Three-day gaming session kills Chinese man A Beijing man has died at the end of a three-day online gaming marathon during which "he did not sleep and barely ate". According to the Beijing Times, reported via the BBC, the unnamed 30-year-old collapsed in a net cafe on the outskirts of the city, and attempts to revive him failed. He'd apparently worked his way through …
As harsh as it is, this is just Darwins work in full view of the world.
I've been "into" a game, but as my post attests, I managed to keep my self alive during.
There are many negatives associated with gaming, all of which are compounded or resolved simply by a choice, do I socialise with people or not.
Those choices purely affect you as an individual and perception of others.
However to choose to ignore your body's warning messags and "alerts", do so at your own peril.
There wont be a shortage of these people, but I dont have any sympathy.
Pussies :p I remember, barely, when I went to uni, I didnt sleep for the last 4 days before my final year project had to be handed in, I did have food and drink, but was 4 days. Then in my first year of uni, it must have been 5 - 6 days with no sleep that i remember (dont remember what the hell I was doing in that time) when I didnt sleep, I did sleep a while after that, and again i did eat and drink, from the little i remember.
does this always happen in asia?
i don't think i've ever heard of a brit dying from too much minecraft... maybe an american though.
what was he playing, and why did an internet cafe let him game for that long without throwing him out - unless he was switching cafes of course.
seems a bit silly to be honest... is this just a (untrue) story intended to throw more mud at "addictive" videogames? if so, it's starting to get really old now.
There's a good billion chinese and ad another half of connected SE asian countries.
There's about 60 million brits.
So expect in general 25 asian reports per brit; that's all things being equal. So no, you don't have data to conclude a trend; you cannot do sample size Exp[n]<=1 and hope for the best.
---
I would guess your basic idea is right, though: it's hard to see it happen here. The 24h cybercafe culture does actually make the difference (remember cybercafes?). Maybe if there were 24h bingo parlors you'd have the same in the UK.
To do the same here, you need to either live on your own (so have shown a certain measure of maturity/self-reliance) or live with your parents (who presumably will interfere somewhere before death): there is no possibility like in the cafes to be the anonymous "guy in the back who's been here since before my shift started," to the staff.
Anyone who parks his/her (usually his) arse in front of a computer and plays games for days on end and avoids sleeping, eating and (almost certainly) bathing during the session pretty much is going to get what s/he deserves: a prominent spot at <http://www.darwinawards.com/darwin/> with Charlie the Bearded One looking on with disdain. And good riddance, too.
It does seem rather common for young people in the far east to drop dead in the midst of an online gaming marathon. I suppose you'd have to experience the gaming culture first hand to really understand it.
And then you wonder why the authorities feel there's a growing problem that warrants a military-style (re)boot camp...
Gaming cafes must provide intravenous nutrient and hydration feed, a full reclining cyber-couch, and full neural interface with the game. That way your body can rest easy whilst you slay imaginary goobers with your imaginary weaponry, in your imaginary life that is so much better than your "real" one.
This would also be a boon to the Chinese government, as it would give them an opportunity to re-program these folks to be more docile and subservient citizens. Direct neural interface is much more efficient than subliminal messages embedded in commercials and cartoons.
I live in China and this is a Chinese phenomenon. But people will just say "addicted to games". But this problem is not game addiction per se, and neither are games 100% responsible.
This problem is actually endemic of something deeper in society. We often comment on the ridiculous bureaucracy and health and safety campaigns in the UK - well it's worse here. People are shit scared of doing anything more risky than walking to work in the daylight.
It terms of a government that has spent years pursuing a way of fearing its people into submission and trying to make them behave as they want, they are now paying the price. It's simply that a bunch of youngsters really just have nothing else to do.
It is also endemic of an education system that does not reward freewill, but repetition of mechanical action and thought, something computer games are well designed for and will satiate a hunger / habit for.
These marathon gaming sessions and their resultant deaths are merely just the logical conclusion of the process.
Therefore, don't blame the games, blame the society it's happening in.
Maybe there is a simple answer. There are heck of a lot people in China - the gaming community is therefore also large coming humongous - so, statistically, even the most improbable shit happens once in long time. It´s not like chinese gamers were dropping like flies. Yet.
Makes more sense than nation wide malnutrition or underlying disease.
"He'd apparently worked his way through 10,000 yuan (£928) feeding his gaming habit in the month before his fatal final session."
and that was in a single month? It would have been a lot cheaper for him to buy a good notebook and pay for his internet connection at home. He would have saved tons on money, if you keep in mind that he must have been playing for many months.
what is so special about spending money in an overpriced netcafe instead of buying your own notebook and internet?!
I suspect all that money went to gold farmers either to buy gold/currency or special items.
Some people put extreme high value on virtual goods. Remember that argument over a virtual sword that left one party dead?
It's easy to stand outside and see the folly but if you're addicted, it's not that easy.
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2025
