On-line gamer dies

Yahoo - AFP ^ | 12/9/05

[Borges]

SEOUL (AFP) - A South Korean man collapsed and died from exhaustion after playing computer games for 10 days without a proper rest.

The 38-year-old man collapsed Thursday as he was playing an on-line game at an Internet cafe in Incheon, west of Seoul.

"He was carried to a nearby hospital but declared dead on arrival," a police officer told AFP.

The officer said the man had played computer games from morning to night every day and had barely stopped to sleep.

In August, a 28-year-old man died in southeastern Taegu city after playing an online computer game for more than two days.

[aft_lizard]

Must have been a real weakling to begin with. I didnt get real sleep until 9 days into the Iraq War and thats just because I got injured.

[samtheman]

I hear it all the time:

"I started out winning, but then I got killed."

[z3n]

Why do I keep seeing stories like this from Korea (and I think one was Japan)? Is there a name for this phenomenon?

[CarrotAndStick]

I read somewhere 5 days without any sleep is fatal to the brain.

[Trampled by Lambs]

Reminds me of Cyber-punk novels I've read where people jack in to their computers - directly into their nervous system and then keel over because it was so intense that they'd forget to eat or sleep.

[CollegeRepublican]

Stupidity.

[Lazamataz]

SEOUL (AFP) - A South Korean man collapsed and died from exhaustion after playing computer games for 10 days without a proper rest.

I do this with Freeping all the time.

And I very seldom die.

[Pete'sWife]

All your bases are belong to us.

So THERE.

[Pete'sWife]

Disregard previous.

Someone set him up the bomb.

That's better.

[Uncle Vlad]

Game over, man! Game over!

[wideawake]

I once spent six days on a project for work in which I got less than two hours sleep per day, most of it grabbed in 10-20 minute catnaps.

By the seventh day I began dryheaving every time I woke up.

At that point, I had to grab some actual shuteye.

[goldstategop]

There was a scene on CSI: Miami a few weeks back - an online gamer died in his chair after playing games for three days straight without stopping to drink or having a bite to eat. Nah, he wasn't in the mood to go to the bathroom either. What can you say, life imitates art.

(Denny Crane: "I Don't Want To Socialize With A Pinko Liberal Democrat Commie.Say What You Like About Republicans. We Stick To Our Convictions. Even When We Know We're Dead Wrong.")

[Post-Neolithic]

Most of the Asian players that go the 24/7 route with online-games are doing so to bilk the online-gaming community for all it's worth. In-game they are called farmers, their only reason for being in the game is to amount as much in-game money and materials as they can and then sell them on places like Ebay.

Believe it or not, there are gamers out there that instead of enjoying the game, would much rather buy their way up the ranks. These are the ones that the farmers target, for example do a search on ebay for wow gold.

Last I checked there was over 19,000 auctions. This doesn't even include the items for sale like swords and such. Keep in mind these are virtual, you do not own them outside of the game. Expect to see more of these "Farmers" keel over as the year progresses.

[Zuben Elgenubi]

Wow. Another permanent ZOT.

[z3n]

"Stupidity."

That word works. But I figured the phych-med-media-nerds invented a specific name for the phenomenon.

BTW< I suffered from the 'stupidity' phenomenon a bit myself. Some games hurt my college GPA for a few semesters, but somehow I always managed to get away from it long enough to eat, sleep, and attend a few classes, and say hi to some members of the human race.

[aft_lizard]

Must have been something about the fear of death that has the opposite side effect.

[wideawake]

Yeah, I guess the prospect of losing a promotion doesn't have quite the same adrenaline-producing effect.

[SIDENET]

I guess that HE LOST.

[SIDENET]

I do this with Freeping all the time.

LOL! I think a lot of us do.