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PC Games (Games) Role Playing (Games) Entertainment Games News

Video Game Addiction Saves Lives 45

Posted by CowboyNeal from the prevents-boredom-too dept.
EzRag writes "Here's a nice bit about a guy who saved a household of people from a fire, all thanks to his late-night video game addiction. Does this mean I can count all my hours of playing Chron X as community service work?"
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Video Game Addiction Saves Lives More

Video Game Addiction Saves Lives

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  • Am I the only one (Score:4, Insightful)

    by rritterson ( 588983 ) * on Friday August 15, 2003 @04:37AM (#6703972)
    Am I the only one who expected the person to have played something like FF3 where one of the parts of the game is to save a kid in a burning building?

    Comeon, he just happened to be awake due to video games. I wouldn't say that the video game addiction itself saved the lives.

    Plus, it would have been a lot cooler had he ran in and held up the building Sabin style while some other girl ran around and saved everyone.
    • It's a bit of a non-story. He could have been doing anything - watching a movie, reading a book, having a wank...
    • That's exactly what I thought - he had learned some skills from playing a game like "Life and death" but for firefighters rather than doctors.

      Imagine how underwhelming it is to learn that...well, you know the rest.

  • Not addicted (Score:5, Funny)

    by Tarpan ( 114764 ) <jonas@fallman.org> on Friday August 15, 2003 @04:37AM (#6703974) Homepage Journal
    Pah, that's not addiction.
    Addiction to a game is when you notice a fire and think "well, just play a little more, then I'll take care of it..."

  • New Excuse? (Score:4, Funny)

    by g-san ( 93038 ) on Friday August 15, 2003 @04:51AM (#6704023)
    Dad/Mom/Girl/Boyfriend: Were you up late last night playing video games again?

    Me: Oh come on, I'm just trying to protect you....

  • Video games saving lives... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by neostorm ( 462848 ) on Friday August 15, 2003 @04:57AM (#6704039)
    I have a good friend of mine who has a really horrid family life. Father works in the north pole for some government satelite project and is only home 2 weeks out of the year, every year. When he is home he dissappears for the majority of those two weeks, drinks constantly, cheats on his wife, and gambles all his money away in Vegas.
    My friends mom is a wreck because of this, she doesn't trust any of his friends, and right now they aren't making enough money to pay for their house, meaning my friend may have to leave school, forfeiting his education to get a job and pay the bills.
    However, with all this drama at home he is one of the most easy going, light hearted guys I know. I blame this all on his video gaming habits. I'm thoroughly convinced that if he weren't able to dive into alternate lives through his PC monitor every night for the majority of his life, he would be angry, depressed, and probably would have snapped and killed someone by now.
    Maybe my explanation doesn't paint the appropriate picture, but you get the idea. In the end, games are also a great way of dealing with stress in the real world, and can definitely benefit those in need of some vacation from reality.
    • Mod me down, for following a troll off-topic, or being an insensitive git. I know I deserve it, but:
      ...forfeiting his education to get a job and pay the bills.
      ...lives through his PC monitor every night for the majority of his life,...

      Just a suggestions, but why can't he quit gaming and either go to night classes or work a night shift?

      • Just a suggestions, but why can't he quit gaming and either go to night classes or work a night shift?

        Why don't you ask him yourself? The article posted the address he is currently staying at.
      • You're totally right, there are a lot of things anyone can do to improve their situation in the world, but everyone has a different capacity, and the main point of the story was how well his outlook on life is despite all the troubles he faces, and how that's largely in part to his gaming.

        I just appreciate the fact that he hasn't lost hope for himself and his family, and I woulnd't dare judge him in that respect. When someone is already doing all they can you don't tell them they're not doing enough.
    • i heard heroin does a great job too when it comes to escapism

    • That's a tough way to do it r/o (Score:4, Insightful)

      by SolemnDragon ( 593956 ) <solemndragon@@@gmail...com> on Friday August 15, 2003 @08:59AM (#6704764) Homepage Journal
      Take it from someone who went through a not-alike but similar adventure: tell him ot to leave school, whatever he does. He can get a night job (which will also get him out of the house) he can wait till he's 18 and tell his mum that either she makes a decision about da or deals with it on her own (Tough to say and harder to follow through with) or he can wait it out and try to get by- but the economy is on the skids, and if he doesn't get that diploma he's gonna have a real hard time with the GED instead, and they don't usually let you get a GED until your class graduates anyway.

      working your way in high school is a tough thing to do, i did it and barely graduated- but it beats working INSTEAD of high school. If he has any hope of making his life better over the next three years, dropping out of school is one of the worst things to do. It will be hard for him to stop gaming to work nights; he'll need to make some hard decisions no matter how this goes.

      Back on topic; i think that i have to agree that this guy's gaming addiction didn't save them- he saved them in spite of the gaming addiction. The fact that he had a late night sleep pattern was a factor, but it could have been from any late night activity. If he'd been an astronomy student, for example, he would have noticed the light from the fire very quickly. If he'd been reading he would have been awake, too. Does anybody else see the potential for a Sims: Catastrophe game in this? watch your sims deal with hurricanes, tornadoe, fires, carjackings, and ebola...

    • Well, speaking as someone who went through a similar experience; yes, escaping into the alternate world does help you to not flip from the depression and pressure, but don't forget, you still live in this world, and have to come back sooner or later... and when you do, you might find out just how much a diploma would help.

      I'd probably tell this friend of yours to hang in there, but try to get that peice of paper however possible. It may be a good idea to contact the local public services to see if there

  • In Other News (Score:1, Funny)

    by berb ( 231742 )
    ...some guy is discovered by his mom in his basement. Mom says, "Holy Crap, we buried him 5 years ago, and low-and-behold, he was just fragging in the basement all that time."

