I haven’t watched South Park in about 8 years, but last night I was flipping through channels and stopped dead on what I thought was some sort of game demo.
Turns out it was a South Park episode all about the game “World of Warcraft” and since I know some Crack Team members are into this, I had to watch it. Much of the episode includes actual gameplay.
The story line goes: There is this high level player going around killing characters for no reason. I guess that normally characters have to accept a duel before risking their characters’ lives? Well this guy is such a high level that he overrides this rule.
The staff at Blizzard Entertainment is worried because the guy can “kill” administrators’ characters, so even they can’t stop him.
Cartman and the gang figure that if they spend every waking hour for months on end (in hiding) they might reach a level high enough for the four of them to defeat him.
Can the gang of four, with the help of Stan’s dad(a noob) and Blizzard’s banned “Sword of a Thousand Truths”, defeat the serial killer?
Quotes from the show:
Blizzard staff: What kind of person would do this?
Blizzard President: Only one kind. Whoever this player is, he has played World of Warcraft nearly every hour of every day for the past year and a half. Gentlemen, we are dealing with someone here who… had absolutely no life.
Blizzard staff: How do you kill… that which has no life?
[think about that for a minute]
Blizzard staff: There are over seven million people who log on to World of Warcraft! Are you telling me all those people’s characters are going to die, and there’s nothing we can do to save them?
Blizzard President: Yes. And it won’t be long before everyone gets really really frustrated and stops playing altogether. Gentlemen, this could very well lead to the end of the World…… (of Warcraft).
Cartman:[Trying to convince others to join his cause.] If you had a chance right now to go back in time and stop Hitler, wouldn’t you do it? I mean, I personally wouldn’t stop him because I think he was awesome, but you would, right?
Yes, MasterChief, Assassin, and I have been talking about this one, we thought it was awesome. And it’s great to hear an outsider’s take on this.
The very first scene hit home, where Stan is completely disrespectful to his father (calls him an r-tard) because he’s interrupting game play. And worse, suggesting he stop gaming to go outside with his friends. This was a pretty accurate portrayal of my video game addiction, and apologies to friends and family members (esp. Hulagun) who did nothing to offend me but call me during game play.
Personally, I set a hard and fast rule that I would always accept invitations for socializing, e.g., movies, dinner, etc. with friends. Even if I didn’t want to, I forced myself. I also took care of minor stuff like eating before I started playing, since I knew once I started the game I was out for the night. This is what we call a functional addict.
BTW, I don’t know anyone else who made that rule.
Thankfully, the game just got boring on it’s own for me, although it took longer than any other game in my history. The social aspect is brilliant, you feel like you’re letting people down by quitting the game.
And I’m getting ready to get back into it when Neverwinter Nights 2 comes out at the end of the month! At least I never played online with that one.