Pokémon, and How It's Over-Taking My Life (again)

Every time I crawl free from its grasp, it draws me right back in. You may be forgiven for thinking that I'm talking about drugs, but I'm not. It's that world-overtaking, super-addicting, mega-cutesy game called Pokémon.

My name is Sprite, and I am a Pokémon addict.

For a long time I was free from its web, but then, my boyfriend bought My Pokémon Ranch with the last of his Wii Points. It was absolutely fucking adorable, and it wasn't long before I had restarted my Diamond game and was catching Pokémon wildly to fill up the Ranch.

Then, I decided that was a bad way to go about it, and instead I was going to get a male and female of every species in it. This was a very very bad idea on my part. There are 493 Pokémon, of which probably about 450 have male and females. It's a massive task, a huge task and not one that I'm likely to finish. But it's got me playing my game obsessively and not only for that task. I'm doing things that I never got round to on my last playthrough. Things which in any other game would be tedious as hell. (Mass breeding; EV training; training past level 50 or so.)

I'm also compulsively using the Global Trade Center.

In the past two weeks I've clocked up more than 70 hours. (Quick check: 73:38 - an average of more than 5 a day!)

Why the hell is this game so damn addictive?

Answers on a postcard please.