Boys keen to play truant at cyber cafe for MMORPG

KUALA LUMPUR: The Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game, or better known as MMORPG, has become an addiction not only among cyber gaming enthusiasts, but also school children.
This addiction has not only caused them to play truant to visit cyber cafes, but also spent all their pocket money just to play the game.
MMORPG blends the genres of role-playing video games and massively multiplayer online games in which the player assumes the role of a character (often in a fantasy world or science-fiction world) and takes control over many of that character's actions.
The existence of cyber cafes offering MMORPG package for as low as RM4 or RM5 for a time span of five hours has made the MMORPG addiction worse as truant children began to turn the cyber cafes as their 'port'.
Bernama checks at a cyber cafe in Wangsa Maju found that several boys wearing casual t-shirt with school pants and shoes were preoccupied with playing the game while their counterparts were at school.

A Form Three student, who wanted to be known only as Wan, said he spent between three and five hours a week with several of his friends at the cyber cafe.
"I began playing the MMORPG two years ago and it was really fun to have multiple players on it. Sometimes my friends and I played truant to visit cyber cafe. We didn't do this all the time, maybe once or twice a week, preferably on Monday or Friday," the 15-year-old boy told Bernama.
Wan said he only spent half of his pocket money, or between RM3 and RM5, to play the game for fear that his parents might find out.
"Luckily, I've never been caught red handed so far," he said while puffing on a cigarette out the cyber cafe.
When asked of his favourites of MMORPG, he named 'Dota 2', 'World of Warcraft', 'Clash of Clans', 'Elder Scrolls Online' among a few.
President of Parent Action Group For Education Datin Noor Azimah Abdul Rahim said schoolboys playing truant to visit cyber cafes was not a new issue, especially among those who had no interest in studying.
"To overcome the issue is not by simply punishing them, but by developing their interests in education. Changing the teaching and learning process is probably the best way to develop their interests to study.
"The authorities must also think of the best suitable method to attract their attention by, for example, introducing technical and vocational subjects to those who are not so keen on typical academic subject," she told Bernama when contacted here. – Bernama