People have known for years that playing video games can be an addictive hobby, but some medical professionals are now suggesting that the lure of Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games, or MMORPGs, may be much more powerful than previously thought.
The lure of the escape from reality that MMORPGs such as World of Warcraft may be so powerful, in fact, that London psychiatrist Dr. Richard Graham, head of the Young Person Technology Addiction Service at the Capio Nightingale Hospital, has compared the hold it has on some users to that of heroin addiction.
Graham discussed one of his patient cases with UK website Daily Mail this week. Apparently, the teenage boy threatened to hurt himself when the console he used to access one such game stopped working.
“He couldn't bear the sudden intense anxiety and agitation he was feeling because he was unable to access this game,” Graham said. “It's almost akin to a withdrawal reaction - like the addict using heroin who can't get that next fix gets into a desperate state because it is so unpleasant and distressing to experience the withdrawal.”
While teenagers seem to be especially susceptible, they are far from the only ones affected.
A 33-year-old woman recently pleaded guilty to child cruelty and animal neglect charges after being reported by her neighbor for the disgusting condition of her home. The woman reportedly got so caught up in an online game that her two dogs died from neglect and were left in the apartment to rot, while her three young children were attempting to care for themselves.
Some are saying now that MMORPGs should have messages that warn players of the potential for addiction. A 51-year-old man in Hawaii is suing the makers of Lineage II for negligence regarding his obsession with the game on the grounds that there were “insufficient warnings” displayed about the level of addiction it had the potential to cause.
But are these games really to blame for these situations? If an MMORPG wasn’t available to these people, would another addiction have filled whatever void they had?
While it’s not clear if there were underlying issues in the case of the teenage boy and the Hawaiian man, the woman was actually found to be suffering from severe depression after the death of her husband last year.
While I feel bad for the people involved in these types of situations, and I’m certain that these games can have a heroin-like effect on some people, I don’t believe that a game maker should be held liable for anyone’s self-destruction. A court ruling in favor of game regulation due to this issue would be a terrible precedent to set and give people further reason to not take responsibility for their own actions.
