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Dad Hires In-Game 'Assassins' To Get His Son To Stop Gaming
An anonymous reader writes
"An irritated father of a 23-year-old gamer hired 'In-game assassins' to attempt to make his son quit playing video games and have him get a job. 'Feng's idea was that his son would get bored of playing games if he was killed every time he logged on, and that he would start putting more effort into getting a job.' While the son recently had a job at a software development company he quit because he decided he didn't like the work."
No need for that, just kick him out.
He will find a job when he needs a place to live and food to eat.
How does this crap get on Slashdot? Seriously! Can we possibly have some tech related news that promotes some form or interesting and educational discourse?
Please!
in game assassin. 200 bucks a day, plus expenses. I can even see the misspelled gold lettering on my office door.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Because he thinks his son should make money instead of game all day, he hires someone to make money by gaming all day?
If you kill him, he will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.
I should use this sig to advertise my book ISBN-13 : 978-1501515132.
At best, you would be encouraging him to find a different game. Presumably, he would find one without player kills.
People generally find jobs because they need a job--not because they are too bored to do something else.
I don't practice what I preach because I'm not the kind of person that I'm preaching to.
I'd love to see someone try to make a career out of this! Pick a game like WOW and then advertise that you will make the game hell for whoever for a fee in an attempt to get them to quit. Two main clients I'd image: dad's and girlfriends. Wonder how long before Blizzard or lawyers step in.
What if his son is running a business by selling his services as an ingame assassin?
Sounds like the kid is living a good life at home; he's fed, he's got internet, presumably some pocket change. Time to cut off the internet, stop paying for the cell phone, etc. Kid needs incentive to get a job it sounds like; he needs to learn to appreciate what it takes to afford the life he's been living. Don't kick him out; that's draconian and it risks the kid winding up on a street with no food, etc. and no prospect of landing a job.
I think the father is overthinking this. I can't get at TFA from here, but if the son is living at the father's house, there are much better solutions. If it's a game console, disconnect it and donate it to the Salvation Army. If it's the son's personal property, fine, but if the son is living at the father's home, the internet connection probably belongs to the father. Login to router, disallow son's device. (And change the admin password.)
What it comes down to is this: "It's my house. If you want to live as you please, go out and get your own place. You're old enough. And if you think you can keep an apartment as a professional game player, let me know how that works out for you."
We had a similar issue at my house. I was at work and missed the fireworks, but I'm told they were spectacular. Wife was absolutely addicted to a Facebook game, wouldn't get off the couch except to go to the bathroom. Daughter needed food, couldn't get wife's attention. So daughter went out to the garage and turned off the router. (Wife doesn't know a router from a coffee pot, didn't know what to turn on.) Whoo boy. Initially wife's reaction was "I'm not going to do anything for you until you turn the internet back on" (imagine that much louder and a bit hysterical). Daughter's response "you weren't doing anything anyway, so what have I lost?" I'm told that after shouting back and forth for awhile, and a half hour of sulking, wife finally got up and made dinner with very bad grace. As soon as the food was ready, daughter turned on the router.
Later, I got home, said "hi" got no answer. Said "Hello" a little louder, still no answer. Called wife's name, got "Don't. Talk. To. Me." Ooookay then.....
I tend to be self-correcting on games. I may have mentioned before, I was a Warcraft addict for awhile, and when I realized I couldn't stay away, I gave the disc to daughter and told her to hide it. A year and a half later, I still don't know where it is. But I have so much more time at home to actually interact with my family (when wife isn't playing facebook games) and do stuff around the house.
In yet another instance, I had a nephew staying with me, and when he quit college because it's "too hard" and decided he could make a living as a game tester if he just put in enough practice, it was time for him to find some place else to live. I hear he slept in his car for awhile.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
If you're assassinated in a video game, what happens to your assets? I can totally see a new a career here. First, I play video games all day long and get really good at them. Then, I offer to assassinate other players with the stipulation that I get to keep all their goods. So I get real world cash for the hit and virtual world goods from the person I just wiped out. And all while sitting on my ass playing video games. Hmmm I think I need to take this idea to a good VC firm before Zuckerberg steals my idea and integrates it into Facebook.
He'll make a killing.
This is a fairly common problem in Asia, and possibly more prevalent in Chinese speaking nations. Sons continue to be revered to the point of being spoiled rotten. So they go through school and enter the workforce incapable of handling the responsibilities and stresses of life. They expect everything handed to them and many have trouble being told want to do in the workplace. It's not fundamentally different than the entitlement culture parents are creating in the west, but it's a bit more focused in Asia and manifests itself a little different.
Where American youth expect they should be free to pursue a life of leisure young men in Asia have it in their heads that they're budding entrepreneurs. So they'll refuse to get a job because they don't want to work for the man. They leech off the parents and because of the strong sense of family and obligation parents will support them indefinitely. They'll even go as far as helping them start a business which doesn't improve their work ethic. For the guys with wealthy and connected parents they'll get a cushy, high paying job doing not much of anything. The irony is that the daughters still get the short of the stick, but end up being the responsible ones who in the end support the parents and the slacker brothers.
Of course, there is the subset who have no aspirations whatsoever, like this guy. So his father didn't kick him in the ass when he should have, let the problem persist and grow, and now is trying to do something about it when it's too late.
Just cut his internet access off after 10pm...oh wait, he might try to drug you so he can get his internet on.
I'd quit and do what they said out of pure geek respect for pulling it off!
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
The problem is loosing your child. China's one child policy has left much of the country with families with one child (little emperors) that know that they can just leave there parents which for a Chinese family is a horrible idea, unthinkable, especially a son. So you have children that know they have presure that threat to disown their parents as extreme leverage. So the "Just kick him out" is truly a scary , not to be considered because of the consequences action. No wonder the father took indirect steps to make his son want to stop game playing. The Chinese do things indirectly and communication is an art in a way that we don't fully understand. So assuming the same value system, and behaviours we would take in the West have any resonance in the East.