we’d occasionally get emails from our Korean or Chinese partners discussing the death of a player who had spent 36 hours or something close to that gaming and ended up dying of a stroke or heart-attack.
I seriously doubt these stories. For one I doubt it's physically possible, you'd be unable to actually play the game long before a stroke or heart attack could be induced purely by neglecting all your other needs, if that's even a thing that happens. Hunger alone makes it hard to keep focus, especially after skipping multiple meals.
For two I've literally only heard these stories come out of China, Korea, and maybe Japan. If it was an actual thing it would happen anywhere. It sounds more like a myth spread by parents in those countries afraid of video games.
If anything close to that has actually happened, there had to have been a ton more factors at play that get ignored in favor of "it was the video games' fault". Similar to how in America people have been quick to attribute shootings to video games as soon as it comes out that the shooter played one.
China and Korea both have a pronounced PC Cafe culture in gaming that is largely missing outside of East Asia (not entirely - I'm aware that part of this is about physical access to computers and that the broader developing world depends on PC Cafes for said access - that said, the centrality of those places to gaming is a cultural hallmark of East Asia, particularly Korea and China). That means that unlike in the US, where, if I spend 24 hours gaming and end up dying, it isn't a public event, the same is not true in a PC Cafe.
PC Cafes serve food, as well as providing computer and internet access. That, along with partner-benefits for accounts playing at PC Cafes, is part of their selling point.
As I noted elsewhere, people don't stay up for 36 hours and suffer a lethal heart-attack or stroke out of the blue - prolonged sleeplessness worsens pre-existing medical issues. Consistent sleeplessness, in particular, is associated with hypertension. Someone who doesn't skip sleep regularly struggles to function at all with that little sleep. Someone with practice may not struggle to function as much, but they also incur a greater health risk,
This is incredibly rare - like, less than once a year rare. The public response is moral panic.
It isn't the video games' fault that someone who likely has other health issues dies while playing them, but in an industry where the central myth is "we build fun", finding out someone died using your product fucking sucks. I don't want my work to be the thing someone uses to kill themselves, whether intentionally or not.
I seriously doubt these stories. For one I doubt it's physically possible, you'd be unable to actually play the game long before a stroke or heart attack could be induced purely by neglecting all your other needs, if that's even a thing that happens. Hunger alone makes it hard to keep focus, especially after skipping multiple meals.
For two I've literally only heard these stories come out of China, Korea, and maybe Japan. If it was an actual thing it would happen anywhere. It sounds more like a myth spread by parents in those countries afraid of video games.
If anything close to that has actually happened, there had to have been a ton more factors at play that get ignored in favor of "it was the video games' fault". Similar to how in America people have been quick to attribute shootings to video games as soon as it comes out that the shooter played one.
So, there are some key things to note here: