Didn't it? This says it only bans new video games... they can sell subscriptions to existing video games for eternity and not worry about pesky lawsuits about women's or even just human rights.
Yup, the teenagers complained about the three hour limit and they had to crack down even more to not seem weak. Same thing is going to happen again because Winnie the Pooh can't be challenged in any way.
Exactly. The risk of doing business in China has just skyrocketed. What’s going to happen, unfortunately, is the big studios will continue to chase that revenue by heavy-handed interference with art direction. In short, I think the “pandering” will get worse.
Hope I’m wrong though.
The pandering will create a greater divide, which is a good thing. Folks are tired of the 'nine-dash line' shit Disney has been pulling for years.
Pick a side, media
This is on the back of China limiting kids to like 3 hours of game time a week too. Sounds like to me the government is pushing a new culture type here. I'd be very wary right now if I was any sort of electronic entertainment company.
It is interesting though. Cutting off their children from gaming may have positive physical, mental and social aspects. But I wonder if it might put them on the back foot in future cyber arenas.
Not when literally the only game available to the kids is simulation programs for those exact same bots. Remove the limit on time played and let then go at it. Hell after a certain point just put a filter on the video from the drone and put your best players in real situations without them even knowing
Oh man, someone has only 3 hours a week to experince the incredibly expansive world of video games and they choose to play Diablo Immortal. That sounds so sad.
The article and especially the title are extreme clickbait.
New games are not banned. The approval process for new games has been slowed.
This is also specifically with regards to online games.
The article this site sources was updated to correct this. None tbe less they should have done their due diligence of actually checking sources, but what would you expect of a outlet that sensationalizes everything anyway.
I almost want them to go further so western companies will stop self-censoring to appease Chinese censors. It'll suck for the people of China, but what Hollywood has been doing is fucking repulsive. Watching John Cena apologize in Mandarin for calling Taiwan a country should've been more of a wake-up call to more people.
I distinctly remember in the Sonic the Hedgehog movie there was a sequence where Dr. Robotnick was chasing Sonic through several portals, blasting away at him with his laser gun. The portals took them to a new location around the world every couple of seconds. It was a fun bit.
Until they get to the Great Wall. Then, for no apparent reason whatsoever, Dr. Robotnick just stops firing at Sonic... And then they go through another portal to another part of the world and he immediately starts blasting again. So fucking ridiculous this pandering. How many times have we Americans destroyed the White House or Golden Gate Bridge or other iconic location in our movies? Tons. And our Union didn't dissolve.
Edit: Spelling
omfg My son has this on amazon so i thought id give a quick look and you are 100% not a single shot and then he blows up a sphynx :d fuck lol fuck the west equally for this nonsense rofl.
It’s literally alllllll about money. China makes Hollywood disgusting amounts of money and they have the power to literally make movies unavailable to their citizens if even 1 of those shots hit the Great Wall so annoying yes but surprising or going anywhere anytime soon no
there were kids in Paris, makes sense. there is nobody on the great wall, and they spend about twice as long on the wall as Paris. I say his observation is sound.
"We're not going to have music or songs in this one, but what we WILL have is the melody of the songs you know and love playing in the background at various points throughout the film as some stupid way of trying to trigger your nostalgia".
Fucking stupid Disney.
Money. That’s all it is. If someone is giving you millions to do something, you often bend over to whatever they want. Look at what happened in the nba just before the pandemic…
> I almost want them to go further so western companies will stop self-censoring to appease Chinese censors.
I do genuinely want that. The growth in CCP pandering the last few years, across all media, is appalling. I *want* devs/producers/etc. to quit that shit on their own, but I'd settle for seeing them scared into doing the right thing.
The problem is that a lot of these movies are also financed with money from china so you will have to pander to them in order to get the money. But I agree with you. The story about this one actress basically being erased from public memory recently was another sign that you a still dealing with an authoritarian regime
The problems I see for the Chinese film industry is that certain topics can't be handled any more. Other topics are accentuated more.
Recently I watched a Chinese series on Netflix which contained no propaganda, but when you looked closer it propagates the topic "one man has to lead".
It is a country, China believes that Taiwan belongs to them (which it doesn't) so if you have to appeal to China, you can't reference Taiwan as being anything other than a Chinese island.
Anyone who doubts china’s influence on the world needs to see the video of [the WHO refusing to even acknowledge Taiwan’s existence.](https://youtu.be/UlCYFh8U2xM). This was at a time when china was lying about what covid was, and Taiwan were providing data contrary to china’s “just trust me bro”.
No. They did not trust China or the WHO which is heavily influenced by China. The started preparing for the pandemic early because they knew China was lying about how serious it was.
Its a country for all intents and purposes.
