Too competitive, ambicious and social for gaming

Dear Forum,

I was really looking forward to sharing my story of what I think is an addiction to gaming. Maybe this could help you in your current situation and I will really appreciate any encouragement from your part, as dealing with this is and always will be tricky. Excuse me that this text got this long, but I really felt this necessity to express it all and give some background info about myself.

I gamed like most of all of you from probably six years of age (GameBoy times/Pokemon) - which is incredibly just to think about!!! - to first Computer Games which really caught my attention like Warcraft III, Sacred, Pirates of the Carribbean, Anno, FLYFF. I reached my gaming climax between 14-15 (around Wrath of the Lich King Days) years in the game World of Warcraft. I always liked the story of Warcraft and this game seemed like the ultimate combination of the social aspect and the lore. It seemed like all my previous gaming experience prepared me for this game with the same sense of progress like maybe training Pokemons. At least, I played this game with my to this day real life best friend and even in our free time we fantasized about the game. We were part of a pretty decent guild on the server, but it was all about the journey, we never raided too much and had small time being on cap level 80. Already as a child I had a pretty caring family and limited screen time with my Gameboy. I still have my notebook where I wrote down my screen times to keep track, of course my Mom told me to. Because of this I never let my real life slip away completely playing WoW. At my most active gaming time I probably averaged something around 6-8 hours a day, but I still got relatively good grades, had a girlfriend and was in a sports team with the same best friend. Still, I did the same things as many people on here: acting sick so you don’t have to go to school and can play more, I thought about the game pretty much 24/7. Neglecting some real life responsibilities like coming late down to dinner or even never because of doing a dungeon in World of Warcraft, actively playing while having a call with someone etc.

Luckily for me, I made a strong stop when at almost 16 years of age I did an exchange program for one year to another country. We could not play together due to internet latency and I made great new experiences learning a new language and had no time for gaming whatsoever. Met my today’s wife in this period, also. Coming back after the exchange year to my origin country I played a lot less and only League of Legends, but I still would play about 2 hours a day, with stronger days for sure. After high school I went to one of the most remote places on earth, so the Internet connection wasn’t even good enough for YouTube. That was good for me. Back in my place, I started to study jazz guitar - that may seem weird, but through all this time I actually practiced a lot guitar and had several bands. I focused my almost obsessive strategies for MMO-Gaming onto music practice and got pretty good, I play in several bands now (Age:27) and have a touring Ensemble with my own compositions. Just finished my bachelor degree in Jazz music and got a place to continue my master’s degree in the same field. But after finishing my Bachelor I fell in a deep hole, suddenly there was not much purpose to focus on guitar and I really needed a break from the busy life I had and got back into gaming and I had a lot of free time due to vacation. It started subtle: I played a little bit of Catan Colonist online against others, then restarted FLYFF (now it is a web based MMO - bad graphics, merely for the nostalgic trip). Around two weeks ago I deleted there my account, gave away all my in game currency and stuff, haven’t made it too far in the game either. It was too much Pay2Win for me and I got the same feeling of wasting time that I have now. I thought sincerely that I had slayed the demon at that moment, I was really productive over the two following days until I started playing Classic WoW (Era). I tried Retail, but this is just not my game and has evolved into something I do not like and I thought to myself that I can take Classic Era just at my pace and not stress myself out competing with others as the game is not progressing. The first day alone I played 8 hours! This was almost 12 days ago and I have played around 36 hours already in total. That does not seem a lot, but considering that I have a loving wife, I practice at least 3 hours per day my instrument plus work and so much other hobbies it is just distracting. The time playing is not my issue so much, but I notice that I sleep worse, I wake up earlier and cannot go to bed again, because of thinking about the game and other real-life stress. Yesterday was the breaking point for me when I was on a rock band rehearsal trip away from home and still carried my laptop with me to farm herbalism after a long day of music at the hotel. I would have really loved to invest those 36 hours into my instrument and things I am still not good at musically speaking. At the same time I have never fully enjoyed WoW Classic and thought that I can probably be raiding in one to two years, but why waste those years thinking about such an old game designed to be extremely addictive? I noticed and it really hurts that I am a too competitive and social person for this game. This brought me far in real life and usually I end up being good in a guild like in the old days, but I am sure that with raiding and end game everything will just get worse and harder to move on. At the same time I catch myself fantasizing about just having my level 60 Rogue more or less geared that I log on from time to time slay some Alliance in OpenPvP – nothing more. But I know that if I hit 60 I will be trying to get the best gear, “be stronger” and the wheel in my head will spin.

I deleted my Level 24 Rogue this morning and cancelled subscription (which is 12 days old). Deinstalled Battle.Net and World of Warcraft Classic. Now I have to clean up my YouTube Algorithm, because there are way too much HC videos. I read all articles about playing WoW with moderation and this alone is a warning sign for me that I should stay away from this game. This is my inner devil to find a way to keep me consuming, I guess. It has been only 2 months since I got back into gaming, but I noticed even more how I was addicted as a child and teenager and that this is something really delicate and something I have to control. I hope to hear your thoughts. I also want to educate myself about this addiction in general, maybe via a Help Group.

All the best, thank you for reading, this means a lot to me,

J*