A woman in southern China went blind in one eye after playing a controversial mobile phone game for a whole week.

The 21-year-old woman suddenly lost sight in her right eye after playing the game for the whole day over the weekend while at her parents’ house in Dongguan, Guangdong province, according to the South China Morning Post.

She was diagnosed as having suffered retinal artery occlusion caused by severe eye strain.

The unnamed woman admitted to regularly playing the game for stints of seven or eight hours in a row without moving.

The game, Arena of Valor, which is also known as Honour of Kings, has become hugely popular in China and is due to be rolled out across the US and Europe.

The world’s most popular online battle game, it already has over 200 million registered players in China.

A deal with Nintendo for release on its Switch console will see it launch worldwide soon.

The multiplayer battle game puts together a team of five players who have to fight others in a fantasy land filled with characters from Chinese legends, and players can buy extra features while playing.

The eye injury follows a string of incidents. In June, a child in Shenzhen stole 30,000 yuan (£3,450) from his parents to buy add-ons, and a 13-year-old in Hangzhou, in eastern Zhejiang province, severely injured his legs after jumping from a five-storey building to escape from his father who was trying to stop him playing.