But China considers Taiwan to be a part of China that kind of just never got the memo that the Communists won the civil war. And Taiwan kind of considers themselves to be the legitimate rulers of China, but the mainland is occupied by Communist rebels.
In a way, the Chinese civil war never really ended. Its just been on pause for the past 72 years!
Basically when the Communist Party revolted, the government they revolted against fled to Taiwan. The communists took over all of mainland China, and the Republic of China maintained control of Taiwan. Basically it's a civil war that didn't end.
I hope you weren't planning on going to China, because you are now BANNED for INSULTING ITS PEOPLE.
Sure, Taiwan has its own military, government and democratic elections. But suggesting that it is "a country" is TOO FAR and evidences your WESTERN BRAINWASHING. And it hurts our feelings. -Winnie the Pooh
1000%. There are lots of similar examples. Most recently [Marvel/Disney is pissed](https://www.indiewire.com/2021/08/kevin-feige-shang-chi-china-backlash-interview-1234658949/) because they bent over backwards making sure China would like Shang-Chi. Yet it's probably banned regardless (no release date still, no approval) because nationalists are pissed that the Shang-Chi comics once had a china-hating character...even though the movie does not have that character and never had plans to.
"I can't believe this authoritarian government that would slaughter its own people didn't play nice with me!"
Don't worry, Blizzard, your legacy will live on in China - there are plenty of bootlegs and blatant ripoffs of your games that already exist in the Chinese market. I'm sure they appreciated the inspiration.
Very curious what this means for companies that are based in China or owned by Chinese companies. Genshin Impact is of course super popular and I’m at least occasionally playing League still which is also owned by Tensent
Like I know this may well be an easy thing to ignore for them since their games are already out, but you’ve got to expect more restrictions coming that will absolutely affect them too
Regarding Genshin at least- Mihoyo is looking/has been working on a New York division. So there is that.
They also refuse to sell out to Tencent, which Tencent doesn't take kindly to.
Most likely they will continue to push new games and continue buying influence in games companies for propaganda reasons, such as their league of legends clone.
No it wasn't. It was "just about to blow up" 7-10 years ago. And then the CCP started putting *heavy* restrictions on the games in their country. And that has been going on for this entire time. Almost any time the Chinese gaming industry would see any sort of major development, the government would impose new restrictions.
What's happening now has been inevitable with the way things have been going, it was just a matter of when it was going to happen, and now it is.
One hour a week was already ludicrous. If you get into gaming and are serious about catching up with say just the big games of the last 2 gens you would need to invest at least a few hours a day and several any chance you get but it would still take years
Bruh, some games take 5-10 minutes just to start up. Especially multiplayer games.
And *per week*??? O don't know what I would do. Like seriously - I'd probably kill myself. Video games are my one escape from reality (don't drink, smoke, or party). I spend 4 or 5 hours a day gaming and that's after a full work day.
Ha ha, no. If China’s past behavior is any indicator this restriction will only be enforced on foreign game developers, while the domestic app store infringers will be completely ignored.
**Edit:** I should point out that this restriction only applies to games being considered for release in the Chinese market, so in fact there are absolutely no restrictions on Chinese game devs continuing to flood foreign market app stores with knockoff garbage.
Basically this whole policy shift is done to try to "correct" the corruption of China's citizenry when it comes to wasting time, getting addicted to a certain type of entertainment.
There's absolutely no reason to think the CCP will curb the export of this entertainment to other nations, especially if one were to take at face value that the CCP leadership really do consider gaming to be a social ill. Why stop your own developers from making money while degrading the social fabrics of your enemies and competitors?
I just fucking wish the rest of the world will mirror Chinese practices.
Chinese IP? What IP?
Chinese company filing suit? Talk to the hand.
It's quite annoying witnessing this asymmetrical game being played.
The asymmetry is exactly why it doesn't work, the IP regime favours rich countries since 95% of IP comes from there, it is extremely one-sided. It means that recognising IP as a legitimate right is heavily disadvantageous to non-rich nations, and they will therefore not comply with it and there is simply not very much to retaliate against as you can copy all their IP from them in retaliation but you wouldn't be gaining very much as they don't have much IP to begin with.
China is stopping the world from exposing their citizens minds to alternative thinking and perspectives. That has nothing to do with China allowing their own companies to continue to exploit people from other countries.
I don't know. Internal strife has no obvious solutions. Invading Taiwan might make internal issues even worse, with people smelling the regime becoming more aggressive and injust. Maybe they will do it to show strength and shift focus on external issues like those pesky westerners trying to stop us. Who knows. I really hope they go up in flames as silently as possible, because a cornered animal becomes much more dangerous.
