[frogus]

nwah ha ha! 512kbps I love you!

anyway, to get back on topic, I think it is appaling how the press can take an effect and say it's a cause...
In the several recent 'why do you play RPGs' and 'why play videogames' threads, you will have noticed that the reason PC games are fun is because they are exciting, whereas real life is boring. So the appeal is greater to people with more boring lives. There are thousands of people however who 'just like videogames', independantly of how boring their lives are, and of course there are plenty of people who have boring lives but 'just don't like videogames'...so the clinch comes really when someone is of the type who just really likes videogames due to their personality (similar to many SYMers I would hazard), and is of a depressive tendancy. Here the attraction to videogames is great, but it is multiplied ten-fold by the extreme boredom with which depressives view their lives...so the appeal of computer games is massive and dangerous and addictive.

Suicide is a possible of depression. Videogame addiction is also a possible effect of depression. This in no way means that suicide is an effect of videogame addiction.