Image via Wikipedia

Looking for ways to get back at your ex-lover for leaving you and breaking your heart into a thousand pieces?

You could ceremoniously burn all of their possessions in a giant bonfire. Or you could make a mini voodoo doll and torture it from the comfort of your own room. But those solutions are so 1990s… may I suggest a revenge tactic fit for our digital age?

How about a cold, ruthless murder of his or her virtual video game character?

That’s what, according to this article, a 43-year old Japanese piano teacher did when her online husband divorced her in “Maple Story“, an online role-playing game comparable to the popular game titled “Second Life“.

The virtual divorce apparently made her so angry that she logged onto her virtual ex-husband’s profile and virtually killed his virtual avatar character. She now faces up to five years in prison (unfortunately for her, not a virtual prison) for “illegal access onto a computer and manipulating electronic data.”

How is this possible? I admit I used to play The Sims as a kid, but this is taking it to a whole other level. The Associated Press article does a great job of highlighting the absurdity of this game:

“… players in “Maple Story” raise and manipulate digital images called “avatars” that represent themselves, while engaging in relationships, social activities and fighting against monsters and other obstacles.“ (Emphasis mine.)

How are people becoming so removed from their actual lives — while simultaneously becoming so absorbed into their virtual avatar in a game in which they fight monsters — that they are willing to risk their well-being in real life? Dear piano teacher: you are 43 years old and you just threw a part of your life down the drain because of an online divorce. And to the “husband”: you are just as bizarre for complaining to the police because of the death of your “beloved avatar”.

Do yourselves a favor: please wake up, kill all of your avatars, and start living your real life. Or at least, don’t endanger your real livelihood for your virtual one.

I leave you with this incredibly creepy YouTube video made by some Second Life player (SFW… but I warn you, it is really creepy).

Tags: Maple Story, Second Life, The Sims

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 28th, 2008 at 6:00 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.