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Role Playing (Games) Government The Courts News

Dead Chinese Gamer Wasn't A WoW Player 62

Posted by Zonk from the bad-story dept.
Despite earlier reports to the contrary, GamePolitics has the news that the dead Chinese gamer whose parents were suing Blizzard was not a World of Warcraft player. From the post: "World of Warcraft (WoW) was not released in China until May 2005... the actual lawsuit claimed he committed suicide after playing the real time strategy game Warcraft III... Without WoW, it would have been much harder to pin the blame on Warcraft because it's a strategy game, not role playing. But with WoW, and the recent focus on the alleged addictive qualities of MMORPGs, the lawsuit gets much more attention..."
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Dead Chinese Gamer Wasn't A WoW Player More

Dead Chinese Gamer Wasn't A WoW Player

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  • he jumped out the window (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    when he realized that every character around him were NPCs.
  • The English version of WoW was out before then, and I'm sure we can all think of ways around the Chinese censorweb.

  • Release dates (Score:5, Insightful)

    by secolactico ( 519805 ) on Friday November 25, 2005 @03:40PM (#14114677) Journal
    From the post: "World of Warcraft (WoW) was not released in China until May 2005"

    So? Lots of players from several countries (including Asian coutries) play on the US servers. Several from Europe did too.

    WoW does not do geolocation to filter connections.

    Likewise, almost all "chinese farmers" in WoW play in the US servers. That's where their customers are.

    • Re:Release dates (Score:5, Informative)

      by Larch ( 229337 ) <larch AT gmx DOT co DOT uk> on Friday November 25, 2005 @03:48PM (#14114719)
      From the article: "the actual lawsuit claimed he committed suicide after playing the real time strategy game Warcraft III"

      So if the article is correct the lawsuit was always about Warcraft III and not WoW. It doesn't really have anything to do with release dates or being able to access US Servers.
    • Well I think the trend is towards more moderate users becoming defined as addicts as certain industries like psychologists and the like smell money. It has and will always be the already mentally ill peoples that take anything that involves a whif of delusion or fanatasy too far.
    • RTFA, it says the actual lawsuit claims he died after playing Warcraft III, the RTS, and that somewhere along the line it got bungled into WoW, most likely in order to get more attention based on the "addicted qualities of mmo's" and other videogame hype. The release date comment was in there as a means to investigation, someone said hey wait a minute that doesnt add up, then delved further and found that it was indeed War3 that was mentioned in the lawsuit

    • So? Lots of players from several countries (including Asian coutries) play on the US servers.

      WoW does not do geolocation to filter connections.
      Play Lineage II, and you'll see why you'll want geolocation and a firm policy to ban farmers, even for WoW's standards.


      Likewise, almost all "chinese farmers" in WoW play in the US servers. That's where their customers are.

      That's also where the torturers (by continuous PK, aka botkilling) are as well. When you can outright disrupt farming operations in multiple areas,

  • Nip it in the bud already (Score:4, Interesting)

    by spyrochaete ( 707033 ) on Friday November 25, 2005 @03:41PM (#14114679) Homepage Journal
    Video games are "addictive" because people are not "addicted" to the real world. They are displeased with their surroundings so they escape into a more palatable place. The cure to video game addiction is to make the real world a better place. Why haven't video game addicts sued their respective governments for driving them to games?
    • Because the government has no reason to obey the people?
    • So it's the goverments job to make your life happy?
    • Isn't it a kind of scary concept that a government should try and make EVERYONE happy with their life. Suppose that like Tom Servo, "I want to decide who lives and who dies.". Should I be made happy?
      Not very thing is the government's fault or responsibility.

    • You know, this is a good point I've never given much thought to. What must things be like in Korea, Japan, and China (especially Korea and China) to drive the people that live there to become so obsessive over video games. Sure you hear the occasional story about this sort of thing happening elsewhere but the vast majority take place in Korea and China with a lesser occurance in Japan. Just think about it.
      • Dude, you don't have to go to China or Korea to find people who are unhappy with their lives and substituting their life for a less destitute one with a videogame. I dated a "Geek" girl for a while who was hopelessly addicted to MUDs... My brother has a masters degree and can't get a job, he plays WoW in my parents back room 18 hours a day.
      • It's happening everywhere! A study was done in Canada which stated that low income Canadian households spent twice as much on video games as those with a higher annual income.
      • Wild guess, I have no idea about the actual situation, but as far as I know Internet Cafes are quite popular in China and Korea, while over here (germany) those don't play much of a role, especially when it comes to gaming. Those that play games, play them at home. So maybe the situation isn't different, it may simply be more visible, since the players play in the public Internet Cafes instead of at home.
      • The idea that reality will ever improve to the point where escapist entertainment will disappear sounds disturbingly close to their propaganda. Free nations will always be imperfect, and fantasy will remain popular as long as we're limited in economics, worldview, and general physicalities.

