MMO addiction

[NegativeS]

Yeah, I'm an MMO addict. I have been since my idiot friend introduced me to WoW in 2010, and since then I've been unable to get enough of the genre.

Unfortunately, WoW lost its soul.
GW2 is one bad quarter away from maintenance mode (according to hearsay).
OSRS is too easy, and too grindy.
EVE is too hard, and an order of magnitude more grindy.
ESO is too poorly balanced and maintained.
Destiny 2 is a FPS wearing the skin of an MMO.
Everything else is too low quality, has too few players, is in maintenance mode, has shut down (RIP Wildstar), or is just an action RPG with an auction house.

FFXIV, despite its problems, is the last place left for me to get my fix.

I wonder if I'll ever find enough sense to go cold turkey?

[ArchlordPie]

Yeah, I'm an MMO addict. I have been since my idiot friend introduced me to WoW in 2010, and since then I've been unable to get enough of the genre.

Unfortunately, WoW lost its soul.
GW2 is one bad quarter away from maintenance mode (according to hearsay).
OSRS is too easy, and too grindy.
EVE is too hard, and an order of magnitude more grindy.
ESO is too poorly balanced and maintained.
Destiny 2 is a FPS wearing the skin of an MMO.
Everything else is too low quality, has too few players, is in maintenance mode, has shut down (RIP Wildstar), or is just an action RPG with an auction house.

FFXIV, despite its problems, is the last place left for me to get my fix.

I wonder if I'll ever find enough sense to go cold turkey?

Destiny 2 isn't even an FPS any more. It's a seasonal ARPG that happens to contain guns and be played in first person. I mean, have you seen their newer arena designs? There is next to zero effective cover anywhere. You're expected to build into one of several healing-centric keywords and sustain through damage now instead of avoiding it. The good builds are all ability-centric, to the point where you use your grenade and/or melee ability more than your guns. Speaking of your guns, unless you're using a heavy weapon or the current FotM rocket sidearms, your guns at their core are worthless without the right perks. And "the right perks" are either the ones that are just plain strong on their own, or are the ones that trigger the aforementioned keywords.

They had to buff exotic primary damage by something like 40 or 50 percent recently just to get people to start using them again, because the meta had shifted to the point where build-defining guns couldn't even make the builds they used to define function properly. You had to get a legendary with the right perk to keep using builds that worked just fine in years past.

I also find it funny that people call it an MMO. Sure, there are dungeons and raids and a heavy emphasis on group content in endgame, and item level and different classes. It's got all the trappings of a standard MMO. But the playerbase itself is beyond antisocial. The overwhelming majority of group content attempts in that game are done via pugs and the game itself gives you next to no reason to build social connections or even utilize your friend list.

[Daralii]

Destiny 2 isn't even an FPS any more. It's a seasonal ARPG that happens to contain guns and be played in first person. I mean, have you seen their newer arena designs? There is next to zero effective cover anywhere. You're expected to build into one of several healing-centric keywords and sustain through damage now instead of avoiding it. The good builds are all ability-centric, to the point where you use your grenade and/or melee ability more than your guns. Speaking of your guns, unless you're using a heavy weapon or the current FotM rocket sidearms, your guns at their core are worthless without the right perks. And "the right perks" are either the ones that are just plain strong on their own, or are the ones that trigger the aforementioned keywords.

They had to buff exotic primary damage by something like 40 or 50 percent recently just to get people to start using them again, because the meta had shifted to the point where build-defining guns couldn't even make the builds they used to define function properly. You had to get a legendary with the right perk to keep using builds that worked just fine in years past.

I also find it funny that people call it an MMO. Sure, there are dungeons and raids and a heavy emphasis on group content in endgame, and item level and different classes. It's got all the trappings of a standard MMO. But the playerbase itself is beyond antisocial. The overwhelming majority of group content attempts in that game are done via pugs and the game itself gives you next to no reason to build social connections or even utilize your friend list.

The game's also on its last legs. Only the Steam numbers are publicly visible, but one platform losing over 200k people(312k peak to 80k peak) in 4 months is remarkably bad.

[Reinha]

Yeah, I'm an MMO addict. I have been since my idiot friend introduced me to WoW in 2010, and since then I've been unable to get enough of the genre.

Unfortunately, WoW lost its soul.
GW2 is one bad quarter away from maintenance mode (according to hearsay).
OSRS is too easy, and too grindy.
EVE is too hard, and an order of magnitude more grindy.
ESO is too poorly balanced and maintained.
Destiny 2 is a FPS wearing the skin of an MMO.
Everything else is too low quality, has too few players, is in maintenance mode, has shut down (RIP Wildstar), or is just an action RPG with an auction house.

FFXIV, despite its problems, is the last place left for me to get my fix.

I wonder if I'll ever find enough sense to go cold turkey?

I also started WoW in 2010 then swapped to FFXIV, and all that time I played nothing but MMOs until a couple of weeks ago. Going cold turkey was surprisingly easy, you know why? Because since Dawntrail I wasn't getting my fix here anyway. No friends, no lasting content, no attachment to my character anymore, no joy from gameplay, no motivation to see what future updates bring. If you are still getting something out of the game then I'm not surprised you'd feel the need to continue playing. It takes so little to feed a years long addiction, just a few crumbs here and there.

[NegativeS]

I also started WoW in 2010 then swapped to FFXIV, and all that time I played nothing but MMOs until a couple of weeks ago. Going cold turkey was surprisingly easy, you know why? Because since Dawntrail I wasn't getting my fix here anyway. No friends, no lasting content, no attachment to my character anymore, no joy from gameplay, no motivation to see what future updates bring. If you are still getting something out of the game then I'm not surprised you'd feel the need to continue playing. It takes so little to feed a years long addiction, just a few crumbs here and there.

Believe me, I probably would have left if I didn't find a cool FC when I transferred to Seraph. At the moment, I'm just leveling all my jobs to 100 hoping that when I'm done there will be content to finally, finally... fill the void.

As I learned in WoW, MMO addiction is a formidable foe. Stronger than any I have faced. Against it, I need bring my all to bear.

I need burn through the candle of my attention span.