Everytime I die, I find myself compelled to just say "FUCK THIS SHIT" and quit. Every single time. In the past, I have. I've taken breaks ranging from 2 days to 5 years (I didn't play from 2005 to this year).

Yet war after war, I see Godfathers--people who had a single life for months to a year just lose it all in a second--just to immediately come back as a Thug without even missing a beat, doing petties and such.

How are you guys able to just push the reset button after just spending hundreds of hours on a character that went to waste?

How do you guys do it?

Because it's a game. You may get killed, so you start back up and work your way back up. I enjoy the character interaction and friends Ive made in the game, so thats why Ive returned after the two times Ive been killed since I was introduced to MR.

Real simple for me.  This game kicks ass!!   The admins (gods) are great!  They care about thier game AND the community. 

The community itself has a lot of great people as well.

Honestly.. routine probley.

This has been my routine for like 6-7 yrs.. wake up.. login check things out etc.. plus I have some real close friends who I have talked to here for 6-7 yrs.. built a bond of sorts.

I think it has become more like of an addiction !

I have not been here for that long, but still I keep coming back again and again.

"after just spending hundreds of hours on a character that went to waste?"

If you really feel that way after dying then you are not playing right. If you really have nothing that you can carry over to the next account, you are not paying attention to what matters the most in this game. The connections you build with people. The trust you generate in other people so your next account is not just another no name C.

I don't mean that you come back expecting to be handed everything onto a plate, but people are likely to give positions of trust to people who already proved they can handle them well.

CN hit it on the head. What does it matter if your high ranking player dies if you know you can rise right back up? For some it is just SSDD with another name.

Oh don't get me wrong--I've made some great friends here--many of which I know will help me out the day I'm shot. That itself isn't a waste.

However, what feels like a waste is all those times you wake up early to shoot an IA or time the next drug price change with your schedule--that all feels slightly pointless after each death, you know?

playing for a a year but its not like this game is the best there are tons of other better games but i told my friend that i would be a god father one day and that he would need a telescope to see me so far since i told him that i died 5 times but my spirt may be down but my resolve has never been stronger guess im just a sore loser who knows maybe i migth one day become a god father  but untill then i will not give up

I'm going to go out on a limb and say you have no chance of making Godfather until you learn how to use punctuation and form coherent sentences.

playing for a a year but its not like this game is the best there are tons of other better games

Yeah, that attitude will really carrying you into becoming a Godfather.

still got time lol no one is perfect  cant break this promise  to my friend really want to laugh in his face about it or it migth be the other way around

Volgola, perhaps you could start by using periods (.) Your massive run-on sentences are hard to read. Just a tip.

People always look for something to preoccupy there free time, and if you make a habbit of it having fun on the computer then you will naturally find other things you try to fill your time with boring unless you really enjoy the subject on which you are doing.

Also, this game is just addictive.

"having fun on the computer then you will naturally find other things you try to fill your time with boring unless you really enjoy the subject on which you are doing."

So for every other 55 minutes of the hour you're here? How wonderfully insightful.

I know what you mean. I got whacked during my first few days and I was reluctant to come back. Finally I got bored and decided to try again. I think its a safe however to say that if I got killed after a years time or more, I wouldnt have the patience to come back.

Most people play this game with entirely the wrong attitude as CrazyNine has already suggested.

People become too focussed upon a single character, when after time people judge you, rightly or wrongly on the cumulative impact you've had with all your characters. That's why so many people are known by their IRC alias rather than individual characters, hell I struggle to recall all the names I've gone on bold on over the years and I know there are people who've done it more times than I have.

Sometimes it would be better for people to take a step back from the computer screen and remember what they are doing. This is a game with other people - nothing is set in stone. When I'm committed to the game properly I'm not just playing the account I'm on at the moment, I'm planning for the next one. I position myself so that my next account is going to be stronger than the one I'm currently playing and it inevitably works unless my entire network of contacts are removed alongside me.

Too often individuals hold on too tightly to their current account and make a mistake that costs them not just on this name, but stands as a permanent smear against there reputation. Hiding behind prowacks and surviving a war might benefit you in the short-term, but taking the risky shot and dying is likely to win you more plaudits and allow you to build stronger for the future.

Very rarely, if ever, do people get to the top solely by themselves. Everyone needs to establish themselves and develop contacts that will be beneficial to them, not just now but also for the future.

Anyway, lessons on how to play aside, I come back because I pathetically have little else to do. Other than work, but who wants to do that?

~G~warble.

Their reputation*.

okay ive played this game for 5 years on and off never made it past wiseguy and everytime i died id be like that games gay im not playing it anymore then all of a sudden about 3 - 6 weeks later im like ah ill make a character and just a couple pettys and then im hooked lol anyway i continue to come back because this game is cybercrack lmao

Thank you Gwarble for that rather insightful response.

It seems much more logical, I suppose, to view this game as a cumulative social/networking experiment rather than, like you suggested, a game based on just one life. Since most people don't amass nearly as much experience as the iRC vets do, we tend to focus very shallowly on the aims of our current lives, rather than a life that hasn't been contrived yet.

However, having been a crewleader so many times, do you ever feel numbed by the entire experience? I'm sure you've seen nearly every possible situation from coup d'etats to multiple-city wars: does it become less of an experience when you've seen it all? I'm sure nothing, at this point, would surprise you?

Essentially, how do you then feel motivated to create a new character when it seems that any achievement you garner would cease to surprise you?