The couple allegedly fed their 3-month-old daughter, who was born prematurely, once a day, leaving her alone for up to 12 hours at a time to raise a character called Anima in a game called Prius Online.

The parents, arrested this week, called the police when they returned from one session at an Internet cafe near their suburban Seoul home to find their child dead. "

The couple seemed to have lost their will to live a normal life because they didn't have jobs and gave birth to a premature baby," police offer Chung Jin-won told the Yonhap news agency.