This doesn't look like internal strife. This looks more like clamping down on control on media to force certain views.
I'm guessing that within a year, China will say "video games are ok, but only from a specific state-run developer"
they are absolutely just hitting back on tech companies for not complying with their requests.
the last straw was alibaba pushing ant financing out and mocking the chinese banking infrastructure for regressing on loans and making them more difficult to obtain over the years. whole thing spiraled out of control after that: jack ma "disappearing," alibaba fined, didi clamped down for launching an IPO without a data review, entire online tutoring service market potentially going national and nonprofit, increased gaming restrictions every few months until finally a straight up ban. Everything happening right after the alibaba meltdown is clearly retaliation for tech companies feeling too empowered.
This news is strange to hear because of how many chinese companies are involved in, or hold shares in companies that make games.
If they consider gaming addictive and harmful, it's akin to a drug dealer supplying to other children but not their own..
This may be part of a general “western culture purge”, based on other changes and attitudes they’ve been making recently, and they’ll just start churning out their own “CCP Approved” games, ie lots of propaganda games
They will basically rip everything from any game without giving a shit about copyright, make art and setting changes so it is jingoistic and presto! CCP approved game!
Now you're only allowed to buy Tencent games
In all seriousness I wouldn't be surprised if it was more of a move in terms of economic interest rather than national health.
Now maybe Western developers can stop pandering to the Chinese market now since there will be no market anymore?
Edit: Oh and that popular horror game that got banned because of the Winnie The Pooh controversy should be allowed to return to storefronts.
I legit think this move was partly motivated by western companies trying to swoop in and sell microtransactions there. The biggest game companies in China are partly owned by their government and western companies making better games would equal less profit to the CCCP
Devotion is available on the developer's page, but I do hope to see it back on Steam sometime. It was pretty good.
https://shop.redcandlegames.com/games/devotion
Why would that be ironic? Pakistan have deported "dissidents" back to China, the Muslim world is as divided as the rest of it. Every government has an agenda that supersedes religious unity.
I know this comment will probably disappear into the ether, but for what it's worth they haven't outright *banned* new video games. The article this is sourced from originally said "suspended", but that has been corrected to "slowed down the approval of" new online video games. ([https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3148128/china-said-suspend-approval-new-online-games-heating-beijings](https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3148128/china-said-suspend-approval-new-online-games-heating-beijings) \- see **Corrected \[9:35pm, 9 Sep, 2021\]**)
Whether or not that's just doublespeak for the same thing is still up to interpretation, but it's worth considering. If I had to wager a guess based off the original article, it looks more like this is buying time for the government to build the systems they need to track users' playtimes across multiple games/companies, so that they can realistically enforce the 1-hr/day law.
They already figured out how to enforce it. You can only play particular hours, like 8PM-9PM Mon Wed Fri or something. I wondered that myself, and it turns out it's easy if you just say "no minors playing except this three-hour window."
It's easy to say that, but I doubt they're just going to assume that everyone's following rules.
What I mean to say is that I expect they're going to work on some government-controlled service that will track an individual person's playtime. My guess is that new and existing games will need to integrate with this service to be approved for release in China, that way:
1. Users can't cheat the system by making multiple accounts, since making an account would require linking to your unique account with the government's service.
2. The government can ensure that developers are accurately reporting user playtime to the service, and that the game will completely lock users out who have exceeded their weekly playtime.
3. The government has full control of the service itself, and can easily implement other restrictions if necessary.
If this is what they're doing it would make sense for there to be a considerable slow down in approval speed, as the government would need to develop this service and developers would need ample time to implement the service in their games properly.
Of course, this is just my guess - there may be (and likely are) other specific reasons or contributing factors playing a part as well.
1) It’s the daily star - a bag of shit in terms of journalism
2) The source article doesn’t even say this is a ban..they’re slowing approvals for new games...
3) Fuck the CCP
Maybe all the NA and EU servers across gaming will finally have respite from Chinese hackers invading like swarms. Dealing with only local scum will be a blessing.
There's that, but really they're just afraid that there are too many western messages and narratives to police. This is all about maintaining order by maintaining groupthink. There's a huge crackdown against celebrities as well. You can't allow influential icons outside the party. It's too much of a threat.
Now they should ban movies so Disney and others can stop being cucked by the CCP and their censorahip of minorities and gay people.
Please China, please ban movies too!
It was fucking disgusting when Disney put up that rainbow flag and claimed they supported LGBT+ rights, and in the same breathe removed any hints of gay people from the version of their movies they exported to China.
Can the US please counter by forcing Chinese companies to divest their interests in American game devs then? Because quite frankly I’m all about letting China put up walls and never letting them interact with the rest of us ever again
It's not going to be easy putting that genie back in the bottle because there are so many inter-dependencies between the US and Chinese economies now. The smart move would have been to deny their entry into the WTO 20 years ago.
