There are 1187 kilometers between New Jersey and Florida. It would take about 17 hours to drive the road along the east coast of the United States to get there, and you have to be very convinced to want to do it, of course. This is the case of Edward Kang, a 20-year-old boy who flew from one place to another with a single motivation: to hit the person behind a character from his favorite MMO, ‘ArcheAge’. Above all, clear priorities in life.
Hammering for life
‘ArcheAge’ is a Korean MMORPG that was born on January 15, 2013 and, paradoxically, has closed in Europe and North America on June 27, eleven years after its launch. And the paradox is, precisely, that Kang (a name not affiliated with Marvel) committed his attack just four days before the closure, on June 23.
Kang took a plane from New Jersey to Florida, got off, bought a hammer at a nearby store, knocked on Zachary Dinh’s door, and started hitting him motivated by an apparently aggressive interaction between them within the game in question. In fact, the whole thing goes further and almost makes for a true crime documentary on Netflix.
Kang flew to Jacksonville two days before the attack, on June 21, under the pretext of visiting a friend. Upon arriving there, however, he bought, in addition to the hammer, a flashlight. He waited until early Sunday morning, dressed in black and wearing a mask, he entered Dinh’s apartment through an unlocked door and only stopped his attack because the victim’s stepfather woke up in time.
For whatever reason, Kang is in jail awaiting trial, but he has assured his mother that he had no intention of killing his opponent. However, the county sheriff no longer knows what to think: “Some things you can’t make up,” he declared. And it’s because the devil is in the details when it comes to MMORPGs.
