A few weekends ago, I got a “free weekend” of play from the online game “City of Heroes.” The game, if you’ve never played it, is one of those “Massive Multi-Player Online Role-Playing Games,” where you sign on, create a character and go online to fight battles with and against other online players from around the world.
I admit that it’s heaps of fun. You can create any sort of superhero you want. You can wander around a huge virtual city battling crime and exploring the games’ nooks and crannies.
Over time, you’re character gets better and better. Or, if you’re so inclined, you can just shelve a character you’re bored with and start a brand-new one.
Anyway, I subscribed to the game for about a year a while back, and I did have lots of fun.
But you know what, I also wasted a lot of time. Tons of time. It was like I was in a state of suspended animation during that period.
Now, many months after I dropped my subscription, I’m glad I’m not playing it “full time.”
This blog, for example, wouldn’t have ever come about if I still was playing “City of Heroes.” While this wastes some of my time — maybe too much of my time — at the very least it’s a bit more creative than playing a video game. It gets my mind working.
If the folks at NCSoft, the game’s creators, want to offer me another free weekend, I’ll probably take it, but I don’t think I’ll ever become a subscriber again — I’ve just got too much to do to be living in a fantasy world.
Instead, I’d rather be creating my own.
Leave a Reply