Addiction to online gaming growing
It was a simple message; a cry for help. A young man states: “I find myself binging on Farmville for two to three hours straight. I get nothing done, but there I am, moving things around until I feel that my property is just the way I want it. I need help; it is ruining my life.”
Matt, no last name given, posted that request on one of the Farmville Addiction Support Group sites found on the Facebook Web site.
Matt is not alone.
Online interactive role-playing games such as Farmville, EverQuest and World of Warcraft draw millions into their multifarious realms and complex social orders. Some become so enthralled that mental-health professionals are seeing patients who play as much as 70 hours a week, neglecting school, work, even marriage. A recent poll on “Farmville Freaks” indicated that 65 percent of those who responded were self-proclaimed addicts.
What is an innocuous passion for many players is coming under increased scrutiny by therapists, and even gamers, as a potentially dangerous addiction. Maressa Hecht Orzack, director of the Computer Addiction Studies Center at McLean Hospital in Belmont, Mass., hears from five or six people a day looking for treatment or information related to obsessive online game-playing.
They are “so used to living in a virtual world, they don't know how to connect" in real life, said Orzack, who is on the faculty at Harvard Medical School. "I've seen more and more people who are so involved in this that they can't put it down."
The Farmville game’s platform is simple: Players first receive an “online” 12 x 12 acre plot of land and 100 gold coins. To earn more game money and experience, players can plant and sell crops, raise cattle and help on neighbors’ farms, among other farming activities. As they gain experience through time and online farm production, players raise more game funds and get a greater selection of things to buy, including larger acreage, new crops, animals or decorations that include grandiose manors, rugged log homes, scarecrows, various colors of barns and fences and more—all that help create the virtual farm of their dreams.
It sounds like something only kids would enjoy, right? Wrong.
Bill Mooney, Farmville vice president and general manager, says the game of farming is a genre that attracts all ages.
“This genre has been around for some years,” Mooney said. “It’s happy. It’s healthy. Everybody likes it and everybody gets it.”
And most players refused to allow MRN to print their last name, for obvious reasons.
Jeanne, of St. Louis County, a self-proclaimed Farmvillian addict, says goodbye for the weekend to her co-workers using a different phrase these days. “Happy Farming,” she’ll say as she heads home to check her crops and her Farmville critters.
Jeanne, who holds the coveted “King of Compost,” title and others for being such a good farmer, is one of more than 63 million players of the online game “Farmville.”
“I keep the game at the bottom of my screen all day at work, and pop it up to check on it about six times a day,” says Jeanne, who opted for a first name only for fear of being tracked down at work. “It’s just like in life; it’s the coins, the money, and buying the things you want for your farm.”
Jeanne has been playing Farmville for two months and says it hasn’t really tied up her time too bad, but, she rethinks it, and adds, “I guess it ties me up some.”
“I didn’t think I’d like it at all, but now that I continued on - it’s like designing your home. It’s your own creativity. It’s kind of like shopping, but it doesn’t cost any money,” Jeanne said. “Well, it’s only cost me $40 so far. I bought some Farmville cash twice.”
Jeanne also signed up for Blockbuster, which is among numerous businesses and service opportunities that give bonus Farmville Cash for subscribing to their offers. Jeanne says buying the cash is easier, and avoids commitment to services.
“I hope I’m not the worst case of addiction,” Jeanne said. “My daughter does give me a little bit of trouble about it, but she’s 21, and she can survive a bit of time away from me. I try not to do it too much at home, but I have a big plantation, and I need one more Farm Cash dollar to get to expand my farm further.”
Zynga, the company that developed the Farmville phenomena, says Farmville has become the most popular online game of all time. According to AllFacebook.com, a Web site that compiles Facebook statistics, the number nearly doubles the 35 million of monthly users of the second-ranked application, “Causes.”
“We expected it to be a big hit, but we didn’t expect this,” Mooney said. “World of Warcraft is at around 11 (million) or 12 million users a month. Farmville had 63 (million) this month.”
The game accessed through the online Facebook site can become an addictive distraction for students who have scheduled it into their daily routines, or adults who delay dinner to harvest their soon-to-wither pattypan squash, green tea or red wheat crops. There are gamers from all walks of life who have somehow become more entrenched in the virtual world of Farmville than in their own neighborhoods.
Adam Apo, of St. Peters, a 21-year-old student at Loyola University, started playing Farmville after his friends did.
“I had to shut it down,” Apo said. “It was just taking up too much of my time.”
The game is one of several popular Facebook applications created by Zynga, an Internet gaming powerhouse that began in 2007. Of the 10 most popular Facebook applications, Zynga owns half. In the near future, plans are to expand the Farmville application beyond the Facebook platform and allow users to play on Farmville.com.
