proppen19, Donator
Volte6 here. Again. The "landlord" mentioned, but more importantly, a friend since high school with Russell. He and I had our first apartment together. We brewed beer together. He was a comrade that few deserve. Always up for anything, never complained about anything. We went fishing on the ocean two weeks prior. I posted my comment on this article as soon as I could in order to hopefully stem the tide I knew something like this could cause. While the article has been picked up by several additional websites, I think I was fortunate enough to get my comment in early and many savvy readers pointed it out in the comments of each copycat article. It seems to have reached many foreign language sites, but I dont' care so much about those.
I know the temptation to make jokes is there... after all, Russell is not somebody you all knew. There isn't a connection you feel to him, and he's just a statistic, or an interesting story to tell. I think Russell would have chuckled at some of these jokes, such as "Did he drop good loot". However, what many people don't understand is that these articles get picked up and spread around the internet. We haven't even held a memorial for him yet, and if we search the internet for him, it paints the picture of some loser who let life pass him by. This wasn't Russell.
He was a great person, a willing friend. Twice a week he had scheduled time to hang out with friends to play board games or D&D. At my house, with my kids we played Crokinole, watched movies in the backyard, brewed beer... We went to concerts together such as NOFX and Tim Minchin. We talked about religion, music, the night before he passed away he was out with close friends. We knew he had breathing problems for years, and it seemed odd, but he never complained. This was maybe our fault for not pushing him to see a doctor about it, or maybe we assumed he had. I don't know.
As for this marathon session nonsense... yes he took vacation time to play Diablo 3. Many did. We had been fans of Diablo 1 and 2, so it was quite an event when part 3 came out. You are here in this forum now, so I'm sure you felt the excitement. Russell seldom took vacation time and had a lot built up. This was an opportunity for him to put in some long hours on a game he loved without worrying about waking up at 6 or7 am. That doesn't mean 72 hours straight. Where that number came from I'll never know. He had a waking and sleeping life like anyone.
Due to his age the police had to do an official investigation, and the coroner had to arrive on the scene. We spoke at length with her, and preliminary diagnosis is that he simply did not get enough oxygen while he slept and that is what did him in. We won't have the official results until 30 days later when lab results are complete.
If you see this spread around please take the time to point out the inaccuracies. I would hate for his family to see this image that is painted of him.
As a final note, no I will not post pictures of him, or me with him, or anything of the sort. I already feel like I'm feeding the trolls by posting anything in reply to this stuff, but I'm just hoping more good is done than harm.
If you want to search steam for me, or his facebook account (which I think is private so am unclear as to how anybody is doing that), you'll see him, denizenzero, and myself volte6 (Dylan Squires). If anybody sees this posted elsewhere please take the time to correct the public and maybe keep this at bay before some network news picks it up.
Raderar...
