NCSoft sued over Lineage II being too addidictive

Doesn't this mean people in the US can sue the bar everytime they go there? after all they were not warned that drinking could be addictive before entering ?
 
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This is just someone seeking a quick buck, no more, no less. Here you can file a suit if you can find a fleabag who'll take it, that doesn't mean the suit has substance. Occasionally, you can bribe a judge into allowing the suit to go forward, such as in this case. Had the judge done his job, both the plaintiff and his representing fleabag would have been placed under contempt, and a note sent to the state bar association to consider revoking that particular fleabags ability to practice law.

Whats bad, is that many companies just settle out of court, as it's faster, easier, and no matter if they were in the right to begin with, less of a PR hassle.
 
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NCSoft's attorneys have responded to the ruling with a filing arguing that Kay should dismiss all charges and award NCSoft legal fees as damages.
Got that right. This guy either has serious mental problems or is just trying to grab some quick cash. Either way, it's not NCSoft's fault.
 
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Well I'm not so cynical to say that the judge took a bribe but I am cynical enough to say he's throwing a bone to all the lawyers in the case.

Although Americans are guaranteed the right to a fair and speedy trial "fair" takes precedence in the sense that the lawyers on both sides can demand every single document from each other just in case it might be relevant. This is what lawyers really get paid for - these are the billable hours and storage fees. Its a license to print money. And judges get their money by sitting in these cases as well as a chance to get their name in some lawbook that someone gets to review for the next 200 years.

This guy suing is not only going to go broke from his legal fees but he's going to drown in a sea of paperwork from the other side. Its a win-win-win-lose-annoy situation.
 
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Eventually, though, people will realise that the detrimental effects of being addicted to an MMO, outweigh the advantages of focusing on it being the players own responsibility to play.

It's going to be increasingly expensive to society, and since greed will always win - they will need to take this more seriously.
 
I'm sure some genes (or lack thereof) are responsible for having a higher chance of becoming addictive or not. If it is true for this guy then it is not really his fault, although he should not be playing games at all or get in contact with anything else that could result in an addiction.
On the other hand it is rather silly to put warning stickers on everything that could potentially be addictive. cigarettes, alcohol, chocolate, hamburgers, work, table-top gaming, sex etc.
If we don't put warning signs on all those things then why on games?
 
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I'm sure some genes (or lack thereof) are responsible for having a higher chance of becoming addictive or not. If it is true for this guy then it is not really his fault, although he should not be playing games at all or get in contact with anything else that could result in an addiction.
On the other hand it is rather silly to put warning stickers on everything that could potentially be addictive. cigarettes, alcohol, chocolate, hamburgers, work, table-top gaming, sex etc.
If we don't put warning signs on all those things then why on games?

I don't think it has much to do with genes.

Also, I don't really give a shit about placing blame or warning signs.

What I care about, is what it takes to make things better. If people can't control their addiction, then I think it's a good idea to consider how to avoid them getting addicted, in the first place.

If it can be done without curtailing freedom of choice, brilliant, but I don't think so.

Personally, I think MMO is a paradox genre.

The better they are, the more damage they do. Yet, all people want is the best a game can be.
 
I don't think it has much to do with genes.

Also, I don't really give a shit about placing blame or warning signs.

What I care about, is what it takes to make things better. If people can't control their addiction, then I think it's a good idea to consider how to avoid them getting addicted, in the first place.

If it can be done without curtailing freedom of choice, brilliant, but I don't think so.

Personally, I think MMO is a paradox genre.

The better they are, the more damage they do. Yet, all people want is the best a game can be.

Some people truly do have addictive personalities. I had a roommate back in '99 that I was pretty sure this aretile was probably about. This guy was an alcoholic. I'd come home witha 6-pack, put it in the fridge, go take a shower and by the time I got back, at least half, if not ALL, of it would be gone. The guy had 5 outstanding DWI's in another state and had lost his driver's license.

When Everquest came out, he became instantly addicited. It got to a point, that he quit his job, took all his money out of his 401k ($5k or so) to live on and just played EQ. I finally tossed him out about 3 months later when checks started bouncing.

That said, he KNEW he had a problem, and he did nothing about it. No counseling, no doctors, no drugs, no rehab, nothing. We shouldn't ban beer because this guy couldn't abstain, and we shouldn't change MMOs (and I am not an MMO player) because people like him can't abstain from that either.
 
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On the other hand it is rather silly to put warning stickers on everything that could potentially be addictive. cigarettes, alcohol, chocolate, hamburgers, work, table-top gaming, sex etc.

I think all of these already have warning signs in the US. They even have warning signs on the cars manual after a guy put his house car on "cruise-control" and went to the toilet……. after the accident he sued the car company… so now each car manual says "Warning: Cruise Control can never replace a human driver"
 
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Yup. Common sense is no longer a defense against idiots.
 
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Some people truly do have addictive personalities. I had a roommate back in '99 that I was pretty sure this aretile was probably about. This guy was an alcoholic. I'd come home witha 6-pack, put it in the fridge, go take a shower and by the time I got back, at least half, if not ALL, of it would be gone. The guy had 5 outstanding DWI's in another state and had lost his driver's license.

When Everquest came out, he became instantly addicited. It got to a point, that he quit his job, took all his money out of his 401k ($5k or so) to live on and just played EQ. I finally tossed him out about 3 months later when checks started bouncing.

