I agree. TRF is better... but that's my opinion, not a fact of life.
The fact is that at TRF you can voice the above opinion and get away with out much in the way of argument from others, however; were you to state the same in a MMO-friendly area, be that a game itself or similar medium, I can assure you that you would find many voices disputing their claim that they are wasting their time, voices which would doubtless cite how much they enjoy the game and how, perhaps, having a level 60 Warrior with elite gear trumps writing some stupid Star Wars fanfic.
And they would not be incorrect, they would simply be expressing a different perspective.
Is a MMO any less of a waste of time as any other entertainment medium? Is $15/month a bad investment if you'll be playing regularly and derive as much enjoyment out of it as, say, a $60 game?
In this time of premium content in the form of DLCs we may well be able to get our value from a MMO depending on how long you play. I'll compare a MMO to one of the most expansive single player experiences in gaming, Fallout 3. For example, to get Fallout 3 and all the DLCs will run you roughly $100 (Canadian). And yes, people do pay for it. In fact MANY people have paid for it and are actually lining up to pay for more to add another $20 to that within the next couple of months. But right now, that'd be damn near 7 months of a MMO. Half a year and some change.
Most people will beat Fallout 3 and all of its content, DLC and otherwise, in a good couple of months assuming that you aren't unemployed with no social life (IE Me, where it took my about 2 weeks). Now if you think of a MMO, that's still 4 additional months before your cost matches that of Fallout 3.
Would you enjoy more 2 months of Fallout, or 6 months of a MMO?
Financially speaking, the MMO is a far better investment in terms of Time:Money ratio.
Now if you ENJOY one type of game to another, that's a far better justification rather than finances. Because really, we are really financially unsound in our hobbies. Or at least I am. I just spent about $300 on my Imperial Guard army in Warhammer 40K. On top of the $500 I spent on Paintball.
But I'm not about to claim I get anything from my hobbies. I don't play paintball enjoy for genuine exercise, I don't care enough about art to say I'm getting anything from the torture of painting little Guardsmen, and I don't write enough to expand my skills any further than they already are.
On that note, I really need to go paintballing again....
Insofar as my two cents on Subscription based games go, like WoW, really the only time the money is wasted is when you pay and don't end up playing. Online games you get to meet a wide variety of people from around the world that you might not have met otherwise, and I network with new friends of similar hobbies that I met through WoW, which I treat as more as a fun interactive type of internet socializing type of deal more than an actual computer game, like AoE III. But to anything above a casual gamer like me would find WoW increasingly frustrating, because by the time you get up the levels and get the good gear, new patch content is released that invalidates your stuff before you can show it off. :ohwell
I guess the problem is that I am such a casual gamer that I play no more than an hour or two a week. Or if I do, it hurts my studies, which is something a law student who has managed to keep a 3.17 GPA for his first year cannot afford.
