Boy collapses after playing World of Warcraft for 24 hours straight

It is important to understand that this kind of things happen also in other fields of life. People hardly say someone's addicted as a problem just because they wait hours to get that new Harry Potter book or tickets to their favourite bands concert. That's not a problem, and nobody is discussing wheter we should limit the time children spend reading Harry Potter or listening to music.

I agree with Mari - overdoing anything is harmful, there really is no need to concentrate on games in particular or make parents and people overly scared of it. Let's look at the facts: Most people who play Wow or other games aren't going to murder anyone or die because they play, or get their life messed up by it. Wow has over 11 million subcribers, and these kinds of news are like what, ten in the history of Wow, which is several years?

This game does indeed have an addictive nature as do many others. I am one of the 11 million subscribers and have heard of similar things happening. People have stopped going to classes/work and end up failing/getting fired. A girl I know allowed her dog to be destroyed by other dogs just outside her window while playing. There are people who are addicted but the greater number of players are not. This game is what every developer dreams of creating, a great game. For worried parents a word of advice. Set up the accout for your child to where you have control of the billing and so forth. Many parents (in my opinion) do not know about the control features, you can limit your child to the number of hours played a day or days they can or cannot play on. Very handy for the easily distracted elementary/middle/high schoolers.

Boy, that must be SOME game!  I think I'll keep my boy away from it, for as long as I can.

moxiepurple has contributed a photo to this story.

Igromir 2008, Russia, Moscow

Arthur Ivanov has contributed a photo to this story.

Blizzard: World of Warcraft, Wrath of the Lich King

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I just want to say that I have been playing the game since Jan 2005. The only reason he probably collapsed is because he didn't eat, drink water, at least take a break, or something. You can't say "I am never letting my ch ild play this game" because of this incident. There are over 10 mil that play WoW and theres rarely ever a death or incident that happens like this.

People need to know when they need to stop, and those who don't are selfish and stupid.

I'm one of those 10 million people out there that play this game. All I can say about this incident is the game is not the cause of the collapse. It was the poor boy's lack self control.

Telling someone not to do something because of some bad incidents that happened is unjustifiable. It's like saying "Getting out of the house will get you exposed to bad influence, I'll never let my child go out and play anymore." The comment was generalized and biased.

We can't keep holding their hands forever, shielding them from the negatives. =(

I hate articles like this... I was asked to add some of my photos to it, and I refused it. I cannot support this kind of limited-information reporting. It's not the game, it's the outside factors. Not to mention doing ANYTHING for 24 hours is wreckless... My heart goes out to this family and to this child.

People have to understand that this situation is NOT the norm... Myself and some friends had a LAN party for a couple of days starting the day of the release... We took breaks, went out to eat on various occassions and took naps and snoozes in between "binges".  Then our vacation days ran out, and it was back to the RL grind. It was a great time, with great friends. I thank Blizzard for their amazing product and their imaginative way of bringing people together.

Blue Crush,  I beg you not to be biased due to articles like this (for this game or anything else!).  Since you're trying to stay informed, it's obvious you are a concerned parent... So I'm sure it goes without saying that proper monitoring and disscipline will keep your chldren from doing anything like this in excess.

That's why you shouldn't play any video game for 24 hours strait. You could have a child playing Pong or Super Mario Brothers for 24 hours and the same thing would happen. It's not the games fault for the seizure, it's the fact he was in front of the screen for that long of a time.

I've gone for much longer sessions than this child did before and suffered nothing more than a little shame, eye strain, and a sore ass.

I'd say that if your child is prone to epilepsy and is 15 years old to begin with, don't let them participate unregulated in these kinds of activities. I have two daughter's myself age 1 & 6 and for the most part I understand that they don't have the faculties to govern themselves with ANYTHING let alone TV or video games until they are adults.

Whenever I see stories like this that involve a negative connotation to video games I have to ask, how old was the person having the problem and where the hell are his or her parents?

Spooner God has contributed a photo to this story.

Seriously...this is ridiculous.  If this is an epidemic-like problem, then kids need to be weened off of the video games.  Go fly a kite!

Seriously that is fuckings crazy !

newb

Woah! That's too much!