China To Crack Down On "Undesirable" Games

The Chinese government is getting ready to launch a new round of content restrictions for online games. Kou Xiaowei, a senior official with the General Administration of Press and Publication, said, "Although China's online gaming industry had been hot in recent years, online games are regarded by many as a sort of spiritual opium and the whole industry is marginalized by mainstream society." The article points out that China has already "banned children from Internet cafes and last year ordered their owners to enforce time restrictions after several cases involving obsessive players dying of fatigue after marathon game sessions." We've also seen Chinese restrictions on player-versus-player content for kids, as well as required content modifications such as removing skeletons in order for games to be sold there.

Re:What's with the skeleton hate?

[MichaelSmith]

Can someone who understands Chinese culture a little better than I explain why skeletons are considered so taboo?

My wife is Malaysian Chinese. I don't have a complete answer for you but I can make a couple of observations:

• Chinese cemeteries in Malaysia are unmaintained and overgrown. Once your relatives get buried there nobody goes back to clean out the weeds and repair damage. There are whole herds of buffalo in the Ipoh chinese cemetery which nobody seems to know about. I found one when I went over a small hill to take a leak.
• They take ghost stories much more seriously than westerners. I got a tour of my wife's home city and was pointed to an empty house site. Apparently a rich man had built a house there but pulled it down when it turned out to be haunted. I said they should just rent it to westerners looking for a spooky experience. They acted like the crazy westerners wanted to get killed or something.
• Walking through the streets I noticed a little shrine. It had burning stuff and fruit like an offering. I ask my wife what that was. She snapped don't go near it. Ancestor worship and we walked on.

Its just that the Chinese have a thing about death. Its not discussed in polite company. They avoid the number 4 because the way it is spoken it sounds like death.

Re:What's with the skeleton hate?

[Anonymous Coward]

The same in Chinese. The number 4 is "si", and death is also "si". The tone is different, but more or less the same.