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Censorship Games Your Rights Online

China Enforces Even Stricter Regulation On Games 235

Posted by Soulskill from the pong-is-contrary-to-the-common-good dept.
eldavojohn writes "Chinese gamers have a pretty hard life. From crackdowns on 'undesirable' games to bans on gangster games to delayed World of Warcraft expansions, they suffer. The worst part is that in order to qualify for operating in China, you face a maze of conflicting bureaucracy and regulation. Well, it just got a little worse. Now, if you want to operate, you need to hire a 'specialist' to oversee content, and you need to 'enhance socialist values' in your game. They also want to limit in-game marriages and how many player-versus-player combat sessions one can engage in. The circular issued from China's Ministry of Culture contained all the vague verbiage giving them easier reign over who operates and who doesn't. It's a large market, but is it worth the gamble to game developers?"
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China Enforces Even Stricter Regulation On Games More

China Enforces Even Stricter Regulation On Games

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  • Good for them! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Quiet_Desperation ( 858215 ) on Thursday November 19, 2009 @01:30PM (#30160500)
    I heard they are banning all Wii games with the word "Party" in the title.

  • Of course (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Improv ( 2467 ) <pgunn01@gmail.com> on Thursday November 19, 2009 @01:31PM (#30160520) Homepage Journal

    There are plenty of game developers that would love to capture part of the Chinese market. It's mainly developers that operate a bit too close to prohibited levels of hedonism and a few other touchy subjects that will have problems, and it's not like Chinese need games tailored to them - people taking the effort to make a game could go worldwide if their game won't work in China.

  • nuts (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Tom ( 822 ) on Thursday November 19, 2009 @01:32PM (#30160556) Homepage Journal

    It's a large market, but is it worth the gamble to game developers?

    Are you nuts? It's a market that in a few years will be 5-10 times larger than the US market, taking into account that asian cultures are more open to gaming in general (see Korea for example). If there is any single market in the world that's worth it, it's China.

    Other industry has been there, done that. Car manufacturers all knew after the initial surprises that if they open a factory in China, their blueprints will be copied and another chinese factory somewhere else will produce the same cars for a cheaper price. Some stayed out of China for that reason. Until the chinese began to buy cars. Then, they had no choice but to do it, because they couldn't sell on the chinese market without having a chinese factory. They did it knowing full well the damage they'd sustain.

    Frankly, ten years from now, game developers will probably wonder whether it's worth the trouble anymore translating their games for the US market.

    • Re:nuts (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Monkeedude1212 ( 1560403 ) on Thursday November 19, 2009 @01:38PM (#30160670) Journal

      But developing a game that pushes Socialist values and limits various gameplay could essentially RUIN your sales in every country BUT China.

      Is China > 50% of the market?

      Will China be > 50% of the market?

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by account_deleted ( 4530225 )
        Comment removed based on user account deletion

        • But developing a game that pushes Socialist values and limits various gameplay could essentially RUIN your sales in every country BUT China.

          Game? Sales? China? They pay for games in China? Who'd of thunk it....

          There's a reason the games that do well there are pay-to-play.

        • Oh, they pay for games in China; I pay for games in China! 20 RMB for the latest XBOX title, 15 RMB for the newest Wii game, and the like...
      • ... does China pay >50% of your revenue?
      • 10 years from now the average Chinese is going to say "Socialist values? Heck, we dumped that nonsense a few years ago."
        • You're joking, right? There's absolutely no way the Chinese government is going to stop controlling information and oppressing its' people any time soon, and definitely not within 10 years.

          You're dreaming.

          • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

            by Jaysyn ( 203771 )

            You say this like the Chinese government could actually control 1.2 billion people if they really & truly yearned to be free.

            The population of China is like the elephant that can be fettered with a thin rope, because heavy chains were used during it's youth. They can only be restricted as much as they *let* themselves be restricted.