  • Ahh, natural selection at it's finest. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by adminsr ( 919472 ) <adminsr@gmail.com> on Friday November 25, 2005 @03:52PM (#14114741)
    Once upon a time, there was a guy named Darwin. Though his ideas have been contorted into the Theory of Evolution, his principles were brilliant. This is clearly an example of natural selection. This one deserves a Darwin Award for sure. http://www.darwinawards.com/ [darwinawards.com]

  • China (Score:5, Insightful)

    by king-manic ( 409855 ) on Friday November 25, 2005 @03:55PM (#14114762)
    When I was in china in may, I coudl nto find 1 legitimate copy of WOW. I couldnt' find 1 cafe that had a real copy of WOW on it. So if it turns out that not only was he not on WOW and was playing an illegal copy of war3, what possibel responsibility could blizzard have?

    • Re:China (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Iriel ( 810009 ) on Friday November 25, 2005 @04:27PM (#14114920) Homepage
      Unless Blizzard has GMs/players specifically coaxing people into staying on the game, I fail to see how they're responsible even if WoW was already out for three years. A gamer has a choice to start playing and whether to keep playing or to stop. Yes, the social aspect can be addictive, and there is such a thing as video game addiction, but the same is true for alcohol, television and even porn. With very limited exceptions in exceedingly rare cases can you logically blame the addiction on the substance itself.
      • The new parental controls are an excellent CYA tool. Soon a parent will be able to control the times an account is allowed to be used.

        It should also be a ton of fun to use on my roommates account >:)

        • The new parental controls are an excellent CYA tool. Soon a parent will be able to control the times an account is allowed to be used.

          Can you use the tool to kick a player? That'd be cool, if really really rude

    • Yes, that's because it's `evil western spiritual influence`. They have guards at TV/radio stations to ensure nothing they don't like gets put on air, and you think they'd let such a western-style game slip through? Especially one where they could communicate with the outside world (chinese communication is supposedly cut off from the rest of the world and vice versa)...

      Then there's the publicity aspect, no-one cares so much about warcraft 3 any more (except me, i play WC3 but not WoW) because it's been ou

  • "Strategy" (Score:1, Funny)

    by Mini-Geek ( 915324 )
    He was playing a strategy game and died? Here's a strategy for him: don't play Warcraft III so much you die...he must've been really bad at the game to have such a poor strategy he couldn't even figure that out.

  • Causation (Score:3, Interesting)

    by GigsVT ( 208848 ) on Friday November 25, 2005 @05:43PM (#14115247) Journal
    An interesting fact is that 100% of the people that died while playing video games had consumed substances containing dihydrogen monoxide in the last 6 hours.

    Seriously though, with so many millions of people playing games upwards of 20-30 hours a week, it's expected that some people that would have died randomly anyway (heart defect, whatever) would wind up dying in front of the screen.

    No one much bats an eye when some teenage athelete dies on the field, it happens all the time. Pushing yourself is more likely to cause latent disorders to surface.

  • Ehhh... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Guppy06 ( 410832 ) on Friday November 25, 2005 @06:23PM (#14115466)
    "Without WoW, it would have been much harder to pin the blame on Warcraft because it's a strategy game, not role playing."

    It was a heck of a lot more RPG than WarCraft II or StarCraft, what with the whole "heroes" mechanic and all.
    • It depends on how you define "role play". Yes, it had hero units, who gained experience and new abilities and progressed, and it seems that's the defining characteristics of computer RPG players these days. But role-playing taken literally doesn't mean your characters go up levels every now and then. It means the game gives you the opportunity to experience the world through your characters eyes. It generally means some level of emotional involvement in the characters - thus all the posts on the net about A

  • Where in this game? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Xarius ( 691264 ) on Friday November 25, 2005 @07:50PM (#14115934) Homepage
    A thirteen year-old Chinese boy jumped to his death last year from a 24 story building, allegedly after playing too much World of Warcraft. -- Joystiq [joystiq.com].