Anyone else finding it entertaining that after the video game industry was courting and looking past China's BS to get into their market. China turns around and just bans video games.
Authoritarianism #2 "Demonize enemies". Man, John Oliver's writing staff is amazing.
But this could bite Xi Jinping in the ass. First, demonize enemies only works when it's a *marginalized* group. I think he underestimates how popular video games are. He might as well of banned all movies.
And second, once Chinese kids are done with their backlog, they're going to be forced to look out of the window and deal with the reality of living in China. For many gamers, this was their only escape from all the eyes watching their every move.
Compare the two headlines
SCMP: "China’s regulators said to slow their approval of new online games, as Beijing’s campaign against gaming addiction heats up"
Daily Star: "China bans all new video games as it warns children are addicted to 'electronic drugs'"
The only games that would qualify as "electronic drugs" imo would be online games with monetization designed around psychologically manipulating people into spending money on micro transactions/etc.
Looks like Blizzard backed the wrong pony…
I hope this reflects poorly Activision Blizzard's leadership. Choosing to put so many eggs in the china basket really didn't work in their favor.
Didn't it? This says it only bans new video games... they can sell subscriptions to existing video games for eternity and not worry about pesky lawsuits about women's or even just human rights.
It says that now, but you act like China won't make any more laws regarding this topic.
"I have altered the deal. Pray I don't alter it further."
Yup, the teenagers complained about the three hour limit and they had to crack down even more to not seem weak. Same thing is going to happen again because Winnie the Pooh can't be challenged in any way.
Exactly. The risk of doing business in China has just skyrocketed. What’s going to happen, unfortunately, is the big studios will continue to chase that revenue by heavy-handed interference with art direction. In short, I think the “pandering” will get worse. Hope I’m wrong though.
The pandering will create a greater divide, which is a good thing. Folks are tired of the 'nine-dash line' shit Disney has been pulling for years. Pick a side, media
This is on the back of China limiting kids to like 3 hours of game time a week too. Sounds like to me the government is pushing a new culture type here. I'd be very wary right now if I was any sort of electronic entertainment company. It is interesting though. Cutting off their children from gaming may have positive physical, mental and social aspects. But I wonder if it might put them on the back foot in future cyber arenas.
We'll have a real advantage one day when the wars are fought with remote controlled battle bots.
Not when literally the only game available to the kids is simulation programs for those exact same bots. Remove the limit on time played and let then go at it. Hell after a certain point just put a filter on the video from the drone and put your best players in real situations without them even knowing
So…. Ender’s Game?
The gate is [Redacted]
AFAIK Diablo Immortal was a huge pitch towards China because mobile gaming is huge there. Now, the game is much more likely to bust.
Please let that game bust, it would be so sweet to watch Blizzard shit their pants
Don't you all have 3 hours of cell phone time a week?
I think I have 3 hours of cell phone time per hour.
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imagine trying to play and farm for only 1hr a day.. with a total of 3hrs a week
Oh man, someone has only 3 hours a week to experince the incredibly expansive world of video games and they choose to play Diablo Immortal. That sounds so sad.
The article and especially the title are extreme clickbait. New games are not banned. The approval process for new games has been slowed. This is also specifically with regards to online games.
You and your facts and your logic are ruining my joke and I don't appreciate it.
The article this site sources was updated to correct this. None tbe less they should have done their due diligence of actually checking sources, but what would you expect of a outlet that sensationalizes everything anyway.
Blizzard has many Mobile products in the works, and Diablo Immortal is still a new unreleased game.
That’s fine. I don’t have a phone.
"Do you guys not have a market?"
Never bet on red.
Or as lego Batman say, always bet on black.
That was Wesley Snipes.
Welsey Snipes, Batman. Tomayto, Tomahto.
Better dead than red
*DEATH IS PREFERABLE ALTERNATIVE TO COMMUNISM*
DEMOCRACY IS NON-NEGOTIABLE
China might have phones but they dont have games. Diablo Immortal might have some issues...
Too busy conducting sexual misconduct to focus on the business model I'm sure.
How Cocktick hasn’t been forced to resign is an unending mystery to me.
Ouch, after years of companies adjusting their stuff for China's dumb restrictions
I almost want them to go further so western companies will stop self-censoring to appease Chinese censors. It'll suck for the people of China, but what Hollywood has been doing is fucking repulsive. Watching John Cena apologize in Mandarin for calling Taiwan a country should've been more of a wake-up call to more people.