  • Humanitarian Aid (Score:5, Funny)

    by floydigus ( 415917 ) on Friday August 15, 2003 @05:08AM (#6704063)
    So this guy loses his home and all his posessions and...

    The video game company - Mystic Entertainment of Fairfax, Va. - sent Machado seven T-shirts and a few hats after hearing about his family's misfortune.

    Gee, thanks! So now they have no home, no posessions and they all look like assholes!

  • Absolute Crap (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Metal_Demon ( 694989 )
    It is rediculous to call that guy a game addict by any stretch of the imagination (according to the article). When you consider the thousands of people, myself included, who load SWG or EQ or something as soon as they get home and play into the wee hours of the morning, nine hours or less a week is nothing. I'm quite sure I'll play more than nine hours of SWG tomorrow. I might expect this kinda crap from CNN but I thought we knew better on /. This is of course assuming he told the truth about how much he p

  • 7 Shirts (Score:1, Funny)

    by freaksta ( 524994 )
    Ohh that's nice.. "We are very sorry your house burned down, would you please advertise our video game?"
  • Late last night in the wee hours of the morning, a fire broke out in a suburban home. Resident nerd Johnny was able to alert the other people in the house because he was up late having a foursome with three models. This proves that nerds should more often have sex with models. The government, backed by the fire department is implementing a program to keep models having sex with nerds. The goal of the scheme is to have a foursome in every household every night. More on this in tomorrows news. Right now I

  • Stupid Headline (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Quill_28 ( 553921 ) on Friday August 15, 2003 @10:02AM (#6705073) Journal
    >Video game addition saves lives

    Please, it does not save lives.

    That like saying cheap alarms clocks save lives because once my alarm didn't go off, so I missed the plane that crashed.

    Silly.

    • Re:Stupid Headline (Score:3, Insightful)

      by jafuser ( 112236 )
      Maybe not lives, but they can certianly save money, and can help with depression.

      Since I started on my MMO addiction back in November I've been able to finally start saving money since I'm not spending my time out driving around buying junk I don't need anyway.

      I started playing MMO games when I was withdrawing from anti-depressants (be cautious about starting on Paxil -- it is evil).

      These games did a faily good job of keeping me distracted from the withdrawl symptoms. Lately, I'm still a bit dysthymic,
      • OK, i admit to know nothing about depression and little about addiction. I am normally quite happy and stable.

        Again, I know little about this stuff, but I would think that using an addiction to help a depression, would be like robbing Peter to pay Paul. Not really fixing the problem.
        Help me out here.
    • I saved myself from failing a couple tests in college because my alarm didn't go off. Oh wait..I still failed them. Damn!
    • ">Video game addition saves lives Please, it does not save lives."

      And slightly more reliable fire detection could be supplied by smoke detectors, which have the advantage of being cheap and rarely off playing Evercrack.

      Slow news day on Slashdot?

    • Dear Quill,

      I am interested in purchasing your magical alarm clock. If
      possible, please let me know how much you would let it
      go for. I look forward to hearing from you.

      Regards,
      bad_fx
  • > He said the only possessions that he could
    > salvage from his home were "just the clothes on
    > my back."

    Oh my God! His DAoC artefacts got burned as well? Geeze, these RPGs are getting realistic... I'm fireproofing my +4 Mjollnir!

  • I lived on a groundfloor suite during College. And a friend of ours had become addicted to NetHack and came over to play all the time.

    Well, one afternoon after everyone is finally awake up (he's still playing) we notice that one of the window screens is broken, and the Lava Lamp has is out on the sidewalk, broken (it was a few feet away from the window, as if someone tried to steal it, but burnt themselves on the hot-lava).

    So, we ask our friend what happened, as he'd been awake the whole time. He had

  • This happened to me... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by freeBill ( 3843 ) on Friday August 15, 2003 @06:48PM (#6708554) Homepage
    ...back in 1986.

    I was playing videogames (first it was the Colecovision/Adam baseball game with a friend, then I switched over to Ultima IV on the Commodore 64 when he left). When I finally went to bed I smelled smoke. I went downstairs and found an apartment on fire (a burglar had apparently set it on fire to cover his robbery). Then I called the fire department and woke up the rest of the people in the building (which turns out to be kinda hard to do at 3a.m., but the 911 operator gave me some tips).

    It never once occurred to me to credit the videogames. I guess that's because we were so backwards in the '80s. We didn't know we needed to come up with excuses for our addictions.
    • So you spotted an apartment fire, calmly reported it to 911, then patiently got everybody out of the building. Somebody has to point out that this counts as major heroism which probably saved a life or two. Or were you just expressing your Avatar?
  • The video game company - Mystic Entertainment of Fairfax, Va. - sent Machado seven T-shirts and a few hats after hearing about his family's misfortune.

    At least he'll be clothed when he goes to the nearest Internet cafe to get his fix.
  • Pretty funny that they gave the guy's former and current address. What the fuck were they thinking?
    • ...they were thinking you might want to drop him a card, stop by and visit, see if he needed a hand. That you might want to submit his story to /. did not occur to them.
  • I always thought /. was a community, despite the bickering and good natured platform loyalties.... flame on, but this is a story about a fellow gamer who has apparently lost everything... like being cloned without any insurance, losing all possessions... (in reality he may have had a very good home insurance policy).

    In any case I read the article and decided to foward a link to the /. post to the original media outlet with a declaration of intent to aid he and his family... hopefully via small donations to

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