To preface, this post isn’t a bash on gaming. I’ve been gaming since I was 3 years old on the NES. It was (and still is) a part of my life. That said, while I turned out ok in the end, I would play games every free moment I had. I’ve spent thousands of hours in World of Warcraft during the TBC-WotLK era. My pattern would be school-home-eat while playing wow-sleep thinking of wow-repeat. My whole social circle formed around WoW and LoL/dota2 later. I would often listen to music while playing. Of course, we grew up and we became distant over time. I more or less ended up with barely any friends.
I don’t play games much nowadays because it’s simply better for my own mental health. I still play but with a lot more moderation - occasionally booting my PS2 or playing a run or two of Binding of Isaac. Most of my free time goes towards creative hobbies.
15 years later, whenever I hear music from that time, I get jittery and think about the fun I had in wow. I’ve fallen into that trap. Private servers galore, I used to play in them back then too, they’ve gotten even better since then. I start playing, ditch all my other hobbies, go out only for work, and in the end not have fun at all, and spiral into depression. The itch barely gets scratched. This cycle has been repeating over and over. I don’t want it to happen again and I just got the jitters again.
I don’t want to stop listening to music I like just because monkey brain associates it with WoW.
Are you sure you are addicted? I’m sorry, but to me it seems like you only have a problem with games that are deliberately designed to be addictive (WoW is basically a giant Skinner box, no wonder). In that case you would be just as susceptible to lots of things: like infinite-scrolling feeds on social networks, or recommendation algorithms on TikTok and YT.
Maybe if you find a way to filter out games that exploit your psyche for engagement, there will be a way to enjoy your very clearly beloved hobby in a healthy way?
Also, have you talked to a professional?
Yeah it sounds to me like OP could get on fine if they restricted themselves to games where you pay once and get the whole game. No subscriptions, no microtransactions, no DLC. Also it might have been a mistake for OP to ask a gaming community about this
Have you considered therapy?
this is probably the best answer imo. This does sound like genuine addiction, and OP’s best bet might just be to work with a therapist on breaking the loop that makes gaming such a honey trap for them.
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I actually agree with you but the mental health communities on Lemmy haven’t caught up yet, and I figured one could find more people here that could relate.
Yeah it’s like if they were asking for recovering alcoholism problems in the beer community
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It sounds like you know the best solution for it… but it’s painful to implement.
You either have it be able to listen to the music without it triggering you, or avoid that trigger. I don’t really know if there’s a third option.
That said it sounds like you might benefit from actual professional consultation on this issue. Therapy is quite common when overcoming strong addictions. Maybe a councilor can give you some additional insight into other solutions.
Here’s my advice as someone that quit drinking about 6 years ago due to my inability to drink responsibly.
Do you want to quit? If you feel like you can’t handle playing a game in moderation, maybe it’s time to think about quitting it entirely. If you feel like playing other genres of games will eventually draw you back into playing more addictive games like WoW, then you could think about quitting that too, it’s up to you. If certain music makes you think about playing WoW and you can’t control yourself if you listen to it , make a sacrifice and don’t listen to it. I avoided bars for years and still don’t really love being around when people are drinking. The sacrifices I make are well worth it though and I’m much much happier as a result.
Have a long, honest conversation with yourself about what you want from life and how video games fit into it. That’s what I did with alcohol and realized I didn’t want to waste my life on stupid shit any more and decided to quit.
Play Skyrim instead of wow, or something other than an MMO. Most mmos are literally designed to do that to you. Hell most mmos now days won’t reward you unless you play them like that. Don’t play MMOs. Single players are great for just 30 min sessions whenever the hobby gets boring. I recommend Dave the diver.
Great points.
To add for OP: I’ve found that I can scratch the “play and progress with friends” itch with games like Torchlight II, which doesn’t have the same kind of addiction triggers.
Sorry to hear about this mate. As someone else mentioned, perhaps it’s the type of game you play? I enjoy gaming and can moderate fine. However, recently started playing Overwatch (hey another Blizzard game) and noticed I got addicted. Couldn’t stop playing, thought about it a lot, etc. Reminded me of being addicted to alcohol or other drugs.
I quit playing OW2, and the urges to play started to get easier, and I enjoy gaming again.
This is exactly what I’m doing right now. I play a game that I can play for 2 hours daily max and it’s fine, I can do without it easily. I also fell into the OW2 trap and I became unbearable to the people around me.
I feel like I didn’t word myself properly because I haven’t played WoW or any of the “problematic” games for 6 months now. I managed to keep myself occupied with cross stitching and books. It’s when I see footage/hear music that I get these feelings of wanting to play again.
I also fell into the OW2 trap and I became unbearable to the people around me.
Exactly this. I became grumpy and angry, couldn’t stop “because I just have to win once” and felt like an addict. It’s a very similar feeling to alcohol which I quit 5 years ago.
Take care. Good on you for managing it with other hobbies!
I’ve found diving deep into retrogames is great for my similar situation.
Games from the 80s, 90s and even some from the 00s are often designed to be played in much shorter play sessions.
I had something similar with everquest.
Hadn’t played it for decades but it still had a deep hold on my soul.
Found a server with gentler rules, worked my way up to a decent level very quickly, felt so good, that monkey is off my back for good.
Random thoughts:
Cheat, in the worst kind of way—Full god mode, BFG with unlimited ammo, etc. That can ruin a game pretty easily when there’s no challenge and the story might not be new or interesting. Might lead to boredom and wanting to do something else.
Play games you don’t like much and can only stand to play in small increments.
Play casual, relaxing games like Dorfromantik that you can quit playing easily after a round or two.
Get into game design. Make your own game so you’re creating something that you can share with others. It’s still related to your gaming interests, but could be more productive.
Make friends with someone or a group of people who have a different hobby in common so you have a reason to socialize that doesn’t drag you back to playing games.
Make a bucket list and start pursuing one of the items on the list like writing a novel or painting a landscape or building something practical.
Set time limits for your gaming and force yourself to do something else that doesn’t allow for gaming, even something simple like taking a walk without a gaming device. Make gaming a reward for being responsible rather than an addictive obligation. Focus on learning to appreciate delayed gratification.
