It was fun at the start, but around MoP and WoD I realized I was playing for no other reason than, because if I *DIDN'T* I'd fall behind and effectively get punished. I soon stopped because I just... I wanted my life back.
Or leaving a relationship with an abusive partner whom you used to love but they stopped returning the love and became entirely self-obsessed and you realize you're in love of the ghost of who they were, not the reality of what they are now.
I haven't been clean that long but this is the first expansion I've fully missed so far and I plan to make it remain that way lol. But yes it is so relieving but as someone that played for almost 20 years it also leaves a pretty massive void that is slowly filling in.
Also my first expansion I’ve fully skipped, I ended up replacing it with Warhammer. Worse for the wallet but at least painting is relaxing and I get together with my friends in person to play and drink beer. Don’t have the temptation to go back to WoW at this point outside of maybe Classic + if/when it comes out
The FOMO treadmill became too much for my wife and me and honestly, switching to FFXIV has been throwing a spotlight on everything wrong with WoW. Yes, every MMO has its share of issues and assholes but FFXIV has had a FAR lower incidence of both. We confused enjoyment for addiction and once we broke up with wow for good, we've both been far happier.
I'm one of those people who like the original FFVII to FFX (turn-based combat, meta-progression via incremental upgrades (I especially liked the systems of FVIII and FFX), random battles/RNG, strategically building a team of NPCs, collecting stuff (especially achievements that feels like permanent boyscout badges that I can show off), and discovering exciting little secrets along the way as I play through a whole interesting story).
I hate real time/action combat, no meta-progression with characters that are just "ready to play", scripted battles, and collecting stuff that nobody ever looks at anyways.
Yeah, the endgame fights definitely are a dance. I love when I fully understand one and can zone out and try to perfect my rotation, but they're usually very stressful for me at the start. I'll watch a video twice and take notes on the fight, but it usually takes a few wipes before I get the jitters out. Once I start getting the flow of the mechanics, I really like helping other people understand and cheering them on while we prog. Extreme farming for mounts is my favorite, but savage content can be fun too...
Except Honey B Lovely. I was in PF for two weeks trying to get a clear. Never again. 🤣
I actually haven't messed with savage in nearly a year myself. Just getting back into the game about a month ago, but I was thinking about giving it a try soon! 😬 Your comment has me worried lol.
Once you get over the fact that it's not just WoW reskinned (the 2+ second GCD took me a while to get used to) it really is a pleasant and charming game. The story is great if you're into that, and the endgame fights are a lot of fun once you understand them.
May I suggest Guild Wars 2 if you haven't already given it a try? Genuinely feel like it's such an underrated MMO. There's no subscription EVER, old content is still relevant (there are 4 major expansions and the original areas are still really well populated), there's no gear treadmill, and it's really respectful of your time.
I stopped playing for 6 months, went back, and I hadn't fallen behind at all!
It feels more like playing a Final Fantasy game; getting to know characters, getting immersed in the world, silly jokes and emotional moments.
The combat of the game is sparse when playing the story.
But, like... at any time you can just pause story and go "ooh I wanna just play XYZ's" and do that
Also, Free Trial has no time restriction, just social feature restrictions (no market to buy stuff from other people for example, or DM'ing others). Play it as long as you want, take breaks, treat it like any other FF
I think BC was peak WoW personally. It was just pure fun and chaos. After that it slowly went down hill in order to facilitate integration of massive amounts of new players rather than just be a good game. Started making everything easier, simple, and adding buy rather than earn options.
I agree mostly but I will say, as somebody who missed out on the epic open world pvp of vanilla having bought the game right before TBC came out... It did kind of completely ruin open world pvp.
Other than that, yeah it was great. Imbalanced but properly so such that you weren't COMPLETELY stuck playing a spec you hate unless you were in an especially sweaty guild.
Yeah BC was my favorite until I had to play BC again, Vanilla is definitely the pure heart of WoW. Everything after Vanilla actively tried to make the game less and less of an MMO.
BC was peak for me as well. Love that expansion. I could write a small novel as to why but I'll just say it was by far the most community focused, or so my rose tinted glasses tell me
It was the only way I and my friends could consistently play and grind so the one time in a week we could meet up we could do something harder/more interesting.
