Op-Ed

A Day in the Life of a WoW Addict

Alarm clock goes off; hit snooze. Repeat five times.

On the sixth alarm, push husband out of bed.

Go back to sleep.

Twenty minutes later, husband comes in to say goodbye. Wish him a good day as he goes off to work.

Get out of bed, get dressed, settle down with laptop in lap.

Check deadlines in appointment book. Closest deadline is two days out.

Hold inner debate – to login, not to login.

"To login" wins and is justified, as I check for successful Auction House sales. Three hours later, my level 263 jewelcrafting mage is no longer a jewelcrafter, but an herbalist with a skill of 137 and rising.

Hi. My name is Stacey, and I am a World of Warcraft addict.

When I sat down to write about my rise to gamer status, I began to wonder how much of an impact WoW has really had on me. In order to answer the question, I did what any logical person would do: I logged onto the game, every single character, to check my "/play" time. While I was there, I may have put a few things up for sale in the Auction House.

The tally on all my characters is a staggering 4,018 hours. That's 167 full days of play time over three years. My played time is the equivalent of nearly 1.5 years' worth of sleep, if I was to sleep a full eight hours every night.

Well, that's a reality check.

And what have I gotten from this time invested? More than 4,000 hours has led to three level 70 characters; a passel of alts; backup characters on different servers for when Dalaran is down; a spot in the best guild on the server for a year and a half; and the opportunity for real-life interaction with people I've befriended in game, including drunken buffoonery in Massachusetts and meeting guildies when my husband and I were honeymooning in England. Time spent in-game has led to blues and purples, professions, countless hours herbing, grinding, frustration, excitement, elation, laughs and stories that are only humorous to the WoW-set.

I do get scared when I write that. I've been living partially in a game for the past three years. I've never spent that much time doing anything, let alone playing one game. Even when I'm not in the game, part of me is indeed still there. When my husband and I go out for dinner or a drink, WoW is often a main topic of conversation. Yes, he plays too.