South Korea child 'starves as parents raise virtual baby'

[Zinn]

A South Korean couple who were addicted to the internet let their three-month-old baby starve to death while raising a virtual daughter online, police said.

The pair fed their own premature baby just once a day in between 12-hour stretches at an internet cafe, the official Yonhap news agency reported.

Police officer Chung Jin-won told Yonhap they "lost their will to live a normal life" after losing their jobs.

He said they "indulged themselves online" to escape from reality.

The 41-year-old father and his 25-year-old wife were arrested in the city of Suweon, south of Seoul, earlier this week, five months after they reported the death of their baby.

An autopsy showed her death was caused by a long period of malnutrition.

The couple had become obsessed with nurturing a virtual girl called Anima in the popular role-playing game Prius Online, police said on Friday.

The game enables players to interact with Anima and as they do so, help her to recover her lost memory and develop emotions.

What is this I don't even

[GSDragon]

What the 

They had a child, but instead of taking care of that child, they decided to get addicted to a online game to take care of a virtual child?!?!?

Has the world gone stupid?!?!? They could've played the game without having a kid. But no, they give birth to a kid so the poor child can starve and die while they go out and play a virtual game to take care of a virtual child. Thus wasting a unfortunate real kid's life.

Screwed up man, screwed up.

[Nocturnally Lascivious]

My thoughts exactly.

That shit is just stupid. I mean, they couldn't possibly forgot that they had a child and yet, they consciously neglected their baby to the point where it had died of malnutrition. How fucking retarded can you be? They deserve any jail time they get.

[Cucumber]

Maybe they thought it'd respawn?
Restore last save point?

[sagimine1]

Maybe they thought it'd respawn?
Restore last save point?

Although this maybe a bit harsh and dry but you can modified virtuality while reality your stuck with it and you have to deal with it. As we obviously know you can't escape reality and if you try too serious repercussion bound to happen as with this sad story.

[GustavKlimt]

I am beginning to believe that people arent wanting to face reality.....
ps i hope the baby in the game dies, so it shows they are a failure at everything -- srs.

[Asylum Cat]

Read this in the Korean papers. Raising a virtual baby while their real one starves to death in a room by itself? Why are people like these allowed to breed? They also tried to evade capture. Bunch of sacks of irresponsible shits.