My gaming addiction…

See that little statue? That represents ten years of my life. Ten years of my gaming life! Yes, I confess I was a World of Warcraft nerd. I played almost every day and logged nearly 200k pvp kills. Before that I played Dark Age of Camelot, before that it was Ultima Online, Everquest, Quake 3 Arena, Quake 2 DM, Quake 1, Doom 1, 2, 3, and finally, Wolfenstein. Granted before that, there were the console games! Too many to list but to name a few of my faves were, Castlevania, Faxanadu, Rygar, Act Raiser II, and Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo, Tomb Raider 1, 2, and 3.

That’s a ton of time.

Wow, what was I thinking? Well to be honest it was entertaining more so than television. A lot of people do not understand that. They’ll watch television for hours upon hours and then call you weird for spending two hours gaming. I say there is no difference. How many sports guys are out there that will spend all of Saturday watching college football and then all of Sunday watching the NFL but call a gamer an idiot for spending his time otherwise?
I gave up gaming to a large degree, because I wanted to become an author and I was doing fine, just a few G-Rift runs in Diablo 3 every so often to slake my gaming lust. That whirlwind barbarian mowing down foe after foe, gold spilling faster than blood and loot dropping like rain.

Bul-Kathos guides my hand!

Then after that was done it was back to writing! The thing is…I heard about this game called Witcher 3. Although, I had never even heard of Witcher 1 and 2, let alone 3, I was told 3 was the gold standard of gaming. So, I checked it out. It looked fairly typical to me, sword and sorcery. Woo boy was I wrong! That game is immersive! I am on my fourth play-through but still, from the time I discovered Witcher 3, I had already published one book, (Yes, I am an author!) and was on my way to publishing my novella after beating the game once already. It’s not affecting me too much 🙂

(That view of the city below…)

It’s not as addictive as World of Warcraft and that is because there is no pvp. (For you non-nerds “pvp” means player versus player. World of Warcraft offers this in arenas and battlegrounds and I cannot resist pitting myself against my fellow gamers.)
I love spending time in the Witcher world, it’s a beautiful game with a great environment. Yeah not as great as when I went to Ireland! Nothing beats the real thing. (Tangent coming)

We stayed in a BnB near Durty Nellys, est 1620, and ate there twice! Yes, a real medieval pub, beside a real medieval castle! Bunratty Castle in Ireland is amazing. Talk about geeking out! Here I was sitting in the same pub that Irish knights probably sat and ate at, listening to Whiskey in the Jar played on a fiddle and banjo. It gave me a good feel for what it must have been like back in those long-ago days.

What are you favorite games and gaming addictions? I want to know.

Cheers!

Mike

Gonna leave you with this. Wow!

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