Next Week, On A Very Special Episode Of "Diff'rent Strokes"…

Hollywood is ‘crafting’ a movie based around the mindblowing spectre that MMOs may be bad for you.

The story focuses on a married man who spends as many as twenty hours a day on a computer, existing through an avatar who is a thriving, musclebound entrepreneur. In reality, he is a diabetic, chain-smoking 53-year-old.

The movie is based on this article from last year about Second Life marital hijinks, so I fully expect a caring, nuanced portrayal of pixelated nudity.

  • Bonedead

    I blame SL.

  • JuJutsu

    Wonder who they will cast for the role of Prokofy Neva?

  • Amaranthar

    This remindeds me of an incident way back when D+D was popular. A genius kid at Michigan State University disappeared and it was thought that something bad happened to him as a result of activities playing D+D.
    The story is very interesting, and [a href="http://pc.gamespy.com/articles/539/539197p1.html" target="_blank"]GameSpy[/a] has the complete story.

  • Amaranthar

    GameSpy
    My HTML is in the noob stage forevermore.

  • Vetarnias

    About the D&D incident: Didn’t they make a film out of that one too, starring a very young Tom Hanks? Or is that based on another case altogether?

    My concern here is that Verbinski is going to direct it. I fear he’s going to go for his usual horror and/or comedy thing, and I’m not sure he’s the ideal guy to film straight drama — which could work if handled correctly. If this is another Ring with WoW, I’ll pass.

    Better than Uwe Boll, I’ll concede.

  • lol

    Who will they cast as Prokofy?

    Philip Seymour Hoffman.

  • Ibn

    @Vetarnias: Yes, that’s the same case. The disappearance of James Egbert led to a work of fiction (“Mazes & Monsters”), a TV movie by the same name (this is what Hanks starred in) and a non-fiction book by the detective hired to find him, William Dear (“The Dungeon Master”).

    I read The Dungeon Master years and years ago… it’s much less a story about gaming as it is a story about one troubled young man.

  • Boanerges

    The only real Verbinski movie I liked was the original Pirates of the Carribean. The sequels were overblown and squandered the superb resources from the first movie to make a few fast bucks (and I hear #4 is on the way, sadly).

    Honestly, they should make a movie about the social lives of community managers. It could be a comedy in the mold of Pushing Tin except that, instead of laying down on an active runway, they could unplug network cables to the servers.

  • Jade Falcon

    At least make it interesting,like say,He get’s sucked into the game through the screen.Said pissed off wife comes by see’s he isn’t around but some game is running and she decides too see what all the fuss is about and proceeds to make the hubby looking avatar on screen go through all sorts of torment.

  • Ardanna

    I wonder what happened with the couple in the linked story? It’s always interesting to see how these things go because they really go could anywhere.

    Maybe she took the old if you can’t beat them, join them, approach? Maybe he quit realizing he really was too involved, or maybe after virtual wife ditched him (or he her).

    May his real wife left him, or maybe, maybe… maybe? I’m mildly curious.

  • Aet

    @Jade Falcon

    Disney stole your idea and turned it into a kiddie movie. Naturally it features Adam Sandler.

    Bedtime Stories