Tina, a St. Peters 40-something level 32 farmer has attained the “Ace of Acreage” moniker. She has been playing Farmville for three months. How often does she check her crops?
“A lot,” Tina said. “(Checking my crops is) the first thing I do when I get up in the morning, when I get to work, after lunch, the minute before I drive home and sometimes in between. And if it’s the evening or weekend… Well, I just don’t know.”
Addiction on the rise
Video game addiction treatment is still a new field and research is currently being conducted in the initial stages. However as with other addictions, the most effective treatments appear to be psychotherapy or talk therapy and medication, if necessary, for anxiety or depression.
However, because gamers are usually computer savvy, a non-profit organization called On-line Gamers Anonymous was formed in 2002. It is a 12-step self-help support organization for individuals suffering and recovering from the negative effects of compulsive and excessive computer game playing. They provide online support meetings, message boards and other tools for healing.
According to Gamers Anonymous, Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (MMORPGs) also known as "MMOs" are the most addictive in nature because they never end.
“You can never truly win or lose the game as a whole. There is always something more to be done and more progress to be made,” an Online Gamers Anonymous report states. “Success in these games is highly dependent on the amount of time you put into them. Playing the game casually will leave you trailing behind others who put in more time, possibly making you feel as if you aren't as good or are falling behind.”
Detox for video game addiction may sound like a stretch, but addiction experts say the concept makes sense.
Kimberly Young, Psy.D., clinical director of the Center for On-Line Addiction and author of “Caught in the Net: How to Recognize the Signs of Internet Addiction—and a Winning Strategy for Recovery” says she has had many parents call during the last year or two, particularly about the online role-playing games.
“I see it getting worse as the opportunity to game grows—for example, cell phone gaming,” Young said.
Sandy Meinert, a 40-something O’Fallon farmer who has reached the whopping level 37, owns six coveted donkeys, an Airstream camper and a couple of fire pits only attained through “Mystery Gift Box” purchases. Meinert is up at 7 a.m. checking her farm and often sends her Farmville avatar careening among crops every two hours to harvest peas, tomatoes, milk cows and collect chicken eggs. She walks through neatly lined orchards with her self-designed avatar picking fruit from more than 10 different types of trees. Next she plows, replants her crops and rakes the leaves off her neighbor’s farm for extra points.
“I also play Fish World and Happy Aquarium on Facebook. It’s fun. I probably spend too much time on it, but it certainly keeps me from shopping online,” Meinert said. “I’ve paid for Farm Cash. It’s not that much money—$20 for $115 in Farm Cash, and that buys a lot of stuff for the farm.”
This year the company will make millions from the success of games such as Farmville. One feature of the game allows players to spend real money in exchange for Farmville currency. Players can use this money to expand and improve their farms and while consequently rising in the ranks.
What does that mean for the creators of the game? Mooney said Zynga’s profits had skyrocketed this year. He said $100 million is a conservative estimate.
Having friends on Farmville also contributes to the competition. Bill, a West County senior citizen and level 39 “Green Ribbon Farmer,” has watched the game’s popularity increase since its debut. He started playing after he and his friends stumbled upon the game last year. Back then, his only neighbors on Farmville were his two friends, but now, Bill is asked several times a day to be someone’s neighbor.
Neighbors reap more daily gifts of cows and fences and even bouquets of flowers, creating a better farm and more points. The neighborly setting definitely contributes to the addiction, Bill said.
“You want to keep up, and if you fall short, it looks like you’re a loser,” Bill said. “People I hardly know ask me to be their neighbors.”
Is it a real addiction?
Some say Farmville is addicting because the more tech-saturated city folk become, the more we crave some sort of agrarian experience. And for many of us plugged in 24/7 and restless to nurture even pixels on a screen, Farmville is as close as we are likely to get.
Others say it just may be an itch to be scratched by games that mimic the pointless, patient wanderings of real life. “The Sims,” in which users build lives, is primarily plotless play, but it is also one of the best-selling computer software games in history.
Online game addiction isn't recognized as a disorder by the American Psychiatric Association, though an official with the group said it could be considered a behavioral addiction.
People aren't hooked on the games, they said. They are hooked on chemicals the games trigger in their brains.
In a study this year, Nielsen Interactive Entertainment found that more than half of the estimated 117 million U.S. gamers play online. Of those, 15 million are involved in MMORPGs (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games). Other statistics about online role-playing games are scant. According to a survey of MMORPG players conducted since 1999 by Nick Yee, a Stanford University graduate student, the average age of players is 26, 85 percent are men and 36 percent are married. Now, however, because adults are joining the Facebook scene, more adults are joining in on the gaming.
In 2004, Yee asked MMORPG players if they were "addicted." Of 2,218 respondents, about 14 percent answered "definitely" and 27 percent said "probably." But, Yee cautioned, many use the term loosely.
