It was an eerie scene on the Fourth Line, off Highway 11 north of Barrie, as a half-moon rose over the cornfields. Television cameras lit the faces of police officers; satellite trucks of television networks crowded the barnyard. Reporters had come from all over to learn the fate of Brandon Crisp.
What they learned on Wednesday night was what family and friends feared most: Police had found the body of a boy they believed to be Brandon.
But by then the story of the missing teen was more than a tragic local story, it had spread because of Brandon’s obsession with video games.
Parents across North America were left wondering if their own children were becoming addicted to the kinds of games Brandon was playing.
That concern resonates with the game-makers.
The Post called Future Shop on Thursday to ask whether it was appropriate, in light of Brandon’s death, for the store to hold a festive launch planned for last night across Canada for the new Xbox game, Gears of War 2. In the game, participants are embroiled in a genocidal war with subterranean locusts.
On Thursday night the chain cancelled the parties outside its stores in Toronto and Vancouver. Events will go ahead in other parts of the country.
“Future Shop has decided to cancel all the festivities out of respect for the family of Brandon Crisp,” said spokeswoman Stefanie Niewada.
Brandon had been obsessed with the online Xbox 360 game Call of Duty 4, in which several participants in different locations fight wars alongside a squadron of others — with whom they communicate over the Internet, using headphones and speakers.
He disappeared on Thanksgiving Day after his parents took away his Xbox.
Brandon had been a goalie in the Barrie rep hockey system and was “a very competitive boy,” his father Steve Crisp told the Barrie Examiner, adding, “he always gives 120% effort in anything he did, and Xbox was his new sport.”
The slight boy, 5-foot-2 and 100 pounds, became “obsessed with Call of Duty,” his mother, Angelika Crisp, told the newspaper during the three-week search for her son.
“That’s his life right now.”
She said she had taken the gaming system away numerous times.
Study of Internet addiction is embryonic. Louise Nadeau, a psychologist at the Université de Montréal, directs a new institute on addiction. She said on Thursday that, while data so far is scant, there is evidence that some people can become hooked on the Internet, just as some develop dependencies on food, alcohol, drugs, gambling or even exercise machines.
“I’m 62,” she says. “The main problem I had as an adolescent of 15 was that my mother said I was a slave to TV. There’s something around being 13, 14 or 15 that kids find it easier to live through a screen.”
She says the difference with Internet games is that you become a participant.
“If you are playing these games you can easily move into another world,” she says. “Our world becomes more and more foreign.”
She said one patient in Quebec had been locked in his room for 2 ½ years playing video games. A therapist had to “slowly reintegrate him into reality,” she says. “I think what the parents did [with Brandon] was cold turkey withdrawal.”
She also notes that participants in online games can feel responsible for the avatar that they become online.
“These people are active participants. Addiction sets in when one feels responsible for what happens in the online world.”
Ms. Nadeau has fielded scores of calls recently about Internet addiction, from journalists as far away as North Carolina and California.
Microsoft, the company that sells Xbox, did feel some responsibility in Brandon’s disappearance: The company doubled a reward for information leading to the boy, to $50,000, and grudgingly co-operated with police who sought IP addresses, to learn the identities of those who played the video game with Brandon.
But on Thursday, Microsoft spokesman John Thibodeau replied to a reporter’s call with an e-mail that read in part: “Unfortunately, Microsoft is unable to provide a spokesperson at this time. Microsoft is deeply saddened by the events of yesterday. Our thoughts are with the Crisp family, Brandon’s friends and their community at this time.”
Heide Demaria is manager of Colossal Video in Barrie, which shares a strip mall near the Crisp home with a pizza parlour, a vet clinic and a tanning salon. Brandon often came in with his mother and his twin sister, Samantha, she said. “They seemed all in all like a really nice family,” she says.
The shop rents several Xbox 360 games; Ms. Demaria is not surprised Brandon became hooked, noting, “TV used to be the babysitters and then the games came along.”
Her own son, 17, also got over-involved with Internet-linked video games, she said.
“I’ve seen him just screaming and yelling and carrying on all over the house, crying because another boy had taken his little bag of goodies. It was just a game.”
Brandon’s school, St. Joseph High School in Barrie, held a morning mass on Thursday in his honour.
A forensic examination of the body is set for today in Toronto. Foul play is not suspected in his death.
Im confused.. did he kill himself because he got his xbox taking away? I would of thought if he was that addicted he would of waited till after he played Gears 2 and COD 5..
What this article fails to mention is that his parents more or less ENCOURAGED his running-away, as his father even helped pack his bags as he was getting ready to leave. I majorly blame the parents for being that stupid, letting a 15-year-old run away.
I have no idea as to why Microsoft feels somewhat responsible.
Addict is the way to describe this. I love playing video games but I give up my PS3 and 360 when finals roll around. I know when I shouldn't be playing.
Me and my class were talking about this, and were doing projects on gaming, ( I get to play wow for school :P ) Anyways, pretty sad, I remember when I first got wow I wasn't eating or going out much, my mom came to my room to feed me. Pretty sad. Now im good tho! I don't play as much. hehe
I hope you morons realize that everyone is different.
Some people prefer one over the other, while some don't really care. For me, it depends on the game, not the console. I just chose to have a PS3 instead of a 360.
I hate it when people blame video games for their problems. Sure it's linked to his running away, but like LiKuid said, his parents didn't really make the situation any better. They realized that the boy was competitive, so they should have understood why he enjoyed COD4 so much. Online gaming is basically a sport, just without the physicality. It's competitive, entertaining, and easy to setup. Why wouldn't it be addicting? It's pretty sad that adults need to analyze all this crap before they actually understand why it's so addicting. Sometimes I wonder who actually has the higher intelligence: teens or adults.
I hope you morons realize that everyone is different.
Some people prefer one over the other, while some don't really care. For me, it depends on the game, not the console. I just chose to have a PS3 instead of a 360.
I hate it when people blame video games for their problems. Sure it's linked to his running away, but like LiKuid said, his parents didn't really make the situation any better. They realized that the boy was competitive, so they should have understood why he enjoyed COD4 so much. Online gaming is basically a sport, just without the physicality. It's competitive, entertaining, and easy to setup. Why wouldn't it be addicting? It's pretty sad that adults need to analyze all this crap before they actually understand why it's so addicting. Sometimes I wonder who actually has the higher intelligence: teens or adults.
Its just a mild joke man, but seriously, theres far too few online features ( and other issues) on the PS3 that would even warrant anybody getting hooked on it.
You cant fully blame parents since video games are a thing that most older parents just do not get like we do. They dont understand the concepts, why its so competitive and fun, and most importantly, why the children are addicted. So they coped the best way they could, by taking it away from the kid. The issue is not about kids that are stuck on playing the games all the time, but the children that are ADDICTED. That issue is alot more serious than just being competitive, and is truely handled better by a threapist.
I think more parents need to better recognize when a child is merely playing too much, or is truly addicted to online gaming, since as gaming and internet as a whole will bemore robust and integrated into our daily lives, this will be a problem that our generation will have to face more heavily as we grow up and become parents ourselves.
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this went through perfectly! didn't think it would happen.
