According to a report on CBCNews, the passing of a young girl has inspired an unexpected outpouring of kindness from the online gaming community.
Last Friday, $122,210 was donated to the Canadian Cancer Society in remembrance of Sarah Parries. She was one of the youngest members of the MechWarrior online gaming community.
The five-year-old Sarah passed away earlier this spring, just a week after her family discovered she had an inoperable brain tumor.
Jonathan Parries, Sarah’s father, said she didn’t show any symptoms of cancer: “It wasn’t like she was sick or had headaches all the time, nothing like that. She was always happy, energetic, loved to play. It was really unexpected.”
Sarah loved to play online games with her father.
Jonathan describes how Sarah would sit on his lap while they played the online robot shooting game, MechWarrior.
The company behind the MechWarrior franchise posted a memorial online in one its forums. Jonathan and the Parries family were overwhelmed with the outpouring of support.
Members of the gaming community voiced their support on the forum, urging the developers to create a virtual robot in Sarah’s memory.
Parries said: “Everyone was like, ‘You guys should make a mech, you guys should make a mech.’ They ended up making it and it was really overwhelming.”
The development team behind the MechWarrior franchise was quick to chime in. Founder and creative director Bryan Eckman said: “We were like yes, absolutely, let’s do this. Let’s jump on it. It’s a great cause. We love it.”
For one month, gamers were able to purchase a mech created in Sarah’s honor for $10. The mech was decorated with the things she loved: rainbows, unicorns and her teddy bear. Roughly 12,000 people donated to the cause.
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