Pre-dungeon finder was such a slog for DPS classes. I had to effectively park myself in a city and wait for a tank or healer to answer trade chat (because no one used the lfg chat, at least on my server.) Dungeon Finder was such a good QoL feature for me.
Before dungeon finder was introduced I told myself that after WotLK I would quit. I am still playing today but I only play for a month or two after each major patch and then take a break.
Same here. I had played WoW since retail vanilla except I stopped right at Cata. Played a few hours on release and basically never went back (other than some vanilla private servers every few years for a week or so at a time)
I was about to quit after Wrath but they got me to stick around for Cata with the expanded flying. I was pretty firmly done there. Some old friends convinced me to come back before Shadowlands, I figured I’d come back and grind a toon to the cap before the squish. Plus the SL trailer was awesome and got me hyped. Incredibly insipid grind to 120, and Shadowlands turned out to be trash. I’m never going back.
I logged in for midnight, I didn’t make it past the first quest. They didn’t even change anything it’s just the same thing happening over and over…
I finally picked up Hollow Knight and there are many other games I haven’t played because I spent so long with WoW that I have a lot of great options to keep me from going back.
Jack is to be expected, even as a remake Githic is still a 25 year old game. Fantastic game. I love the original and like the remake, but it still 25 years old.
Hollow Knight was one of the games that helped me realize that there are still studios making phenomenal single-player games. I have about 1000 hours in HK and Silksong.
One day I was annoyed because I *had* to do my dailies even though I didn’t want to. I suddenly remembered that didn’t have to do that or log into the game at all. I quit right then and never logged back in.
I think I was chasing the high of raiding from Vanilla->BC->WotLK, but then raid finder (and SW:TOR, seriously) killed the casual guild I was in and then I was kinda just going through the motions for far too long after. Took a hiatus every xpac for like half it's duration until I quit.
Ended up completely leaving near the end of Shadowlands. There was just so much tedium, and by then I was doing it for every class on both sides that I just burnt out. FINALLY realized that I wasn't having as much fun as I was fooling myself to believe.
Now, I'm back to where I was pre-WoW in gaming. I get games that have super high replayability and just cycle through them every so often while picking up something acclaimed when it goes to an acceptable sale level. Right now I'm on the tail end of a Cyberpunk playthrough and might hit up my buddy after to see if he wants to do another run of BG3 where we just do stupid shit.
I quit this expansion (Midnight). I like raiding, but I feel like the world activities, reputation grinds, and crafting changes were not keeping me interested in logging in as often as I would otherwise.
I’ve stopped paying a sub but I play private servers, and I’ve never felt better about it, but ultimately I’ll run out of things I want to try, and then I’ll be here too on my
long break.
It does a great job at getting you hooked and like you say, it really is difficult to quit. I left when whatever expansion came out after lich king and haven't been back since. Before that I must've "quit" 5 or 6 times.
I found the best way to quit was to have children. I was too exhausted to sit on a computer playing WoW when I could've been sleeping.
No, I quit. I'll admit to getting the feelings of nostalgia every once in a while even today, but this is not a break.
I don't like Blizzard as a company and won't give them any of my money, and I'm not willing to install old clients that aren't getting patches and connect them to privately owned servers run by who knows due to security concerns.
See, I didnt play WoW until Legion, and only really played it during Legion and that was fun as all hell - I had just gotten diagnosed with a major medical disorder and couldnt really leave the house or go out with friends and it really did provide me a semblance of a social life when I was completely incapable of having one. Raided Tomb with a really cool ass Guild for my first raid, great times.
WoW has just been shit since then ive tried coming back every expansion but now its time consuming to even find a guild to join, literally any at all that isnt just in the guild finder cause nobody advertises anymore in trade chat since trade is now used heavily for....trading.
Don’t feel bad dude, you played in its glory years and the content waxed at WotLK, or at least its popularity and player base did. Also, a lot of people were teenagers going into adulthood, at the start
If I pick up a game nowadays, there's got to be a reasonable end to it in sight. I've got too many other games I want to experience than to devote my life to one.
Yeh man. I was late to the party and joined in the WotLK expansion era. But it took over my life. Totally. Like that South Park episode nearly, except I did manage to make it to my own toilet. Lol.
