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Erm multitasking... playing arena and working at the same time, talking on and off vent.. Iunno stuff like that, comm skills improve, you learn types of people n stuff on the net...Kinda usefull, but iunno. Sometimes i wish there was something else to do :S
My typing skills have improved immensely by playing WoW. This was mainly through raiding and responding to PuGs in /trade. I've also learnt to be diplomatic, and to work as part of a team.
I totally agree with all of this.Sure we are getting better at a game, but what aspects of ourselves are we improving as well? We are still using our senses and minds to solve problems and work towards a goal. Something is improving.If only people can feel the same about tabletop RPG's.
I play WoW with my sons and not only have we learned collaboration with other players, patience, persistence and optimization skills (picking gear, attack rotations, etc.) there are other benefits as well.My sons occasionally make assumptions about how things work, and WoW has proved to be a great laboratory to teaching rational thinking and using the scientific method. Example - one of my sons was convinced that wearing a particular ring seemed to increase his probability of getting good loot. I suggested he keep track and prove it to which he replied "You're only trying to prove I'm wrong!" I convinced him that I had no stake in correctness, but that it would be interesting to really determine one way or the other. Well as you might guess, it made no difference. Being a game player myself since Pong, and being a manager who hires software folks now, my personal opinion is gamers often make the most collaborative, inventive contributors to teams. But perhaps I'm biased. :)
my inglish haz impruvd sins i start play wow !No really, I'm a much better English speaker & listener than I used to be.I also learned how to be patientand kind with other people. Oh come on you &$^%$&* idiot druid , heal me ffs ! *&%$&$&(% priest rogue comps !
My whole family plays WoW. My oldest daughter was first, then my husband, then my youngest daughter and myself. We homeschool, and my youngest daughter (she was 8 when she began playing) was a VERY reluctant reader. Playing WoW dramatically improved her reading ability. So, thanks for that, Blizzard! :)
People are telling me: "You are sitting in front of monitor whole day, why dont you do something useful?"Heh, whut?As somebody said before: WoW improves team-play, focus and so on. But the biggest improvement for me is English. I used to be good at it on primary school, but they were teaching us alphabet. :XNow I am nearly the best in my class only by playing WoW, attending guild raids and talking on ventrilo. I know that when I travel abroad, I wont use words like two-hand sword, mail armour or bloodlust, but I will be able to at least understand people. (tankspot videos without subtitles teached me a lot too ^^)So dont sit whole day on your butt, sit there only half a day and it will be fine. :-PBtw I dont like watching sports... What can you change? It will happen somehow and you can do nothing, just watch. I like doing things by myself ;-)
The OP touched on everything of what I'll write, but hopefully I'll be able to add something.I suspect convenience and comfort plays a big part in why people continue to play video games as they grow up these days, as opposed to sports. To continue to do sports as an adult requires far more time and effort to get around to the actual activity than video games do - for many sports you need special equipment and for even more specific places to be which you need to buy / maintain and get to at regular times respectively.Very few people (that are relevant to this discussion) do not have a computer at home already even though many of them might not have played video games much as a kid nor later, so the means to play video games will be standing there when you get home from work / studies / whatever. Sports? Go root through your drawers to dig out your sports clothes, find the racket or whatever the particular sport demands in the most deeply buried cupboard you have, pack everything into a bag, get into your car / take the public transport, go to the court / track / field, change into your sports gear, set up the necessary equipment and organise yourselves. Now you can get playing for an hour or two. Then do everything mentioned previously in reverse when you're done.Video games are always available with almost no effort or planning required where team sports absolutely rely on a majority of the people involved in that particular team or group to have done everything described above and be there for a minimum time for them to be able to play at a meaningful level (apart from such activities that can still be classed as sports while being solitary such as the mentioned mountain climbing, but most of those still requires the same or even more time spent on getting to the activity itself as other sports). Sports players also don't have access to the "pool" of people available for group activities that MMOs have, f.e., nor is any such realistically possible to recreate for any real life activity to any larger extent than sports leagues and the like.The third party challenge point is well made, but I'd like to point out that while not common it's certainly possible outside of computers. Almost any sort of education can provide a third party challenge in problem solution by group, as can the kind of team building exercises you'd get at a company outing for such purpose. They just require a lot more effort to set up and get to and certainly more effort being made a meaningful group activity in comparison to what people are normally doing in an MMO. The latter is often as relatively simple as "find four other people and kill this dragon", but the games by their very construction (and inherent reward (systems)) make that activity far more complex in both execution and reward.
What I also forgot to mention is that the game helped me to think quickly and critically. While it may seem noobish to attempt to tank dungeons and raids without knowing their tactics, I've been in WoW long enough to predict what's about to happen just by listening to what the NPC says or how his adds look/move. This isn't useful in WoW alone, it's a life skill.
For just about every job interview or application the question arises, "what are your hobbies or intrests?" If you said play chess, poker, or monopoly It would not seem so wierd. If you said that you like to farm the auction house to make gold and organize raids or plan PVP , You could kiss that job goodbye. In reality, what skillset transfers better to your job? Does monopoly or aution house farming make you a better economist? Does chess or leading a premade BG give you better tactical skills? Look at how communication skills need to improve to run a raid with or without vent. Video games can create awesome skillsets. The problem is that they need to roll through a few generations like board games to be accepted as a serious pastime
People keep saying "Why is WoW bad on your resume? Its the same as any other hobby or game."Many employers have probably heard of how addictive the game is and how much time people spend obsessing over it. I don't think its too "out there" that they would deny you a job because they can't trust that you won't spend time on WoW instead of work-related activities. Plus, WoW has a way of distracting people's thoughts even when they are AWAY from the game, and I've heard plenty of people on these forums alone say that they are posting from work.You guys really can't figure out why WoW looks bad on your resume?Anyway, WoW is nowhere close to real life. Managing people as a guild leader is not remotely close to managing a company or even a 10 or 25 person group in real life. And, you have to remember, even IF it made you a better HR person or the like, you'd be a LOT better at it if you spent all the time you did playing WoW interacting with people face-to-face.I apologize if I'm offending anyone, but people who think that WoW has a large positive impact on their life compared to other activities are kidding themselves and/or are in denial.