            • Re:nuts (Score:4, Insightful)

              by DNS-and-BIND ( 461968 ) on Thursday November 19, 2009 @02:45PM (#30161884) Homepage
              Yearning to be free?!? Where did that idea come from? Chinese people aren't "yearning" for anything. As a matter of fact, they are intensely grateful to their government for making the present prosperity possible. It's better in China today than it has been at any time in their 5000 years of history, and it's only improving. It's a damn sight better than the Mao years when he murdered tens of millions and the lucky ones merely froze in unheated factories and classrooms. Oh, maybe they should go back to Chiang Kai-Shek and the warlords? Let's see...Empress Cixi? Nope, unmitigated disaster there, too. Unequal treaties, Opium wars, should I keep going back? The government could decree that every citizen gets a boot to the head daily from the security guards at every community entrance, and they'd still proclaim loudly that China is better off than it has ever been - and they'd be right. And the reason is the government. If the government wanted, the entire nation would still be living in poverty. 1.3 billion starving poor: the Chinese called it "1949-1976".

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by Jaysyn ( 203771 )

                What part of "really & truly yearned to be free" don't you understand?

              • And the current prosperity of China is in fact despite of it's government. See India for how China should be growing.

                • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

                  by Rakishi ( 759894 )

                  You mean China should be growing more slowly and incompetently?

                  Compared to India, China has been way ahead in terms of economic growth. It took India two decades and a major economic disaster to even approach China's growth and it's still not rivaling it despite another two decades. You know why it took so long? Because India's government was blocked from implementing economic reforms. Yeah, really useful form of government they had.

            • But they don't "yearn to be free." I've known several Chinese nationals at various jobs and generally speaking they don't mind their government.

              The problem is, as long as you play along, you're all good in China. If you decide you don't want to play along, you'll find no recourse.

              The Chinese government is BAD, but because they have the control they do, they are able to make sweeping changes in their economy that takes "western" cultures a lot longer to accomplish. If China wants to clean up a city, the

          • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

            by Opportunist ( 166417 )

            That goes without say. But "socialist values"? C'mon, China hasn't been socialist for quite a while now.

            Don't equate socialist with dictatorship. There are socialist dictatorships, but there are also socialist societies that are no dictatorships as well as dictatorships that are anything but socialist.

            • Maybe you replied to the wrong person. I never used the words socialist or values in my post.

          • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

            by Ellis D. Tripp ( 755736 )

            Exactly what does controlling information and oppressing citizens have to do with Socialism?

            For that matter, what does the government of the PRC have to do with Socialism? Their situation looks a lot more like crony capitalism and kleptocracy mixed with old fashioned totalitarianism than a system where the workers control the means of production and allocate resources toward the common good...

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by fuzzyfuzzyfungus ( 1223518 )
          I don't think that it'll take 10 years. Their present system is, at least, classifiable as "crony capitalism with state intervention", and the proles(both city and country) are getting the shaft to a degree that would please any sneering Dickensian oligarch(though, since they are getting the same shit slice of a larger pie, their anger hasn't yet become unmanageable).

          • Funny how the USA has to deal with similar issues... but China-- they were supposed to be communist! They couldn't even keep the capitalist flame under control for a generation and its a wild fire already. The USA managed to go longer; but we in many ways are in the same boat anyhow... (for the religious zealots; surely you can now acknowledge a simple fire == capitalism analogy after the recent banking/credit/insurance mess. )

            • Capitalism is not evil. It's genesis was born when one neighbor made shoes, another neighbor made horsewhips, and then they purchased one another's products. The fact that we've allowed corporations to grow out of control doesn't negate the value of the basic system

              I propose revoking all corporate personhood (i.e. no rights wjatsoever), so they can be regulated more effectively. We also need to stop buying-up all their shit. It's a bit hypocritical to complain about the evils of capitalism, and then tu

            • The recent banking/housing and insurance messes were caused primarily by .gov regulation. The banking/housing mess was originally caused by pressure from the government to lend to poor people so they could own their own house, at which point the banks began to seriously search for a way to offset the crappy balance sheets this directive produced, took the idea that 'solved' their balance sheets, and extended it to all classes of homes. That, combined with the low interest rates from the fed, caused the mass

        • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

          by geekoid ( 135745 )

          haha, people have been saying this since Tiena square. Not happening any time soon; however there form of socialist/market is very interesting, and due mostly to Tienanmen square.

          There socialist i the half of income from imports goes into a giant savings that is used to establish and maintain a global business presence.

          In effect, any single US company is competing with the whole of China. If we don't adapt to that, then we will be doomed. As long as people are lying about something as simple and obvious as

      • Just how many "Socialist Values" does China have?

