Taiwanese Teen Dies Following Diablo III Binge
- Thread starter The Wooster
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It's not available (legally) in China at the moment due to censorship by the Chinese government. Not because Blizzard don't want all of that delicious Chinese money.Scarim Coral said:Well I don't know (yes it make sense in hindsight). I just remember that news about some people in Asia (I think it was in China) fall for a scam for buying the game online from this site claiming it was in partnership with Blizzard.Rainforce said:how would that make any sense, you cannot even imagine the amount of potential sales you lose if you not go for the asian market as well.Scarim Coral said:
OT:
well...I hope it was worth it for him. probably wasn't, but still.
I haven't heard of any problem in Taiwan (or other Asian territories).
Lunar Templar said:
Possibly for the same reason that a lot of attacks on pet cats and dogs seem to happen in the UK. People in Britain go nuts over cruelty-to-animals cases. A women who was filmed putting a cat in a wheelie bin got death threats! So newspapers (particularly the tabloids) vastly over-report and exaggerate any especially juicy animal-related crimes that come up, blowing them out of proportion.Kungfu_Teddybear said:
It's possible that - in some Asian territories - the potential negative impact of gaming is something that a lot of people have a real paranoia about. (It's certainly something that the Chinese government spends a lot of thought on - to the point that they insist on closely reviewing all games before release.) This means that the media in those countries is likely to over-report and exaggerate any gaming-related deaths/crimes that occur.
In this example, we have no idea whether or not this guy had some sort of medical condition that caused his death, and just happened to have been playing a video game for a long time when it happened. I doubt the result of the autopsy will make the news (especially if it does show that there was nothing gaming-related about his death).
I'm not saying this is the case, but it's worth keeping in mind before jumping to conclusions about whether Asian people are somehow inherently fragile.
Whether it's admitted or not there has to be more to this than is being said. 40 hours of gaming isn't going to kill anyone, especially at the age of 18. Two entire days without sleep and little food or water? Anyone who thinks that is unusual has apparently never been in college or done much in the way of power gaming with PnP RPGs (where a bunch of nerds will lock themselves in a room with a bunch of D&D books and then find out three days have passed.. lol). 40 hours of gaming, reading, cramming for tests, etc... is not unusual.
What's more, having worked at a casino I can tell you that people get REALLY into gambling and will frequently camp on slot machines for days on end. You'll sometimes go by with people stinking of feces and urine, or even having it oozing out of the leg of their pants, and still be playing the machines because "they need to catch up" or "will hit any minute now". I can say from personal experience that people collapsing from exposure, lack of sleep, dehydration, etc... while not common, happens with enough frequency to not be all that noteworthy either. Indeed problem gambling groups are full of people who tell each other stories like that.
If an 18 year old died after 40 hours of video gaming there was another cause. The guy who died after a mere 23 hours is a case where it's even more obvious. The human body is pretty resiliant, and this basically doesn't happen.
My immediate thoughts here are something wrong with the ventilation system in that private room the guy was in (fungus, mould, insulation) which could in theory do this after 40 hours of constant exposure if the person ignored the signs.
I'll also say that I lack much faith in the Taiwanese authorities to figure this out, so I imagine it will remain anti-gaming rhetoric for a long time to come.
What's more, having worked at a casino I can tell you that people get REALLY into gambling and will frequently camp on slot machines for days on end. You'll sometimes go by with people stinking of feces and urine, or even having it oozing out of the leg of their pants, and still be playing the machines because "they need to catch up" or "will hit any minute now". I can say from personal experience that people collapsing from exposure, lack of sleep, dehydration, etc... while not common, happens with enough frequency to not be all that noteworthy either. Indeed problem gambling groups are full of people who tell each other stories like that.
If an 18 year old died after 40 hours of video gaming there was another cause. The guy who died after a mere 23 hours is a case where it's even more obvious. The human body is pretty resiliant, and this basically doesn't happen.
