MMORPGS and Social Skills?

With MMORPGS currently on a huge upward trend throughout all age categories, and many of these games becoming highly addictive, people are beginning to spend more and more time immersing themselves into these virtual worlds.





With some of these games, in specific World of Warcraft having a very social network involved. Do you feel that these games could possibly have a positive Social impact?





I am an avid gamer of World of Warcraft, but I am also 22 years old, maintain an excellent fulltime job, and have an outside social life.





I am primarily interested in the impact of people who fully immerse themselves in the game, and maintain a decent social interaction ingame.

MMORPGS and Social Skills?
MMORPGs have the same impacts as any society. It really is a society. Folks can get destructively addicted and let their RL connections fall away in favor of the games connections. You see the same thing happen with groups of friends, with clubs/organizations. So the most common problem is for one member in a couple to get hooked deeply in the game and the other to feel neglected. Many a relationship went down the sink because of gaming, not just MMORPGs.





It can also have postitive impacts. Many people, not only young learn a great deal of social interaction skills from participation in such a society. It can build confidence and depending on the game enhance the ability of a person to work in a team, stratigize, prioritize and especially leaders in such society learn or sharpen leadership skills. Many MMORPs also help develop negotiation skills. So there are quite a few valuable skills that can be learned or sharpened thorugh MMORPGs. Most people that play them do so and enjoy the experience. Some like KOC can be so time draining to be successful at that it interferes with life to be a top player. Others can be played part time and time invested generally is not as relivant to the level of success.





As added impacts. A number of romantic relationships that carried into RL relationships have developed between people meeting in MMORPGs. Friendships, sometimes even with people local to you that you never would have met if not for the MMORPG. I've heard of job opportunities, allies rooming with each other or providing other such goods and services for their fellows in need. Help finding work and a host of other functions that any society should play for it's members. So MMORPGs do touch the RL for some people. Both positive and negitive.
Reply:my sister is 14 years old. she plays a game called "maplestory." i dont get whats so popular with the games.anyway, she failed so many classes, been cutting class, lying to her friends/family/me. she has lost the trust that i entrusted in her.
Reply:as a 33 soon to be 34 year old player of Endless Online which is very similar to World of Warcraft and in the same boat as you ( i hold down a full time job as a social advocate for homeless and poor with most of my clients being special needs people and maintaining a decent social life playing in real life pool leagues and mixed martial arts tournaments and hanging with friends on weekends)





i find there are positive aspects of MMORPGS like i not only chat on Endless Online but maintain close friendships globally and potential business contacts later on in the game where I would normally not make such encounters across the planet or have the opportunity to do so (my best friends who also play the game are in poland. russia, canada and the dominican republic)





so that is the positive aspects i can see from the rise in popularity of MMORPGS





since chat rooms are a dying artform due to pedophilia, bots, virus code booters and spammers I believe MMORPGS are the next popular evolution of that sort of chat rooms taken to the next level and should also be applauded for taking that next courageous step





Hope that helped
Reply:I think its more the cost on time. However I have friends from all over the world from wasting time on games. My friend is going to norway this week to meet someone he met playing WoW. He came over here (to UK) last october and lots of fun was had by all.





This Generation could lead us further to more international understanding if we have links all over the world, or could not.