      • Re:nuts (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Applekid ( 993327 ) on Thursday November 19, 2009 @02:17PM (#30161328)

        But developing a game that pushes Socialist values and limits various gameplay could essentially RUIN your sales in every country BUT China.


        #ifdef REGION_CHINA
                gameRules.PVP = false;
                gameRules.GroupRules.Max += 5;
        #endif

        If Duke Nukem puffs on a cigar to a backdrop of the US flag in a cutscene, I'd see either the content re-rendered with a different flag texture or just removed outright. The commercial response to censorship will be the cheapest and shortest workaround to get within the law, not a group-up redesign.

        • If your game has the capability to break the law - people will exploit it. The Chinese citizens will simply pirate the American version, or hack their region to be not China - and before you know it the game will be banned.

          You either ship your game with the limitations, or don't ship to China. World of Warcraft expansions are experiencing major delays because World of Warcraft basically has to be recoded this way. If it were as simple as a few lines of code, they would have patched it.

        • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

          by mckinnsb ( 984522 )
          It goes just a little deeper than that.

          You have to consider the fact that games like Grand Theft Auto 4 and Assassin's Creed are not even capable of being released in China - not just because of particular things in the game which could be set by a configuration file or bypassed with a boolean (the main character is Slavic, shooting of 'Triad' gang members), but because of the raw nature of the gameplay itself. Granted, GTA IV is a very visceral example, but with these new restrictions, China is now going

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by commodore64_love ( 1445365 )

        >>>Is China > 50% of the market?
        >>>Will China be > 50% of the market?

        1.3 billion Chinese versus 0.4 billion Americans/Canadians + 0.5 billion Europeans + 0.1 Japanese
        57% > 43%

        Yes China will be >50% of the developed world's market. That's assuming they don't stumble due to an oil crisis (oil becoming scarce) which would prevent them from reaching US/EU/JP level of advancement.

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by DNS-and-BIND ( 461968 )
          Well, this is probably the most ignorant comment I've seen in a thread absolutely chock full of them. Where the F is India in your little calculation? Brazil? Moreover, a single Westerner has the buying power of many Chinese.

    • Are you nuts? It's a market that in a few years will be 5-10 times larger than the US market, taking into account that asian cultures are more open to gaming in general (see Korea for example).

      I may be a bit touched in the head to suggest staying out of the Chinese market to avoid unclear penalties and becoming a government tool, but I'm not crazy enough to generalize that many people or even try to compare Korean (I assume you imply South Korean) culture to Chinese culture. That's a brazenly occidental view of the world. Are you an expert on both?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by qoncept ( 599709 )

        I may be a bit touched in the head ...

        What does that mean? Honest question.

        I'm not crazy enough to generalize that many people or even try to compare Korean (I assume you imply South Korean) culture to Chinese culture. That's a brazenly occidental view of the world.

        As far as I can tell, he isn't suggesting anything about any number of "people." He's discussing cultures. When you watch the History Channel, do you complain that a show generalizes the Aztecs and implies every single one of them murdered for sacrifice? Is it not true that asian cultures play more games? Again, an honest question. Occidental or not, I'm a lot more likely to believe Chinese people, as a whole, would be more likely to play more games than Americans.

        Are you an expert on both?

        Do you

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Ogive17 ( 691899 )
      Working in the auto industry I can tell you first hand how much of a pain in the ass it is to sell in China. They basically require a bribe to import anything into the country. It's their way of making it so pricy to do business in an attempt to force companies to build factories in China. I'm not just talking about complete units, I'm talking about componant parts, service parts.. everything. Every part needs to have a costly certification done (where the company has to pay to fly 3-5 Chinese "inspect

      • Because they produce cheap crap cheaply. Period.

        Of course, if I don't give a shit about my workers (and have nonexisting work laws) I can produce dirt cheap as well. What I wonder is why no country bothers to go up in arms about that while we get to hear about every other shit going down on our planet, when A shoots B and we get asked for donations for the starving kids and whatnot.

        But maybe just 'cause they don't produce cheap shit for us.

    • . If there is any single market in the world that's worth it, it's the United States of America.

      FIFY.

      Other industry has been there, done that. Car manufacturers all knew after the initial surprises that if they open a factory in China, their blueprints will be copied and another chinese factory somewhere else will produce the same cars for a cheaper price. Some stayed out of China for that reason.

