AS DUSK descends on the Sinchon neighbourhood of Seoul, a wave of Saturday shoppers melts away into restaurants and bars. But in a windowless room several floors above the throng, Ji Yu-tae is steeling himself for a very different night's entertainment.

His only companions are a bottle of vitamin drink, cigarettes and a monitor displaying a scene from Aion, one of South Korea's most popular online games. When the hunger pangs become irresistible, he will click a box in the corner of his PC screen and order instant noodles. By Monday morning, after two days of almost non-stop gaming, Ji will make his way to work, pale and sleep-deprived, but content that he has progressed in the virtual world that has been his second home for the past two years.

Hundreds of gamers compete in Seoul, South Korea, where 90 per cent of people have high-speed home internet. Credit:AP

Seated next to him among rows of screens at this ''PC bang'', an internet cafe in the South Korean capital, are scores of fellow obsessives whose attachment to online gaming is fast becoming a problem in the world's most advanced internet society. According to the government, about 2 million South Koreans - nearly one in 10 online users - are addicted to the internet. Many spend every waking moment immersed in role-playing games, in which players form alliances to guide their characters through mythical worlds, collecting extra powers and other items as they go.

''I've been playing this for about two years and won't stop until I get to the end,'' Ji, a 27-year-old mobile content developer, says as beads of sweat form on his brow. But he denies that he is addicted. ''It's my way of relieving stress. I could drink or go to the cinema, but this is how I want to spend my spare time. I don't have a girlfriend, and I'm not likely to meet one here.''