A Taiwanese man was found dead on January 8 inside of an internet cafe in Kaohsiung city. Authorities say the man had been playing video games for three days.
An autopsy found that the 32-year-old, identified only as Hsieh, died from cardiac arrest caused by exhaustion.
Hunei Police spokesperson Jennifer Wu said Hseih was found motionless and not breathing in front of his computer by employees at the gaming cafe around 10am. Emergency officials discovered that he had been dead for several hours, and rigor mortis had already set in.
"The CCTV footage from the Internet cafe showed that he had a small struggle before he collapsed motionless," Wu told CNN.
Hseih was a regular at the cafe, and employees said he frequently indulged in multi-day marathons of "combat-style games."
"He has been unemployed for a long time, and internet cafes were the only place he could go to," a cafe employee explained. "His family said he would disappear for two to three days on end.
"When tired, he would sleep face-down on the table or doze off slumped in his chair. That is why we were not aware of his condition in the beginning."
According to police, other gamers continued to play on their computers as Hsieh's body was examined and taken away.
On January 1, a man in Taipei City was found dead at an internet cafe after a five-day gaming binge. Police in that case also said that cafe patrons appeared unaffected by the death.
