Man Dies After Days of Non-Stop Gaming
If you don't think Internet addiction is serious, consider the man in China who just died after a three-day, non-stop gaming session at a Beijing Internet café. The unnamed 30-year-old man was rushed to the hospital -- most likely after passing out -- and was pronounced dead shortly thereafter. Suicide has been ruled out as a cause of death.
The man's death reflects a disturbing trend amongst gamers in Asia who are playing online until it literally kills them. In 2005, a 28-year-old South Korean man died of exhaustion after a 50-hour marathon gaming session in an Internet café. In 2002, a 24-year-old South Korean man died after 86 straight hours of online gaming, while that same year, a 27-year-old Taiwanese man died after 32 hours of non-stop Internet gaming.
Internet addiction has become such an epidemic in China that the government no longer allows the opening of new cyber cafés and has started a state-sponsored Internet addiction camp to help treat the 13 percent of Chinese Internet users under the age of 18 who are believed to be addicted.
China has gone so far as to force game developers to institute mandatory limits in online games. For example, games will reward the player with fewer points or treasures after three hours of play and even inundate the player with messages that his character will soon be killed if he doesn't get offline immediately.
Though there's never been a case of a U.S. citizen dying from over-gaming, there have been reports of children suffering from seizures or developing blood clots after sitting in front of the game console for too long. Hopefully, we can rely on parents to do the policing instead of having time limitations actually programmed into the games themselves.
From Reuters
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Steve @ Sep 17th 2007 10:57AM
Just plain stupid. I play online games, but I know I still have to eat, drink, and sleep.
Elizabeth @ Sep 17th 2007 11:25AM
I've played games for a long time but never neglected my own care. These guys needed to reset their priorities and I'm sorry for their families' loss. Can you imagine having to say "My son died gaming"?
txnguy @ Sep 17th 2007 11:36AM
GET A JOB - DUMBASSES
Carmen Luna @ Sep 17th 2007 11:52AM
There is no mention if these "gamers" are betting online for all these hours on end. Either way, it's a pathetic way to go!! I've seen people playing eight-liners for hours on end, wonder how many of them have met with the same fate.
Stephanie @ Sep 17th 2007 1:03PM
Very sad, such a huge waste.
Couldn't kick the addiction --
We should have time limits built in here as well ---
KIDS much younger than these young men are allowed to play for hours on end, hurting their eyes and doing
who knows what other physiological damage to themselves --
INBUILT LIMITS ARE AN EXCELLENT IDEA --- THREE HOURS A DAY AT MOST --- or the character kicks the bucket (instead). Brilliant solution, hopefully they won't just create other characters... Whether at home or elsewhere, there needs to be a limit imposed.
2 hours is preferable, that's quite damaging enough. My eyes ache after 20-30 minutes....
Steven @ Sep 17th 2007 9:12PM
Thank you Stephanie for deciding how I can spend my time. A parental control? Fine. (Although, unplugging the Xbox works great!) Otherwise, it's heartless but it's natural selection. If you can't stop playing a game to save your own life, the human race is better off without our DNA clouding the gene pool.
Joyce @ Sep 17th 2007 10:52PM
I wonder how much of this is due to personal choice, and how much of it is "job related". In World of Warcraft, the term "Chinese gold farmers" is used to refer to off-shore employees who take a character to the highest level in a few days for an amount of money, or who repeatedly play in order to farm in-game money and items. This is in violation of the user agreement; why should players who follow the rules have self imposed limits put in place to monitor activity that is against the rules of the user agreement?
Christopher Kidwell @ Sep 19th 2007 4:56PM
Anyone find it kinda convenient that China says it will be cracking down on 'internet addicts' and this just happens to come out not 2 weeks after that announcement?
I find it very convenient, and think this was planted by the Chinese government to make it appear that playing online games is worse than it actually is.
S.J.C. @ Jun 23rd 2008 1:21AM
@Stephanie: Although I believe younger kids probably shouldn't be playing online games, period, the limits will probably vary by person otherwise. I'm not an online person, but I am a somewhat avid PC gamer, and will play for 7-8 hours on end, and I haven't experienced anything just yet.