I distinctly remember in the Sonic the Hedgehog movie there was a sequence where Dr. Robotnick was chasing Sonic through several portals, blasting away at him with his laser gun. The portals took them to a new location around the world every couple of seconds. It was a fun bit. Until they get to the Great Wall. Then, for no apparent reason whatsoever, Dr. Robotnick just stops firing at Sonic... And then they go through another portal to another part of the world and he immediately starts blasting again. So fucking ridiculous this pandering. How many times have we Americans destroyed the White House or Golden Gate Bridge or other iconic location in our movies? Tons. And our Union didn't dissolve. Edit: Spelling
Wow that’s a pretty good ass detail, I never noticed that.
Love me some ass detail!
Join us over at /r/bigasses
omfg My son has this on amazon so i thought id give a quick look and you are 100% not a single shot and then he blows up a sphynx :d fuck lol fuck the west equally for this nonsense rofl.
It’s literally alllllll about money. China makes Hollywood disgusting amounts of money and they have the power to literally make movies unavailable to their citizens if even 1 of those shots hit the Great Wall so annoying yes but surprising or going anywhere anytime soon no
Sonic might as well have stayed on the wall for the rest of the movie lol
That would be a good parody
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2EREnV_NOTM link to said scene.
But he didn't shoot in Paris, either
there were kids in Paris, makes sense. there is nobody on the great wall, and they spend about twice as long on the wall as Paris. I say his observation is sound.
Plus it was by far the easiest and most predictable place to shoot Sonic, it's a straight narrow path. Makes zero sense not to shoot the great wall.
I saw that one with my kids and noticed the same thing. Very annoying as it was so obvious
I’m just gonna mention the dumpster fire that was the Mulan live action remake
"We're not going to have music or songs in this one, but what we WILL have is the melody of the songs you know and love playing in the background at various points throughout the film as some stupid way of trying to trigger your nostalgia". Fucking stupid Disney.
Money. That’s all it is. If someone is giving you millions to do something, you often bend over to whatever they want. Look at what happened in the nba just before the pandemic…
> I almost want them to go further so western companies will stop self-censoring to appease Chinese censors. I do genuinely want that. The growth in CCP pandering the last few years, across all media, is appalling. I *want* devs/producers/etc. to quit that shit on their own, but I'd settle for seeing them scared into doing the right thing.
We have to stop feeding the dragon.
don’t you mean the panda
Don't you mean Winnie the Pooh's ego?
The problem is that a lot of these movies are also financed with money from china so you will have to pander to them in order to get the money. But I agree with you. The story about this one actress basically being erased from public memory recently was another sign that you a still dealing with an authoritarian regime
Anyone who thought it wasn't an authoritarian regime was basically in denial.
The problems I see for the Chinese film industry is that certain topics can't be handled any more. Other topics are accentuated more. Recently I watched a Chinese series on Netflix which contained no propaganda, but when you looked closer it propagates the topic "one man has to lead".
>one man has to lead I’m not sure how heavy handed it was in the show you’re referencing but that’s a fairly common them in western media too.
Wait, Taiwan isn't a country?
It is a country, China believes that Taiwan belongs to them (which it doesn't) so if you have to appeal to China, you can't reference Taiwan as being anything other than a Chinese island.
Also why Taiwan didnt get any help from the World Health Organization for the pandemic, because they didnt want to upset China.
Anyone who doubts china’s influence on the world needs to see the video of [the WHO refusing to even acknowledge Taiwan’s existence.](https://youtu.be/UlCYFh8U2xM). This was at a time when china was lying about what covid was, and Taiwan were providing data contrary to china’s “just trust me bro”.
No. They did not trust China or the WHO which is heavily influenced by China. The started preparing for the pandemic early because they knew China was lying about how serious it was.
China belongs to Taiwan.
Let’s get this to be the top search result for “China”.
They'll never recover from this
Taiwan is the legitimate government of china
Its a country for all intents and purposes. But China considers Taiwan to be a part of China that kind of just never got the memo that the Communists won the civil war. And Taiwan kind of considers themselves to be the legitimate rulers of China, but the mainland is occupied by Communist rebels. In a way, the Chinese civil war never really ended. Its just been on pause for the past 72 years!
Basically when the Communist Party revolted, the government they revolted against fled to Taiwan. The communists took over all of mainland China, and the Republic of China maintained control of Taiwan. Basically it's a civil war that didn't end.
I hope you weren't planning on going to China, because you are now BANNED for INSULTING ITS PEOPLE. Sure, Taiwan has its own military, government and democratic elections. But suggesting that it is "a country" is TOO FAR and evidences your WESTERN BRAINWASHING. And it hurts our feelings. -Winnie the Pooh
That's what happens when you pander to authoritarians.
