Ramblings, just ramblings
Published on September 7, 2005 By Amitty In MMORPG
So, it seems that after a few deaths, Asia and it's game loving people are going to have a hefty withdraw as early as October of this year.

After the untimely death of a small child while the child's parents left the child alone to go to a internet cafe to get in a few hours of World of Warcraft, the powers that be decided that it was time to put a end to video game related deaths. As early as October of this year Asian governments have asked widely played MMORPG makers, Blizzard in particular, to impose a restriction on the amount of time that a player in the Eastern countries can be on line. The idea is to prevent other issues from happening and continuing to pop up in the news.

One such instance, beleive to be urban myth for a while was the killing of a person over a sword that was obtained in the game Lineage II. The sword in question was lent from the owner to a friend while he stopped playing the game, and the friend sold it. When the original owner found out, he went to the seller's house and murdered him.

Is this really the image that gaming needs at this point in time. There are already many in the USA that would be more than happy to hold these examples up to the media and ask " How long until it happens here?"
Which is a good question.

Online gaming has become a national pastime almost for countries like Tiawan and South Korea, where the estimate amount of people that play any one online game reaches almost 7 million. It is also a way to make some money, with ample opportunity for websites to sell online currency for these games to other consumers. While the amount difference between what they recieve per gold piece to US dollars that it sells for is a huge gap, it is enough to feed a family in some asian countries if the players spend a lot of time collecting money.

The imposed idea is to limit the game time to 3 hrs a day, with allowances for players to log back in after 5 hours not online. After 3 hours, the rewards in these games will be reduces until a point where there are no rewards, be it experience, treasure, or what have you. To be honest, there is no reason that it should go unopposed, considering there have been more that two fatalities this way.
Will there be a case like that here? Will we have to start restricting our own online time, if only to prevent a fatality, and a silly one at that, from happening?

Comments
on Sep 08, 2005
I would say no because we don't live in a strict, freedom-less society. May as well make it so that TVs shut off after a couple of hours because they make people be lazy. Ridiculous. May as well just call it 1984 and be done with it.
on Sep 08, 2005
This is actually great news. It would prevent some farmers from operating. The farmers are most often actual companys that have logins farming 24x7. A restriction like this would kill their business.
on Sep 08, 2005
If someone can neglect their children like that while they go down to the cyber-cafe, what does it matter where they went? Those people could just have easily gone to the pub. WoW didn't kill that child, the parents self-centred lifestyle did.
on Sep 08, 2005
"To be honest, there is no reason that it should go unopposed, considering there have been more that two fatalities this way. "

There is no reason it should go unopposed? How about people who can handle their playing time? Even if it is greater than 3 hrs. Thousands of people watch 3 hrs of TV consecutively every day. At least games are interactive.




"Asia and it's game loving people..."

Additionally, "its" is a posessive pronoun and "it's" is a contraction for "it is".

on Sep 08, 2005
I am from New Hampshire the "Live Free or Die" State. Why is it that the solution to problems like this is always to put limitations or restrictions on people? For every one incident of gaming craziness there are 100's or 1000's of responsible people playing them. If I choose to spend my day off playing computer games it is my business. Government should spend their time prosecuting the screw ups and leave the rest of us alone. We should not cater to the lowest denominator. Addicts will find a way to play regardless of the laws anyway, so they only effect the people that don't need to be policed anyway.

Soldiers are not the only casualties for freedom. It has a real cost, if you are not willing to pay it move to China. Freedom should always come first, always.
on Sep 08, 2005
Yarlen... Too tell ya the truth The U.S. Government is sorta Fascit if you look hard enough Bush is STRONGLY (i Mean really) supporting The Largest Companies in the U.S. and The Major News Agencies are heavily influneced by governement and they have control everywhere in the world sorta reminds me of a "lighter" version of 1984 to me... very few outlets of true freedom are not found. and in reality the U.S. Government may not be strict but its not Completly free if it were The nation would be in anarchy there is a need for Order Which requires a bit of strictness but no so much... but i belive that The U.S. Government will collapse withen the 22nd century if things like this keep going or the game Supreme Ruler 2010 if uve tried the game yet... society is breaking apart... A new world order is coming...
on Sep 08, 2005
Zoomba mods the above comment by lowa11 as -1 Paranoid/Delusional
on Sep 08, 2005
Freedom is a state by state issue in the USA. If you haven't traveled it much or don't live here you prbably wouldn't understand.
on Sep 08, 2005
It is paranoid... i have a "special" Brain but uhh... its better not to think that doom is coming... might not happen let the real ppl deal with it... but freedom is limited in the U.S. and Several Media agencies are Sortof Controlled by the government... its all true on a atleast small level... this what i know from past history and present history...
on Sep 08, 2005
I'm none too fond of the current administration, but by 2008 it'll be gone. It's the people you have to worry about, not the government. It's the people who allow crazy stuff to happen by giving government their consent through voting. Anyway, we're getting off topic....
on Sep 16, 2005
Well, to comment on one of the above, yes, there are people that can 'hold their game', as it were, but from reading all the media that comes out of Asia as far as the level that gamers take it their playing to, I would have to say that it would be a better idea to impose some sort of restriction until people get their priorities straight. I mean, come on, a child lost their life because parents wanted to play online. That is really what we should be looking at.
on Sep 17, 2005
neither am I yarlen, but back with the mmo topic. I think one of the other reasons the asian government decided to past that, is probably due to the online gaming community over there. From what I've heard in the past onling gaming is more or less a sport over there. I guess since so many people pretty much played MMO or other online games so much they probably figure it will cut power bills or something. Sorta like a kill 2 birds with one stone idea.
on Sep 17, 2005
It won't stop farmers (or players), they'll just make more accounts, and rotate them when time's up.
on Sep 19, 2005
agreed, it won't stop users, for the most part, too much, to loop around such measures. The point is that something IS being done. I'm not sure if people really understand, at least for Asia, that MMO lifestyle is becoming a little dangerous. It is fine to look at a article and kind of be amazed at the stuff that is going on, and laugh at it, but there is a problem when things like death result because of a video game. I'm not saying that it is a videogames fault, of course not, tho there are others that would, for sure, jump on the blaming wagon and would like to hold these examples up high. I am glad, through no pressure from anyone else, that companies such as blizzard have agreed to regulate their game in countries where it obviously needs it.

As far as stopping people, yes, it will, for a short time. I imagine that if it becomes too much of a problem, that the powers that be will come down with harsher penalties. As a hard core gamer, I would love to see these kind of issues vanish from the media in general, before someone gets the idea that all games and such will result in this kind of problem.
on Sep 19, 2005
It's not like Blizzard has a choice.  If the Chinese government wants to, it could simply ban Blizzard from the country and make their games illegal. Blizzard certainly doesn't want that and gets the same amount of money either way, so it's in their business interests to obey.