You Begin Casting Lawsuit.... It Fizzles!

Massivly Multiplayer Online (MMO) games, while exploding in popularity, are also gather critics. By critics, I mean angry spouses. Their player bases are famous for doing little but slaving away, killing monster after repetitive monster, slowing grinding away at that elusive progress bar. Everything else is placed on hold, be it feeding or bathing, in pursuit of "just one more level". Or so they say.

Enter Craig Smallwood, who, after five years of a crippling addiction to the mmo Lineage II, was left a hollow shell of a man who was “unable to function independently in usual daily activities such as getting up, getting dressed, bathing or communicating with family and friends". For having his life stolen from him, he has filed suit against he creators of Lineage II, NCsoft for making their game too addictive, and not warning people of the dangers of their product.

Of the millions of people who play these games every day, only a small fraction experience problems that affect their daily lives. These issues are not caused by the games, but by something else. If someone becomes cloistered from normal social contact, the game only brings out their issue, instead of creating it. Dependancies and addictions are the result of a lack. No one ever became an alcoholic without a reason to drink. 

Yet, mmo's are some of the most manipulative games ever made. They are meticulously constructed Skinner Boxes, giving the player just enough food pellets to keep them shelling out for their monthly subscription. There's always something more to grasp, some new shiny sword to randomly appear in a treasure chest. The player is never allowed to be completely satiated, lest he cancel his subscription and play something else. 

Yet, even with this manipulation, mmo's are not drugs. They're not far removed from a well-paced hollywood thriller, with a diverse cast crafted to appeal to targeted demographics. We are not the malleable victims that lawyers would have us think. We do not purchase everything we see in advertisements, and we do not repeat every action we see on tv. We are more then mindless consumers, but reasoning people who can control their actions.

There's more to the story then what first fills the ear. When you dig deeper into the suit that Smallwood filed, you'll find that he was involved in trading in-game money for real-world money, a practice that was strictly forbidden by NCsoft. As a result, half his accounts where banned. That couldn't have anything to do with it, could it? Nah....

Besides, Lineage II sucks.