My immediate thoughts here are something wrong with the ventilation system in that private room the guy was in (fungus, mould, insulation) which could in theory do this after 40 hours of constant exposure if the person ignored the signs.
I'll also say that I lack much faith in the Taiwanese authorities to figure this out, so I imagine it will remain anti-gaming rhetoric for a long time to come.
That thought crossed my mind. And I don't ever recall saying that I'd come to that conclusion.MetalMagpie said:
I have never played one game that is worth playing for 40 hours in a row. After 5 or 6 hours i get bored and want to do something else. Even had this with WOW, no idea how people play that game for days on end....but i guess thats what addiction is all about.
East Asian person dies from spending too much time at an internet cafe, stop the fucking presses!
I think part of the reason you don't see this happening as much in western countries is mainly because of the differences in population.
China alone has a population of ~1.3 billion, which is more than the population of USA and Europe combined. And that's not even taking into account all the other asian countries we hear these stories from -- according to the google, Asia's whole population is about 4 billion.
So its simple percentages really, more people = more people dying (even though the probability might be the same).
China alone has a population of ~1.3 billion, which is more than the population of USA and Europe combined. And that's not even taking into account all the other asian countries we hear these stories from -- according to the google, Asia's whole population is about 4 billion.
So its simple percentages really, more people = more people dying (even though the probability might be the same).
Hmm, not really. Binge behavior is part of being human. I actually feel sorry for you that you've never found anything that has interested you to the point of binging, which, reading between the lines I'm guessing is a general thing for you, rather than just with video games. To be honest I'd actually suspect you might have ADHD or some other problem, albiet not a bad case of it.SonOfVoorhees said:
Pretty much everyone has say sat down and watched 10 or 12 episodes of a TV series or a couple trilogies of movies back to back, or done 20-40 hour sessions of reading, gaming (pnP or video games), or whatever else. For some people it's drinking or gambling, and all kinds of other things.
It becomes a problem when someone wants to binge constantly. Heading out and drinking almost non-stop for a weekend does not make someone an alcoholic, but when they do it every day that's an addictive behavior. The same can be said of video games, TV, or whatever else. Of course other factors (like what else a person has to do) come to mind. Someone who has a lot of time might display addictive symtoms, without being an addict, it all comes down to how they react when someone else comes along.
That said I'm posting this not so much about you, so much as to say that I don't think this guy was displaying addictive behavior just from what was said. A gaming binge is no big deal, and most people have done that (or similar things) more than a few times. 40 hours of something like gaming isn't going to do much to someone who is 18. Heck, young, active kids hve been known to go 2-3 days without much sleep without many problems at all. If playing video games for 40 hours was lethal "addictive" behavior that could stop the heart from sedimentary behavior, we'd have an epidemic of deaths every year before midterms, SATS, and major tests at academic institutions where cram sessions frequently go that long.
(Nice to know that you can go into a threat like this and guess almost all jokes that people will make about this kind of news. Stay classy and predictable, Internet)
Fleeing into the seclusion of the internet coffee seems to be some kind of problem in Asian countries. I mean, I have seen pictures and movies of really comfortable private rooms that have everything you could wish for. You practically can be in there for days isolated from the outside world.
Since we don't know his medical history, I guess it may be possible that his gaming marathon just put his body on too much stress, leading to the failure of his circulatory system...or something. Seems entirely possible to me.
Fleeing into the seclusion of the internet coffee seems to be some kind of problem in Asian countries. I mean, I have seen pictures and movies of really comfortable private rooms that have everything you could wish for. You practically can be in there for days isolated from the outside world.
Since we don't know his medical history, I guess it may be possible that his gaming marathon just put his body on too much stress, leading to the failure of his circulatory system...or something. Seems entirely possible to me.
2 people died (possibly) due to gaming binges, some government officials want to stop millions of responsible people from playing games, my crystal ball tells me.