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The Balancing Act: WoW & Other Video Games

When are they making the 28-hour day?


Like 95 percent of the eyes on this page right now, I play World of Warcraft.  I am not one to shy away from the subject that I play WoW, unlike some people.  To top it off, I am actually proud of my nerdiness, displaying the titles I am playing in my living room as if they are trophies from the local bowling league.  This brings me to my point, I am a gamer - console, PC, handhelds, IRL sports, you name it.

For nearly the past 20 years, the holiday season has become a video gamer's time to shine.  By that, I mean their time to get a handful of games, and lock themselves in a room in a vain attempt to finish all those news titles.  In recent years the holiday window has been extended further and further into the summer, with some analysts claiming that the new rush begins as early as September.  With all these triple A titles hitting the market, how is one supposed to find the time for them, as well as World of Warcraft?

When I first started playing WoW, all other video games fell off the radar.  I let titles like Oblivion, Battlefield 2, Call of Duty 2, Company of Heroes, Neverwinter Nights 2, even Half-Life 2 slip by me.  Sadly, Resident Evil 4 (one of the best titles ever, in my humble opinion) and F.E.A.R. are the only titles released in that timeframe that I played and are worth noting - looking at you, Halo 2.

Earlier this year I started a new regiment of gaming to compensate for all the missed material.  First and foremost, I cut back my World of Warcraft play time as a whole, and now play about half as much as I did during my high-end raiding days.  To accommodate this, I joined a raiding guild that was a close group of friends (I am not one of them) rather than a hardcore PvE guild.  Another simple change was to schedule things ahead of time and stick to it.  Basically, I only raid when I allocate the time a week or so in advance, as you would for any other activity that may take more than 30 minutes.

Since implementing my new "life strat," I have been able to play dozens of other games, for better or for worse.  No longer am I missing as many big titles as I was before.  Portal, Team Fortress 2, Dead Rising, Halo 3, Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Mass Effect, all defeated.  I even found the time to go back and play the amazing Half-Life 2.  With titles like Fallout 3, Red Alert 3, Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War 2, F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin, Street Fighter IV, etc. coming or here, I am glad I made the new strategy.  Then of course, there is Wrath of the Lich King.  That may change things for awhile...

Are you guys content with just World of Warcraft and everything it has to offer?  Or do you fruitlessly strive to digest everything the wonderful video game industry has to offer as I do?  If so, what is your strategy?

For those who may be wondering, I am currently playing The Witcher: Enhanced Edition, Red Alert 3, Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning, The Incredible Maze (WiiWare - oh god, what a piece of trash), and still wrapping up Grand Theft Auto IV.  Fallout 3 is still in its shrink wrap, waiting for me to finish The Witcher.

Reader Comments (35)

firsties!!!

October 30, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterJake

well wow is a massive game, i was a giant gamer before wow, Kingdom Hearts woudl have to be my fav franchise ><

October 30, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterAtomsk

i most definately have ignored most games for quite a while now...
Me and my wife play WoW together, we raid together whenever it is feasible (we dont cry if we cant, but definately prefer it).

we took a 6wk break from WoW when we moved house, and in that time i beat Mass Effect, COD4, and played Spore much more than it was worth (but dammit, i wanted that game to be awesome!)

Since then, i discovered Mount&Blade (taleworlds.com for free trial) - this game is AWESOME by the way... and i havent really played much else. Im keen to play Fallout3, and i hear DeadSpace is worth a look. FarCry2, Crysis Warhead & STALKER are also in my sights... but with Wrath bearing down so fast, im quite happy kicking back and working on achievements at my own pace instead.

October 30, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterSaemundr

I actually play WoW and Red Alert 3. I tried to get into Warhammer Online, but had so many issues with the registration process, I gave up after 3 weeks.

What are your thoughts on Red Alert 3? Like it?

October 30, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterJosh

Most console games are short so they come first for me. I use wow to hold me over until the next great console game. Fable 2 takes up most of my time these days

October 30, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterZeb

I spend most of my time palying COD4 and CSS these days and a sprinkle of WoW since i have done all i can with WoW currently but then i have started playing Crysis again and bought Far Cry 2 so i have alot of serious thinking when it comes to deciding which one to pick to play for the day lol but when Lich comes out its all going to change i am going to be locked in my room for about 2 weeks and emerge with three level 80s under my belt in truimph lol

October 30, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterAnanun

Beside WoW i play Halo 3, Super Smash Bros. Brawl and Guitar Hero 3. I played WoW long before the others i said, but Pokémon still is the game where i grew up with and i still play it, have Pokémon Pearl version

October 30, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterVitolas

I grew up with legend of zelda 2 (didn't realize how bad it was until I played another game) so I would say Nintendo has a monopoly on my console gaming (but the Wii is making me start to drift towards pc gaming a xbox 360) so, and WoW is something I do half-way liberally, so WotLK CE for me (have had it reserved since they anounnced the CE version)

October 30, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterChacka

Proud to be a nerd since 1995(my date of gaming,not birth)

October 30, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterReyson

yer i'm a proud gamer to play many things other than wow i just got fable 2 awesome game so am spending quite alot of time on that atm :)
my strat is play wow untill i get a new game complete that go back to wow get a new game complete back to wow etc...
and theirs so many games that look awesome comnig out this time such as fallout 3, left 4 dead, dead space, guitar hero world tour diabo 3, the list goes on to many to buy :(

October 30, 2008 | Unregistered Commenterteeters

what server are you playing on in warhammer online?

October 30, 2008 | Unregistered Commentermacbethy

Gears of War 2... Left 4 Dead... Call of Duty oh my!