That said, he KNEW he had a problem, and he did nothing about it. No counseling, no doctors, no drugs, no rehab, nothing. We shouldn't ban beer because this guy couldn't abstain, and we shouldn't change MMOs (and I am not an MMO player) because people like him can't abstain from that either.

I don't know your friend, so I can't really comment on him.

I do know people though, and it's my number one passion to try and understand how they work.

No one really knows the depths of what it takes to become addicted, so it's basically guesswork. My own personal opinion is that it's less about genes, and more about social patterns and the early years of development. Even so, I've witnessed socially amiable and very active people become addicted, in the most subtle and surprising ways. It's never really a clear cut thing, trying to define what makes people self-destruct.

About people who don't do anything for themselves, you'd have to be ignorant to truly believe people WANT to ruin their lives. It takes effort to break a strong addiction, and for that you need surplus resources and motivation. Not everyone has those things, and I'd rather try and help them than just ignore it.

It's not my responsibility to help, nor do I feel "good" when I try to counsel against MMOs. I simply believe it's for the best - and as such I will always advocate helping others, whether they "deserve" that help or not. If I can help a single individual against addiction, I will consider it worth it. Fuck guilt, blame, taking credit for helping, and all of those irrelevant things. Focus on what helps.

That's my opinion, anyway :)
 
Don't get me wrong, I'm all for helping them too, but of course they have to WANT to be helped first. But I don't think helping them means necessarily depriving the rest of us.
 
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Don't get me wrong, I'm all for helping them too, but of course they have to WANT to be helped first. But I don't think helping them means necessarily depriving the rest of us.

I don't wish to deprive anyone of anything. The whole idea is to prevent deprivation ;)

That said, what do you think would happen if the perfect MMO was released, one day?

Think about it ;)

I'm saying this as someone who was once addicted to WoW, and who is anxiously awaiting Guild Wars 2 ;)

The genre is a paradox - I kid you not!
 
Screw personal responsibility, bring on the nanny state. :rolleyes:

@GG- I don't think I've seen any warning signs related to sex. I certainly haven't seen any cautionary tattoos so far... ;)
 
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@GG- I don't think I've seen any warning signs related to sex. I certainly haven't seen any cautionary tattoos so far…

That's because sex is so dangerous in the US that you're not allowed to talk about it :p much less have any warnings about it.
 
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No one really knows the depths of what it takes to become addicted, so it's basically guesswork. My own personal opinion is that it's less about genes, and more about social patterns and the early years of development. Even so, I've witnessed socially amiable and very active people become addicted, in the most subtle and surprising ways. It's never really a clear cut thing, trying to define what makes people self-destruct.

About people who don't do anything for themselves, you'd have to be ignorant to truly believe people WANT to ruin their lives. It takes effort to break a strong addiction, and for that you need surplus resources and motivation. Not everyone has those things, and I'd rather try and help them than just ignore it.

It's not my responsibility to help, nor do I feel "good" when I try to counsel against MMOs. I simply believe it's for the best - and as such I will always advocate helping others, whether they "deserve" that help or not. If I can help a single individual against addiction, I will consider it worth it. Fuck guilt, blame, taking credit for helping, and all of those irrelevant things. Focus on what helps.

That's my opinion, anyway :)

And an interesting one, as always. I have a family background of addiction, work with addicts daily, and have struggled with abuse if not addiction myself. That's chemical dependency, though, and I'm not sure how well that translates to addiction to games (which I do believe exists … saw someone with it a couple days ago).

But the thing that seems to have helped chemical addicts the most over the past century has been the 12-step programs. The fields that were supposed to come up with the treatment (psychiatry, psychology, social work) were mostly ineffective. Throughout the US anyhow, most treatments for addiction (chemical, sexual, gambling) are 12-step based. So if you're interested in helping, I would think that would be the way to go. Building 12-step groups or encouraging addicted gamers to check them out. I'm not a 12-stepper myself but I see the benefits everywhere in the world of chemical dependency. A lot of people avoid 12-step support groups because of the spiritual aspect, equating them in their mind with some type of religious organization. That's a misunderstanding. As long as you can believe in some power greater than yourself, upon which you can call for help, then you're set.

I agree that addiction is a multifaceted and still-mysterious thing. The last 20 years has yielded a lot of neuropsychological evidence supporting the "disease" theory. Something happens to certain parts of the midbrain during an addiction, and the system no longer operates the way it should. The drug (or whatever) becomes the #1 thing for that person, and the brain becomes completely focused on getting more of it. There is definitely a genetic component, too.

But beyond that, every addict I've known has had some sort of personality or interpersonal issue that contributes to the addiction — maybe a risk-taking tendency that puts him in situations others would avoid, a social isolation that leaves him bereft of normal pleasures, an idiosyncracy that makes him different, a tension or depression that makes him uniquely attracted to the type of "high" a particular drug/experience offers, etc.. Sexual, physical, and verbal abuse is well known to increase the risk for addiction/relapse. And then you've got all the different kind of issues that can make people unhappy and looking for a way to mood-alter. So there are a lot of possibilities here.

I don't really have a point here. I just wanted to add some of what I know about addiction.
 
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Don't get me wrong, I'm all for helping them too, but of course they have to WANT to be helped first. But I don't think helping them means necessarily depriving the rest of us.

What if "they" (those that become addicts) were 10% of people? 25% 50%? 95%?
 
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