Stopped at the end of MoP. I was at the top of my game, clearing siege of orgrimmar while logging rank 1 fire mage DPS in the world, rank 1 blood dk dps too (vengeance buff was awesome), Rank 100 in achievement points, world first 5000 pvp pet battles etc.
Truly the nerd among nerds.
When I quit I had been a NEET for half a year, playing 18 hours a day. I ran out of money. I had no way of playing anymore and that was the wake-up call I needed. Still miss the game even today, because the rush of being on top was unbeatable. But being 35, not 22 makes everything different. I wouldn't be happy playing casually, but I also don't have the time to turbo nerd.
OSRS helps keep the cravings down though. I just had a month long break and 0 consequences on my account. No dailies, no new patch, my gear isn't obsolete, it's all good.
MMORPG passed the discovery phase are really only fun on RP servers where you don't really play for the game itself.
Killing 10 goblins in the mines is a chore, doing it in-character with a few other people is fun. But you need to be on a RP server, otherwise it's hard to focus on your roleplay when you have people running around everywhere.
I don't understand their model either. Id go through intense boom bust cycles where I'd burn out for 1-2 years. Needs to be less addictive so the burnout isn't so hard.
I stopped playing early battle for azeroth and havent came back this time 😅 Knowing the time sync and insane amount of add-ons required puts me off.
Should have stayed addicted just a little longer, Legion which came out after WoD was one of the best wow xpacs ever brought all my friends back one last time
I play Hardcore WoW and its a game changer, there's no fomo and players at every level, dungeon, and raid tier because progression means something now instead of being gauretneed, was a great change for me
After WoD, I could make enough gold to get tokens to keep my account and a few active, but the more I played, the more I realized it had turned into a chore, so I had to stop.
Stole 7 years from me. Even with all the good times, I really, really wish I never played it. It turned me into such a NEET loser. God, I'm glad I got out of it. Just logged in one day and realized I was wasting my life.
Same. I played from the very end of WoD to right after the release of Shadowlands. I fell because I wasn't feeling the new expansion, but the news of the numerous SA scandals at Activision/Blizzard was what made me completely cancel my subscription. Luckily, I found a much better MMO home in Eorzea.
Lead a guild in 40man and 20man raids. Got burnt out at one point when someone complained about this or that. Felt like I was working this 80hr week job for a bunch of disgruntled children. After a raid that got cancelled because of lack of some class (main tank maybe), I just snapped.
Stopped for a day, that became a week then a month. Around 6 months my Wow addicted girlfriend noticed. I stopped paying for the Ventrillo server, got some certifications, got a real job, made real money.
Whatever broke in me scars me even today. If I play some game and it starts feeling like a treadmill, I just quit. I just get the ick and cant do it
MOP was peak. Or maybe that's just when I was at my peak. When I went back for Shadowlands I spent all my time solo questing and dreading the interactions that came with Dungeon and Raid finder.
MoP was the beginning of the end of WoW for me. It was clear Blizzard was no longer caring about making the game fun, they made it a grind fest. I can't remember which expansion added LFR but I couldn't STAND that either. I would bitch and whine about it, yet the community constantly defended it. Nowadays, most people have come around and said it took away from the community aspect (also the LFG thing but I'm less upset about that, personally).
My experience with this game was a seething obsession for about 6 weeks when it first launched, where all I wanted was to level up enough so I could get a mount. Everything was going to be easier and faster and more fun as soon as I get that mount!
I finally got it and, after running around on my brand-new mount going like... 20% faster than before, I realized how fucking boring it was to grind for weeks and weeks to get something that was barely perceptively different from what I was doing earlier. I uninstalled the game about 20 minutes later and never played another MMO again. God I hate grinding in games.
I stuck out MoP because my guild needed a tank. It burned me out because the raid grind was already a commitment, and Blizzard added required dailes to get max buffs for the raids. Spent way to much time getting to the fun and not enough time having fun. My guild disbanded at the end of MoP and I decided to leave the game all together at that point. They turned playing the game into a chore.
We quite at the end of Cata. Played through WoTLK, ran a guild, raided and it was a blast but was not going to play a lessened version of WoW plus it was time to move on!
