Gaming saves a life.

[Optional Opinion]

With all the bad press gaming has been getting recently.

"Gaming is teaching suicide bombers"
"Games taught my child to dress up as pacman and violently murder ghosts"
"Games ate my child"

A positive story about gaming is a rare treat to find in the news so I wish to share with you.

"Matthew Krizsan was driving along Highway 401 in Ontario, Canada, on Friday morning when an articulated lorry travelling in the other direction smashed through the concrete barrier"

But due to his l33t reflex skills which where honed by hours of mortal kombat and killing hookers with baseball bats he was able to steer himself to safety.



My source with the full story. [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1350071/How-driver-miraculously-avoided-motorway-crash-thanks-gaming-skills.html]

Apologies in advance if this is a repost.

 

[BlueberryMUNCH]

...I was about to be all '0MG DIZ IZ A REPOST' but I think I saw it on Kotaku xD.

Tbh, there isn't any proof that gaming does heighten your reflexes...but I always kinda thought they must to.

Hip hip horray guys, we're gonna be able to dodge cars, rocks, bullets, you name it>:].
[sub]just don't try it at home...[/sub]

 

[F'Angus]

Quality, Matrix like dodging abilities... Gonna go fight me some crime... Or play frogger on the motorway

 

[Optional Opinion]

The report made me all happy inside (even if games have nothing to do with it).

My only problem is that they circled the lorry in the video clip, did they really think we would miss the huge lorry smash through the concrete barrier?

 

[Nickolai77]

He is very good to have avoided getting struck by that lorry. I confess, my attention would have been on the lorry in the right hand lane and probably wouldn't have got away in time. All the more kudos to him.

 

[Daffy F]

Can we stop acting like our leisure activity is so good for us? We don't need to justify it. It doesn't improve your reflexes, it doesn't improve your eyesight, just enjoy it as entertainment and stop trying to flog it as healthy.

That's not what he's saying. What he's saying is, there are other positive effects of video games besides entertainment, that's all.

 

[CarpathianMuffin]

Eh, great. Good to see that it might've had some practical application, however small it was.

 

[Hoboape]

There was a story a while ago were a kid (from Germany I think) managed to survive in the wilderness for a few days thaks to foraging skills he learnt in World Of Warcraft.

 

[Daffy F]

Alright, maybe that is what he's saying, but there's no need to be cynical about it. Seriously. Don't be a dickhead for no reason.

Huuur, someone expressed a different opinion to me, I must insult them.

Grow up.

Again with the cynicism. Why even bother replying?

 

[Pyromaniak3]

TU4AR, Daffy F

your not even on topic anymore, you are just insulting each other.

Maybe games do increase your reflexes, in order to beat somebody on, lets say, Black Ops you have to be the first one to the trigger, that requires reflex.

 

[ThatLankyBastard]

If zombies ever attack, I'll be a survivor...
... and I owe it all to video games


"The More You Know..."

 

[Nouw]

That's good to read, although it would be going out on a limb to save that Gaming saved his health but it did indeed help (I guess).

Someone should do some kind of study into the positive effects of Video Gaming.
Oh Wait.

 

[PeePantz]

Can we stop acting like our leisure activity is so good for us? We don't need to justify it. It doesn't improve your reflexes, it doesn't improve your eyesight, just enjoy it as entertainment and stop trying to flog it as healthy.

I believe video games improve hand eye coordination, or the repetitiveness of it will bring out our full potential. However, I agree with you that playing video games do not save lives or that they improve us as humans like so many allude to here. The same people who advocate how video games are humanities greatest achievement and that they push arts further, etc., are the same people who yell that games don't ruin relationships. Or video games don't incite any angst. Or that video games aren't addictive. It's always the person, never the video games in that situation. Can't have it both ways people.

 

[Dragonpit]

Well done with the reaction time, but I'm not sold on the whole "video games saved my life" part. My parents are excellent drivers. They don't play video games as much as I do (less than eight hours every week, having started about a year ago or so), but I'm sure they could've avoided that crash as well if they saw it coming, too. And that's what I think happened here. He simply saw it coming, and he reacted. Anybody can do that, with or without video games. I'm sorry, but I can't buy into the whole 'video games saved a life' shtick.

 

[Hoboape]

There was a story a while ago were a kid (from Germany I think) managed to survive in the wilderness for a few days thaks to foraging skills he learnt in World Of Warcraft.

Clicking on mythical plants in World of Warcraft gives you no real life skills.

It was more along the lines of her learnt what he could and could not eat.

 

[Staskala]

There was a story a while ago were a kid (from Germany I think) managed to survive in the wilderness for a few days thaks to foraging skills he learnt in World Of Warcraft.

Clicking on mythical plants in World of Warcraft gives you no real life skills.

It was more along the lines of her learnt what he could and could not eat.

This might surprise you, but Ghost Mushrooms don't grow in German forests.
Much to the contrary, by listening to WoW [http://www.wowwiki.com/Red-speckled_Mushroom] he would have gotten himself killed.

 

[Hoboape]

There was a story a while ago were a kid (from Germany I think) managed to survive in the wilderness for a few days thaks to foraging skills he learnt in World Of Warcraft.

Clicking on mythical plants in World of Warcraft gives you no real life skills.

It was more along the lines of her learnt what he could and could not eat.

I assure things like Felweed and Grave Moss don't grow on our planet.

Sorry I remembered the details a little wrong he survived a moose attack and was Norwegian. My Bad

http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2007/12/boy-survives-mo/

 

[JUMBO PALACE]

Tbh, there isn't any proof that gaming does heighten your reflexes...but I always kinda thought they must to.

Actually there is. I wrote a college paper last semester about the societal and personal benefits of video games,and numerous studies have proved this.