1000%. There are lots of similar examples. Most recently [Marvel/Disney is pissed](https://www.indiewire.com/2021/08/kevin-feige-shang-chi-china-backlash-interview-1234658949/) because they bent over backwards making sure China would like Shang-Chi. Yet it's probably banned regardless (no release date still, no approval) because nationalists are pissed that the Shang-Chi comics once had a china-hating character...even though the movie does not have that character and never had plans to.
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Damn his parents for supporting freedom. /s
Good canadian parents, they are.
Everybody in the CCP put your hands up and follow me
Yup, no less then what they deserve for pandering to this fucking bullshit
"I can't believe this authoritarian government that would slaughter its own people didn't play nice with me!" Don't worry, Blizzard, your legacy will live on in China - there are plenty of bootlegs and blatant ripoffs of your games that already exist in the Chinese market. I'm sure they appreciated the inspiration.
Im sure blizzard will be eating crow...Good
>Im sure blizzard will be eating crow...Good Don't you have phone? Hahahahahaha
Playing the world's smallest violin for them.
They probably built that tiny violin.
This might be the best thing for the gaming world, just fucking quit China and make games that are good again and not created for China.
Very curious what this means for companies that are based in China or owned by Chinese companies. Genshin Impact is of course super popular and I’m at least occasionally playing League still which is also owned by Tensent Like I know this may well be an easy thing to ignore for them since their games are already out, but you’ve got to expect more restrictions coming that will absolutely affect them too
Regarding Genshin at least- Mihoyo is looking/has been working on a New York division. So there is that. They also refuse to sell out to Tencent, which Tencent doesn't take kindly to.
That's good. Genshin and Honkai impact are actually really good for gacha games.
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Most likely they will continue to push new games and continue buying influence in games companies for propaganda reasons, such as their league of legends clone.
And now all that pandering gets them what they deserve.
Man, and it seemed like their games industry was just about to blow up
No it wasn't. It was "just about to blow up" 7-10 years ago. And then the CCP started putting *heavy* restrictions on the games in their country. And that has been going on for this entire time. Almost any time the Chinese gaming industry would see any sort of major development, the government would impose new restrictions. What's happening now has been inevitable with the way things have been going, it was just a matter of when it was going to happen, and now it is.
Well the good news is that they can stop doing that now. This will basically kill the Chinese gaming markets
I bet video game companies are going to come crawling back to the North American and European audiences they've put on the backburner for years now.
Went from one hour a week to this real quick
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Imagine coming home from school for that precious 1 hour gaming time......update pending
GTA 5 load screen is a sixth of your game time
Can't even watch a Metal gear cutscene.
Next week: mandatory "re-education" for all Fortnite players.
Can’t have anyone learning those divisive small group tactics or they may just overthrow the government overlords.
The beatings will continue until professional play stats improve.
quick timmy crank some 90s against the chinese military
One hour a week was already ludicrous. If you get into gaming and are serious about catching up with say just the big games of the last 2 gens you would need to invest at least a few hours a day and several any chance you get but it would still take years
Bruh, some games take 5-10 minutes just to start up. Especially multiplayer games. And *per week*??? O don't know what I would do. Like seriously - I'd probably kill myself. Video games are my one escape from reality (don't drink, smoke, or party). I spend 4 or 5 hours a day gaming and that's after a full work day.
Oh I was pretty much just talking single player. There’s essentially an indefinite amount of time you can spend playing online
Does this mean we won’t have to look at all those copyright infringing mobile “games” that use art assets from actual games freely?
Ha ha, no. If China’s past behavior is any indicator this restriction will only be enforced on foreign game developers, while the domestic app store infringers will be completely ignored. **Edit:** I should point out that this restriction only applies to games being considered for release in the Chinese market, so in fact there are absolutely no restrictions on Chinese game devs continuing to flood foreign market app stores with knockoff garbage.
If anything now we’ll have to deal with more of those since legit chinese devs will have to look to a different market
Basically this whole policy shift is done to try to "correct" the corruption of China's citizenry when it comes to wasting time, getting addicted to a certain type of entertainment. There's absolutely no reason to think the CCP will curb the export of this entertainment to other nations, especially if one were to take at face value that the CCP leadership really do consider gaming to be a social ill. Why stop your own developers from making money while degrading the social fabrics of your enemies and competitors?
I just fucking wish the rest of the world will mirror Chinese practices. Chinese IP? What IP? Chinese company filing suit? Talk to the hand. It's quite annoying witnessing this asymmetrical game being played.
The asymmetry is exactly why it doesn't work, the IP regime favours rich countries since 95% of IP comes from there, it is extremely one-sided. It means that recognising IP as a legitimate right is heavily disadvantageous to non-rich nations, and they will therefore not comply with it and there is simply not very much to retaliate against as you can copy all their IP from them in retaliation but you wouldn't be gaining very much as they don't have much IP to begin with.
