I am sure that you have heard of some of these urban legends. I don’t know if you believe them (or used to believe them) but I thought it would be interesting to look at some of the biggest myths of video games.
Donkey Kong is a result of a wrong translation – it was really supposed to be Monkey Kong.
Funny isn’t it? Unfortunately, there is no truth to this. Shigeru Miyamoto, the legendary Nintendo designer would be the first one to debunk this myth. He says that the name may sound funky but it was the choice at that time. It turned out to be a good choice – it is one of the most popular video games of all time.
PS2s – thousands of them – were purchased by Saddam Hussein to create a supercomputer for his military.
Not! Why would Saddam make use of PS2s to create a supercomputer? I am sure that a man of his means would have had access to more powerful processors. This hot piece of rumor didn’t stay alive for long – government officials officially debunked the myth soon after it circulated online.
A man has died playing video games.
Alright, this one has truth to it. I remember reading about it several years ago. This Korean man played for 50 hours straight and died of a heart attack. That was in 2005. Another Korean guy died of exhaustion after playing straight for 86 hours. The moral of the story is this – get some rest while playing video games!
Want more of these urban legends? Read Yahoo’s feature on them.