Wedding Woes: The Dark Side of WoW

[Capper]

Although best-selling online role-playing game World of Warcraft boasts over ten million subscribers, it's also leaving in its wake an increasing list of casualties.

Even though she's never played the game, 28 year-old Jocelyn is one of the fallen. A well-spoken California resident, she divorced her husband of six years after he developed a crippling addiction to the smash online RPG.

"He would get home from work at 6:00, start playing at 6:30, and he'd play until three a.m. Weekends were worse -- it was from morning straight through until the middle of the night," she told Yahoo! Games in an interview. "It took away all of our time that we spent together. I ceased to exist in his life."

Jocelyn had been friends with her ex-husband Peter since the age of 13, but it took only nine months for her marriage to collapse.

"I bought the game for him for Christmas 2004, when it first came out. By May we had our first serious discussion about where our marriage was going, and by September I had moved out," she said.

Jocelyn recalled one particular incident that was typical of Peter's habits. "I had set aside 30 minutes for us to watch a television show together, and he couldn't. He was stuck on a raid, and completely failed to understand why I was upset," she said.

Peter's domestic duties also suffered. He stopped paying bills, she says, and refused to do his share of the housework.

Jocelyn doesn't hesitate to cite Warcraft as the main reason for her divorce and remains emotional about its impact on her marriage. "I'm real, and you're giving me up for a fantasy land. You're destroying your life, your six-year marriage, and you're giving it up for something that isn't even real."

Despite their differences, the couple remains friends, and although Peter still plays World of Warcraft, Jocelyn says he made an effort to cut down after their split.

Wedding Woes: The Dark Side of Warcraft

[oldman_gamer]

Atleast I pay the cable and electric

[garetjax]

Primary way to combat divorce when playing copious amounts of WoW: make sure your spouse plays with you.

[Capper]

I'm sure you meant "Plays the game with you".

[Zambini]

News Alert: Blizzard has announced a new expansion to Burning Colon--... erm..... I mean Crusade
It is being released this July. WoW: Bane of Humanity.

[Capper]

hahahahahah

[screwballl]

Originally Posted by Capper

I'm sure you meant "Plays the game with you".

it works either way

[polobunny]

In garet's case maybe playing with him would make his wife suffer more than playing Warcraft...
j/k man. :P

Makes me think of those kids that are close to dying for playing video games 1 week straight without sleep. Those creeps freak me out. And I thought I was bad for a few times staying 6ish hours playing Final Fantasy in boxers on weekend.

[XoRn]

Totally went about that the wrong way. She should have picked up a copy of WoW herself and played the free month with him. I play (or used to, I'm more casual with it now) from midnight to about 6 am every night with a friend I used to work with. My faincee still works with this friend but was none the less a little annoyed by how much we play so I let her start a toon herself and she had a blast. Once we get a new PC up and running for her, shes going to be joining us now. Now I only play a couple of hours a night, maybe every other night at most.

[screwballl]

if it is anything like my wife, she is just not into games at all except some of those basic Yahoo games.