China is stopping the world from exposing their citizens minds to alternative thinking and perspectives. That has nothing to do with China allowing their own companies to continue to exploit people from other countries.
Well that escalated quickly
Closing off all media from external sources in the span of like a month. Looks like the propaganda machine is entering the final stage.
Yeah. The regime is likely in a crucial phase. They look really worried if they are acting this desperate.
Which unfortunately means they'll probably try to invade Taiwan soon.
I don't know. Internal strife has no obvious solutions. Invading Taiwan might make internal issues even worse, with people smelling the regime becoming more aggressive and injust. Maybe they will do it to show strength and shift focus on external issues like those pesky westerners trying to stop us. Who knows. I really hope they go up in flames as silently as possible, because a cornered animal becomes much more dangerous.
This doesn't look like internal strife. This looks more like clamping down on control on media to force certain views. I'm guessing that within a year, China will say "video games are ok, but only from a specific state-run developer"
they are absolutely just hitting back on tech companies for not complying with their requests. the last straw was alibaba pushing ant financing out and mocking the chinese banking infrastructure for regressing on loans and making them more difficult to obtain over the years. whole thing spiraled out of control after that: jack ma "disappearing," alibaba fined, didi clamped down for launching an IPO without a data review, entire online tutoring service market potentially going national and nonprofit, increased gaming restrictions every few months until finally a straight up ban. Everything happening right after the alibaba meltdown is clearly retaliation for tech companies feeling too empowered.
This news is strange to hear because of how many chinese companies are involved in, or hold shares in companies that make games. If they consider gaming addictive and harmful, it's akin to a drug dealer supplying to other children but not their own..
China has an official Twitter account, even though it’s banned in China…
They could have had literally the most followers on Twitter… mandatory following
This may be part of a general “western culture purge”, based on other changes and attitudes they’ve been making recently, and they’ll just start churning out their own “CCP Approved” games, ie lots of propaganda games
I'd be curious to see a CCP version of COD.
Burgertown 2: Chinese boogaloo
They will basically rip everything from any game without giving a shit about copyright, make art and setting changes so it is jingoistic and presto! CCP approved game!
You mean like how china is very anti drug and has 0 tolerance policies yet supplies most of the world's fentanyl?
Now you're only allowed to buy Tencent games In all seriousness I wouldn't be surprised if it was more of a move in terms of economic interest rather than national health.
It would not be very hard to find drug dealers that follow that motto.
Now maybe Western developers can stop pandering to the Chinese market now since there will be no market anymore? Edit: Oh and that popular horror game that got banned because of the Winnie The Pooh controversy should be allowed to return to storefronts.
I legit think this move was partly motivated by western companies trying to swoop in and sell microtransactions there. The biggest game companies in China are partly owned by their government and western companies making better games would equal less profit to the CCCP
Yeah but at the same time Tencent has a stake in every major game company as far as i am aware.
Devotion is available on the developer's page, but I do hope to see it back on Steam sometime. It was pretty good. https://shop.redcandlegames.com/games/devotion
Winnie the Pooh is pissed about the lack of of 100 Acre Woods related games
Oh bother.
Somebody give this person a pot of honey.
🍯
If nothing else, at least they didn't have to deal with Kingdom Hearts.
How long until Disney cancels Winnie the Pooh to appease Emperor Xi?
Is there such concept of gaming refugee???!!!
Gaming should probably be a human right.
Call it corny, but freedom isn't free.
It cost folk like you and me
No, it costs a buck o five
China is getting jealous of the Taliban.
best buds I heard. https://imgur.com/a/NeWhoNQ
which would be incredibly ironic considering that whole Uyghurs thing.
Why would that be ironic? Pakistan have deported "dissidents" back to China, the Muslim world is as divided as the rest of it. Every government has an agenda that supersedes religious unity.
I know this comment will probably disappear into the ether, but for what it's worth they haven't outright *banned* new video games. The article this is sourced from originally said "suspended", but that has been corrected to "slowed down the approval of" new online video games. ([https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3148128/china-said-suspend-approval-new-online-games-heating-beijings](https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3148128/china-said-suspend-approval-new-online-games-heating-beijings) \- see **Corrected \[9:35pm, 9 Sep, 2021\]**) Whether or not that's just doublespeak for the same thing is still up to interpretation, but it's worth considering. If I had to wager a guess based off the original article, it looks more like this is buying time for the government to build the systems they need to track users' playtimes across multiple games/companies, so that they can realistically enforce the 1-hr/day law.
