Ok this is in response to the article posted on gamespot http://www.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/worldofwarcraft/news.html?sid=6162382 claiming 12% of mmogamers are addicts.My response ended up so long I figured id blog it. My personal thoughts is that some games are more addictive than drugs, (i've even seen people use stuff like speed to stay on games for longer periods of time) and this article really understates the situation.

12 percent, lol. I doubt its that low. Lets see various factors to consider.
#1. Whod they quesion?
#2. What games did they actually play? #3. How many were in denial or wernt willing to admit stuff? Im guessing a lot.

The most popular, henceforth more likely in a majority of those studied would be WoW, which ill later do some comparisons with. (still in question who all was questioned) Im guessing they included fps games etc. basically all online games calling them, or implying in the article for flare mass multiplayer. Which as we know have less addictive elements but again were lacking info. What we have here is "One in nine MMOG players addicted" Followed up by "Poll of 7,000 online gamers" Another quote from within the article "concerned principally with the potential for addiction to online gaming." and I could quote more. Clearly a misleading inaccurate A.Title or B.Article. Again lacking greatly in key information about test subjects which would include graphs and stats based on games as well as other factors. (Just an article with flare for the readers?)

Ok now putting all that aside. First we take addictive factors, loss, gain, effort, difficulty, need for companionship. (When someone feels a sense of gain or accomplishment it increases chemical levels in the brain causing addiction) Thus showing that harder games with more to gain and loose will ultimatley be more addictive assuming the player is able to get past the initial stages.

Now lets take 2 games and compare (mmorpgs)
World of Warcraft: Level limit:60, Time to get there:Low, Loss resulting from death:low, Fighting difficulty:Low, PK Limits:many, sense of accomplishments when gaining various:Low. Companionship (as with all or most mmorpgs high)

Tibia: Level Limit:None, Time to get there:Infinite, Loss resulting from death:high Fighting difficulty:High, PK limits:none, Sense of accomplishments when gaining various things:High, Companionship: Due to the pking gain/loss nature of the game etc. the game causes people to bond and extremely quickly into groups so Extremely high.

Ok I played tibia. Ive seen very very few who are able to quit and a majority are honestly addicted badly. I even saw a ton get WoW when it came out, play it a less than a month get lvl 60 and run back to tibia saying how boring WoW is. Other than people whos 1st or one of few games is WoW I see WoW players game hop all the time, its simply not an extremely addictive game by nature, from what ive seen the majority case in WoW is companionship based. The fact is this study cannot be accurate in a generalization.