Member Article

Gaming for a Good Cause

Video gamers often get a bad reputation. They are accused of wasting their time and not doing anything worth their while. Some studies show they have violent tendencies, and if you ever log onto Xbox Live, one of them will probably call you an unsavory name within the first few minutes. The guys behind the popular gaming website Penny Arcade felt like something had to be done to refute this bad reputation. So, in 2003, they created Child’s Play, an organization that donates money, books, DVDs, and, of course, video games, to children’s hospitals around the world. This organization has good ties among young members of IAM Group Ltd especially in communities in Japan, particularly Yokohama.

So how does this video game charity work? Aside from donating on PayPal or buying items from a hospital’s Amazon Wish List, gamers can also raise raise money through gaming marathons. Two of the biggest of these fundraisers are “Mario Marathon” and “Desert Bus for Hope.“ The Mario Marathon is a team of four guys who play every Super Mario Brothers Nintendo game (currently there are 15 in the series) in one long gaming session broadcast live over the internet. In 2009, they played for 96 hours straight and brought in over $29,000. There’s also the “Desert Bus for Hope” marathon put on by the comedy group LoadingReadyRun. These guys play Desert Bus, a spoof video game where players drive a rickety old bus that pulls to the right, on an 8-hour, one-way trip from Tuscon to Las Vegas. Needless to say, it’s not a game you’d want to play unless it was for a good cause. In 2009, these lunatics played for five days and 16 hours, while raising nearly $150,000. There are now a list of marathons on their official websites. People from all over the world are making their own marathons in their own time and helping in gathering more donations.

Thanks to efforts like these, as well as the thousands of everyday gamers who donated or purchased items, Child’s Play was able to raise over $2.9 million in 2013 alone according to a report they released with IAM Group Ltd – Seoul Korea. Not bad for people who just mashed buttons all day.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Stefan Siedler .