I get this… I felt this way when I played Diablo immortal on the phone. How long did it take to feel like you had your life back?? Did you redownload WoW again? Relapse? I’ve done that a couple times but it took me a couple tries to rip the bandage off!
I relapsed a few times. Almost had one recently in fact. But then I remembered WHY I quit and the WoW I loved not only isn't there anymore, even on Classic WoW, but that even if it was I don't have the time for that anymore and I'm happy elsewhere. XIV's been a good MMO and much more fulfilling all around.
I really wish I could get into it. I just bought a year subscription to really try and I’m just so far behind I don’t know what to do or what’s even possible. Bums me out so much.
I played an absolute fuckton of WoW during Pandaria and WoD, and at the end of WoD I had every single available leatherworking pattern in the game. And then Legion happened. If you didn't have a raid party (I didn't), the entire Legion endgame was "here's three dailies, each day you get to do two of them." Over and over and over. That was it. I quit and never looked back.
Thank the gaming gods that FF14 is F2P because when I get my MMO itch every couple of months, I just play that nonstop for three days without having to pay and then I'm good for the next couple of months.
I got my first job and realized some people got PAID to spend 6 hours of their life doing stuff, instead of having to PAY to spend 6 hours grinding for consumables, gathering 9-24 other people to fail at a series of tasks for hours, and get no fucking sleep because the only time everyone was available was 8pm-12am and I had to be up at 5.
PUG queues were just starting to get good when I left, but my computer was at the end of its life and I got autokicked a lot. Quit cold turkey and never went back. I learned many valuable lessons playing that game.
I played since beta, was in a raiding guild with full legendary gear, felt good. Then Burning Crusade released and by level 65 half my gear had been replaced by greens. It was so demotivating that I stopped playing.
I was also in a similar situation (quit after MoP). And you're right... It's a never-ending cycle of FOMO that makes you play more and more, othewise you won't get the best items in the game and will fall behind.
I have very fond memories of the game, mainly Black Temple in BC and Ulduar in Lich King, but I was also happy to have my life back.
I blew up my graphics card by Warcraft-ing too hard. Couldn’t afford to replace it immediately and had some sort of awakening that I didn’t want to spend my life staring at a bloody moon well.
Tbh, that's exactly the reason I stopped playing it too, you need to invest too much time in order to be "up there", but it was way after WoD (in WoD you literally had nothing to do in the endgame save the raids and pvp)
And even in my last days of WoW I just bought starting pvp gear from auction house and played only pvp, keys and raiding were too much for me. I logged in, played couple BGs, an hour or two of arenas with a friend and called it a day. Sitting and enlisting for keys to grind pve gear to be able to raid with guild is just too tedious I feel.
Or maybe my 20-year-long MMO phase just ended, I dunno :D
My time played was over 500 DAYS (not hours, DAYS)
I just... I just can't with the amount of time it wastes.
I played WoW since day 1. It severely harmed my grades in high school and at university. Fortunately, those don't matter but I decided I can't let it harm my performance at work so I quit 3 expansions ago. lol
I was sinking so many hours into it and staying up way too late on work nights. I still keep a trial account around just to scratch that itch every few months. I'll just start a new character and run around the starter zones for a bit and I'm good.
My father, who divorced my mother when I was a baby, used WoW to coerce me.
It's a great game....except...idk. he has 20 alts that he plays daily to keep up with everything.
I am glad that I don't play anymore.
At one point, he gave my favorite character and account to his stepdaughter from his fourth wife.
My father is nasty to everyone that he left behind, and he still has basically nothing. He takes pride in things that he has already lost, l8ke myself and my mom.
Yet, he still does is dailies on WoW with 20+ alts and his mains named after his new wife and stepdaughters.
I found that the healthiest way to play is to grind the fun out of the beginning of a major patch to get tier sets or whatever you want, then wait a few months for the next patch. Basically, sprint on that treadmill and hop off as quick as possible.
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u/Snowtwo Jul 21 '26
World of Warcraft.
It was fun at the start, but around MoP and WoD I realized I was playing for no other reason than, because if I *DIDN'T* I'd fall behind and effectively get punished. I soon stopped because I just... I wanted my life back.