids off the streets.

I don't imagine that Kang the Decapitator appreciates being described as "benign." When your nickname is "The Decapitator," you tend to expect a certain respect for your lethal potentcy. Although Kang could be compensating for something.

A number of interesting points, accurate those from Mr. Mesh.

Yes, it could be argued, but you'd be wrong. Certain videogames have shown mass appeal behond the core of "hardcore" gamers, a number of the Mario Bros. games, Tetris, Sonic, and WoW to name just a few. Something approaching a third of WoW's players are female, and myself and some of the friends are relatives you would not characterize as "disgruntled", at least no more so than yourself or others, perhaps even less.

WoW, approaching something like 5.5 million active accounts (and increasing every month) is moving beyond a mere cultural niche towards something like a phenomenon. A "game" that my sister can sit and play, having absolutely no interest in video games whatsover, and find great satisfaction is something deserving of a more interesting consideration than the traditional "that's just for disgruntled, anti-social dorks" slant.

Perhaps its the fact that, contrary to what you've stated, the rewards and criteria for sucess are nuanced (and quite difficult) to say the least. While anyone posessing a base level of intelligence can pick up a mouse and keyboard and play, it takes an enormous amount of intelligence and group-coordination to
even begin to approach certain game-defined levels of sucess.

Now there's an argument to be made against the supposed "virtue" of applying one's intellect, time, and communal resources towards achieving those in-game lofty goals, and I'd be interested in hearing it. So go for it.

Is gaming the new gay?

Your response uses the defensive tone and many of the tactics of empowerment rhetoric for other historically marginalized minorities. Could this be the birth of a new civil rights movement? Maybe you could organize a WoW Million Man March - though the planning committee would somehow have to accomodate the fact that most of the participants would likely suffer incapacitating blindness from the harsh natural outdoor light after spending so many years in their parents' basements.

Actually, I'll concede that my conception of the gaming demographic is based on a stereotype that may no longer be accurate. However, do you seriously think that using the profile I sketched earlier one wouldn't have a higher than 50% success rate in picking out gamers from a police lineup?

Also, regardless of the complexity of these fantasy worlds, they are still governed by intelligible and highly specific rules which display none of the caprice common to the actual working world, where advancement is often the result of a complex set of factors, many of them not necessarily linked to actual competency in performing one's assigned tasks. And even if the gaming fantasy worlds are as complex as actual life, that does nothing to undermine the argument that in many cases their illusory triumphs serve as compensatory sources of reward to young men trapped in routine, menial, obscure employments.

But you won't be able to bait me into arguing that gaming is somehow a wasteful use of one's time. That position assumes that without their consoles gamers would be working in soup kitchens or mowing old folks' lawns. Which is ridiculous. They'd be watching TV like everyone else. Compared to Xena: Warrior Princess, the occasional dalliance with Kang the Decapitator isn't all that bad.

World of Warcraft, it's a feeling!

plzwatch

Started writing a response to this, but it got long enough that I just made it a post on my blog. Check it out.

Ever since my college days watching people on my hall (guys and girls) getting sucked into EverCrack, MMORPG's have scared me. I just feel like if I start, a lot of time will be wasted when I can be doing things like reading a good book, exercising, and being in prayer more often (Lord knows I don't do that enough).

The reason why I would it be a time waster is that I am an avid "gamer", and If I "get into" a game, I play it until I beat it or become the best.

Yet, here I am posting this comment which somewhat defeats the purpose of my social tirade against time-wasting and MMORPGs. Maybe I will have to give a try once work cools down (5 weeks on the job and I am already project lead of 2 projects)...