October 30, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterUrza

wow used to take up most of my time but now i got fallout 3 & fable2 ...im hooked to my xbox360

October 31, 2008 | Unregistered Commentermcb172

back then(last year) I decided to leave wow after my main dinged 70 because there is TOO much drama QQs and bragging rights and decided to play CoD 4 and Rock Band, i have enjoying it alot, more than WoW. This year as new content is coming out, I'm content on playing my main again, one problem is, like I said earlier, with drama QQ in raiding and too much unintelligent people in the trade chat, it isn't fun or enjoying to play more.

Especially that illidan server stupidity incident. I don't want to play a game that is like a job, grinding, pugging, getting ridculous amounts of drama QQs and stuff. That whole Zombie infestation was fun at WoWinsider but when i started doing that, there was alot of drama(people whining/bitching about this) and it turned out to be lame as people didn't start zombie raiding and shit.

Left 4 dead, Fallout 3, Last Remnant and especially LittleBigPlanet will be on my list.

October 31, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterDaelin

Yeah since I have been playing World of Warcraft I have notice the other titles have been ignored and I feel it has not been a issue with me. Currently right now I have Little Big Planet and enjoying the heck out of it. At the end of the day I go back to WoW. Just like how it will be when I get Fallout 3, well then again I think I noob addictive state right now were I just started playing WoW for the first time so everything I see is new and awesome.

October 31, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterRicanelite

Guys this is like way off topic compared to other things but i think i just found where jerry in a movie lol! But seriiously about half way through on "Donnie darko" there he is with short cut hair, i'm either blind as shit or that guy is extreemly similar to him. about 1hour 5mins into film THERE HE IS seriously if anyone can watch the film comment i wana find out if i'm correct cause thats serioulsy freaky lol!

October 31, 2008 | Unregistered Commenterandrew

Siiiigh. Thanks to WoW, it takes me forever to get through console games. I'm still not finished with GTA4 or The Force Unleashed, among many other games.

October 31, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterCloudbearer

i to have problems balancing my gaming though i do not play as many games as the rest of you i only get about 5 hours of play time a day and i usaly spend my time with wow with the WOTLK coming i am on a tight dead line the games i like to play when i get sick of wow star wars the fors unleashed, since i like to chalange my self i tryd i switched it to sith lord thats was tuff it took me an hour just to beat the first level it took some getting used to and some special aproches the boss was suprisingly easy i got as far the the sacond boss and i gave up i got the fealing that most of you are grown ups i am still a kid so i play more kid games

October 31, 2008 | Unregistered Commentercocopuffs

yea i dont know what to do. i would love to get fallout3, but that would just take so long....cuts into my wow time. ive been playing deadspace, gta4 and littlebigplanet, but i always find myself to come back to wow, even when im doing the same exact thing everyday. so with so many amazing games coming out here soon like left4dead, streetfighter2, sooon to be resevil5 and KILLZONE2! leaves me hoping i can set aside wotlk to play these, bc i know its going to be so hard to do so...

October 31, 2008 | Unregistered Commenterfriskydingo

Having played vidoe games since the days of Atari/Colecovision, I have found being an adult in this day and age terribly frustrating. As video games keep getting better (both visually and content-wise), I keep finding myself with increasingly shrinking time to play them.

When I have to be a grown up by day, I'm an attorney putting in anywhere between 50-70 hours a week at work. When I come home at night, I have to be a husband and father to 3 kids (6 yr. old twins and a 2 yr. old). That leaves very little time for me to play ANY game. Fortunately my nephews have advanced to video game ages and my wife is OK with my WOW time because I'm mainly playing with them (talk about cementing your status as the 'cool uncle' =) ).

The bottom line is that I have found that the older you get, the less time you have to play all the awesome games that are out there. Somewhat sad.

October 31, 2008 | Unregistered Commenterlawman30

@MacBethy: Wolfengurd - Chaos

I do not know HOW I left out Left 4 Dead. I also love the Prince of Persia games, so the new PoP has me excited as well.

Lawman30 - Just wait until we are old enough to retire. Forget golf, we can just play all those epic titles we missed.

October 31, 2008 | Unregistered CommenteriTZKooPA

to andrew

check out www.imdb.com/title/tt0246578/fullcredits for your answer. (which is yes by the way!)

October 31, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterDrstealth

Im sad to say Grand Theft Auto 4 has been collecting dust on my shelf for a while. What can I say, I love WoW. I have been playing Fable 2 a bit though recently.

October 31, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterAllenok

nice post. How are u finding WAR?

October 31, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterValadras

I have been a gamer since pencil and paper days, and being a girl gaming geek in those days did not score me any points, let me tell you.

I did all the stuff 'the boys' were supposed to do, including collecting comics, I just love graphics. BUT I also loved reading.

Had a Commodore 64, and believe it or not, rocked some games on that, along with the Atari and other various consoles.

Now, as a Mom, we have the Wii, a PS2 and working on getting the PS3, and three PCs. There are very few titles I have not tried in the PC on-line gaming family. As for the console games, Anything Spyro, got a gameboy advanced just to play one of the titles. Love Kirby and fun titles. We get mostly games to play with the kids... (and nothing with too much jumping, I totally suck at jumping in games, never watch me play Mario..... it is hysterically sad... and driving, yeah, I don't do those well, either.)

BUT, time is definitely a commodity. I took a year and three months off of WoW, I had played since beta of the old world. Tried a lot of on-line games in the meantime, but they aren't WoW. And now, I am back into the game. The expac is going to prove to be a huge time sync for me already, as I have not touched the Wii in weeks, gearing up and re-learning my class with all the changes that have happened. I have to write down schedules for myself, and stick to them, but man, there is a part of me that just wants to shut-in for two weeks..... *sighs* Sometimes being responsible is not what it is cracked up to be!

October 31, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterDrkSiren

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