    I was just wondering exactly what portion of World of Warcraft, Warcraft III, or any Blizzard game contains a 24 storey building. And what part of this fictional game area involves you jumping to your death from it?
    • You've never been to Thunderbluff.
    • Actually there is a quest in the "Thousand Needles" area that requires you to jump to(what would be) your death from a very high mesa, but magic saves you at the last second.
    • I can (almost) understand the claim about WoW, there are many times where you jump from high locations. (Albeit, a lot of times you just die from jumping so high.. and you'd think the kid would have taken the hint from that.) ..but Warcraft III? I can't think of ANY jumping scenes of any kind from Warcraft III. Not one. And you can't really create your own either, it's a top-down view RTS, with no actual way "to" jump. So exactly how is this a reinactment of any kind? It honestly sounds as if the kid was s
    • Thunder Bluff.

      Seriously. Falling there hurts. Bring a [Parachute Cloak].

  • Ban Video Games (Score:2, Insightful)

    by nurb432 ( 527695 )
    Just ban them all.

    They are evil, and have no redeeming social value.

    No one needs to play a 'video game'. No reason for them to exist, except to corrupt the mind.
    • I am video game you insensitive clod

    • Re:Ban Video Games (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Supurcell ( 834022 )
      Video games have had a positive impact on me. Playing many computer RPGs has increased my problem solving abilities as well as my lexicon. They kept me away from drugs and alcohol, which have much more harmful side effects. They have introduced me to many new friends from around the world.

      Playing video games is no more harmful than reading a book.

      Forsooth, such a post would be made by someone with the sig: Booth was a patriot.
    • I agree entirely.

      So if you happen to be playing WoW on Cenarion Circle, and are going to follow this advice, please leave me all your gold.

      kthxbai.
  • Any game can be addictive!

    For example, I was playing NannyMUD text MUD at lysator for three day, and then committed suicide.

    In fact, I jumped from the suicide tower 3 times to see what would happen, but nothing much happened except loosing levels and some XP, which was not a big deal since quest points where holding me back.

    So there.
    • Lol MUDs! What i find funny is that because MMORPGs have become mainstream, people are trying to deal with their addicting affects now as though they were new news. Ask anyone who played a good mud back in the day, and they will tell you, it was damn hard to type quit sometimes! In a good IVE (interactive virtual environment) you always feel like you're going from somewhere to somewhere to do something or meet someone. I think that "hearts clubs diamonds spades" clearly enough expresses that successful M

  • Jumps-too-conclusion dept.? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by paintswithcolour ( 929954 ) on Saturday November 26, 2005 @02:11PM (#14119654)
    For me this perhaps reflects more on the danger of journalism drawing conclusions where the evidence is not there. Rereading the orginal cited source, from Xinhua, make it clear that the parents are suing 'The makers of World of Warcraft', nothing states a direct relation to the game itself. Perhaps this is merely a slip...would suing 'Blizzard, The Makers of World of Warcraft' prevent the same conclusion hopping?

    Furthurmore the orginal Red Herring article goes on to discuss the 'gaming backlash' and governmental involvement in cutting out aspects of gaming, specifically those on-line. Now I've hear critique of Chinia and their attitude to this before, this lawsuit was in a number of sources related to this, which could now become a little more irrelevant. It seems, therefore, that western journalism has contorted facts to make another point about China's meddiling in an electronic society. Reminds me of the recent story that the BBC were getting too involved and placing too much pressure about the issue of censorship.

  • So are we just now finally retributing the Soviets for Tetris? How many hours were wasted by that infectious little game, now is the time for our revenge! Lets ship some computers to Cuba with free copies of WoW or W3, Blizzard will singlehandedly destroy the last traces of Communism on the planet! :)

    Im.
  • With piracy so rampant in China, I was surprised that there were no news of a Chinese gamer committing suicide after trying to beat the water temple in Zelda: Ocarina of Time. Now THAT'S something to commit suicide over.
  • At least we know it isn't only fundamentalist Christians that blame the deaths of their idiot offspring on RPGs.

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