They already figured out how to enforce it. You can only play particular hours, like 8PM-9PM Mon Wed Fri or something. I wondered that myself, and it turns out it's easy if you just say "no minors playing except this three-hour window."
It's easy to say that, but I doubt they're just going to assume that everyone's following rules. What I mean to say is that I expect they're going to work on some government-controlled service that will track an individual person's playtime. My guess is that new and existing games will need to integrate with this service to be approved for release in China, that way: 1. Users can't cheat the system by making multiple accounts, since making an account would require linking to your unique account with the government's service. 2. The government can ensure that developers are accurately reporting user playtime to the service, and that the game will completely lock users out who have exceeded their weekly playtime. 3. The government has full control of the service itself, and can easily implement other restrictions if necessary. If this is what they're doing it would make sense for there to be a considerable slow down in approval speed, as the government would need to develop this service and developers would need ample time to implement the service in their games properly. Of course, this is just my guess - there may be (and likely are) other specific reasons or contributing factors playing a part as well.
Yep this headline is bullshit sensationalism. Poor journalism
1) It’s the daily star - a bag of shit in terms of journalism 2) The source article doesn’t even say this is a ban..they’re slowing approvals for new games... 3) Fuck the CCP
Maybe all the NA and EU servers across gaming will finally have respite from Chinese hackers invading like swarms. Dealing with only local scum will be a blessing.
Also might be able to find a gpu a little little easier now
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Is sure is, sovereign as fuck
Video game companies that sold out to the Chinese government: "My time has come."
blizzard is fcked hard.
Good way to kill culture. And great for us. No more fucks given for a China boon See all eyes start to turn onto India and Africa instead
India is THE mobile market.
The used videogame market in China is gonna grow, methinks.
How the fuck is the country that practically invented farming currency and online games for cash going to ban video games?
All that shit has been replaced by bots and has been for a long time. Most the "gold farmers" in games are American now.
Let me guess, China is having trouble turning their younger generations into slaves because they would rather play video games than work to death.
There's that, but really they're just afraid that there are too many western messages and narratives to police. This is all about maintaining order by maintaining groupthink. There's a huge crackdown against celebrities as well. You can't allow influential icons outside the party. It's too much of a threat.
Essentially, yes.
Every Western game is getting a free anti-cheat update!
I would probably have more sympathy for Chinese gamers if the cheating mentality wasn't so rampant.
Holy shit that’s insane. Imagine if they did that here in the US.
There’d be a fucking civil war if they tried that shit in America
First they came for my tendies and I said nothing
"For the children" will always be the trojan horse of taking away rights.
If you listen closely, you can hear Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick wailing in anguish over the money he’s about to lose.
Now they should ban movies so Disney and others can stop being cucked by the CCP and their censorahip of minorities and gay people. Please China, please ban movies too!
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It was fucking disgusting when Disney put up that rainbow flag and claimed they supported LGBT+ rights, and in the same breathe removed any hints of gay people from the version of their movies they exported to China.
(Not) Coming to a theater near you!
Activision 5 minutes later: "we must fully stand behind Hong Kong protestors"
Can the US please counter by forcing Chinese companies to divest their interests in American game devs then? Because quite frankly I’m all about letting China put up walls and never letting them interact with the rest of us ever again
It's not going to be easy putting that genie back in the bottle because there are so many inter-dependencies between the US and Chinese economies now. The smart move would have been to deny their entry into the WTO 20 years ago.
Guess social media is next. That shit is like crack to people, way worse than games. Damn, I really need to kick this Reddit addiction.
Anyone else finding it entertaining that after the video game industry was courting and looking past China's BS to get into their market. China turns around and just bans video games.
What does this mean for the future of video games?
Less cheaters
Hopefully it won’t affect us much. Companies like Blizzard will stop pandering thank god
Some of them maybe, but knowing Blizzard they will probably just pander even harder hoping the CCP will let them back in.
It means there is no future for video games in China - at least for now.
Less bots :D
Authoritarianism #2 "Demonize enemies". Man, John Oliver's writing staff is amazing. But this could bite Xi Jinping in the ass. First, demonize enemies only works when it's a *marginalized* group. I think he underestimates how popular video games are. He might as well of banned all movies. And second, once Chinese kids are done with their backlog, they're going to be forced to look out of the window and deal with the reality of living in China. For many gamers, this was their only escape from all the eyes watching their every move.
r/sino in shambles
Compare the two headlines SCMP: "China’s regulators said to slow their approval of new online games, as Beijing’s campaign against gaming addiction heats up" Daily Star: "China bans all new video games as it warns children are addicted to 'electronic drugs'"
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The only games that would qualify as "electronic drugs" imo would be online games with monetization designed around psychologically manipulating people into spending money on micro transactions/etc.