      Good reason to stay out of a Second(Russia) World or Third World country(China/India/Brazil) and manufacture in a First World(US/UK/Pre-Expansion EU) one.

      Besides, you're selling largely to party bosses anyway. The rest are just junk-grade copies.

      Frankly, ten years from now, game developers will probably wonder whether it's worth the trouble anymore translating their games for the US market.

      They will translate for the US and it won't be a second-rate job. End of story.

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Mr Otobor ( 1097177 )

      Frankly, ten years from now, game developers will probably wonder whether it's worth the trouble anymore translating their games for the US market.

      Well, that hardly seems likely, even if the US is still "only" the number one market in 10 years :) (Maybe a different story 20 - 30 years out.)

      While I could imagine a collapse of UK/US to just "ENG", but I seriously doubt the English speaking market is going anywhere (UK, US, AU, CA, NZ, de facto second language for many in India, lots of other people who don't get to have games/manuals/books/etc. translated to their native language as part of the standard 8 or 10 translations done for most modern product

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by pwnies ( 1034518 ) *
      Not quite. While the population of China is about 4.3 times the United States', the number of those connected to the internet is only slightly higher [wikipedia.org] As it stands, China only has about 12 million more broadband subscribers than the US does. I highly doubt that it's going to increase by a multiple of five in the next few years, especially seeing as the majority of China's population is spread out over its rural areas.

    • That's the China fallacy (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Xaedalus ( 1192463 ) <Xaedalys@yah[ ]com ['oo.' in gap]> on Thursday November 19, 2009 @02:25PM (#30161506)

      "China's going to be a HUGE market!" is the China fallacy, which operates with the assumption that consumers in China are like consumers elsewhere, and that as soon as they get money they will become a gold mine.

      That is a fallacy that's been going on for three to four hundred plus years, and contributed directly to the downfall of the Qing Emperor, the Open Door policy, and all the other problems that China's been trying to recover from for the last hundred years. See, China's culture is very nationalistic and one of their flaws is that they believe they are the center of the Earth. In the mercantile age, that meant that China always exported its goods but would only accept silver from the West because western goods were always seen as 'inferior'. It almost bankrupted the British Empire, and did significant economic damage to the other Western countries, so they retaliated by basically taking over China's ports (and the whole country) to boot.

      To assume that once THIS happens then China will open up to the West is wrong. China will continue what it's doing right now with the currency, and with it's trade policies: accepting money (in the form of Treasury debt and other convertibles) and exporting its goods without buying our goods, because they do not want to be 'dependent' on us. This is at the heart of the Chinese currency manipulation problem - that China is doing exactly what it did 200+ years ago - hoarding monetary assets while not accepting imports from us and slowly bankrupting us. They're not doing it out of spite, they're doing it because to them, all other countries and cultures are 'inferior' to a degree and they want to be the center of the world - and the center never accepts help from the edges.

      That's why the best route for developers is to ignore China. Don't buy into the fallacy, because then you force China to accept your goods, and in doing so, you fix the imbalance.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by abigor ( 540274 )

        Holy shit, a post from someone with actual historical perspective. Well done. So many people think today's international problems are somehow new, like the world was just invented yesterday. There is nothing new under the sun.

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by kklein ( 900361 )

        Someone else knows Chinese history!!!

        Yes, to everything you said. Just a little low-hanging fruit that you missed (but probably know), though:

        China doesn't just believe they are the center of the Earth; that's what the country is named. Westerners often wax quaint and endearing to the "Middle Kingdom," but that first character can mean "middle," but here it means "central." It isn't "Middle Kingdom;" it's "Central Nation!"

        The emperor used to make Western envoys dance for his pleasure to secure trade c

    • It's a market that in a few years will be 5-10 times larger than the US market

      China's GDP is 2-3 times smaller than the USA's (depending on how you count it). Though it is growing faster, some argue [blogspot.com] that China will never catch the USA.

      Not even mentioning the widespread piracy. Not even mentioning the Chinese people's reluctance to pay money to foreign companies...

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by khallow ( 566160 )
        They don't actually argue that. Instead, they argue that China won't catch up in real GDP per capita to a 20th Century US continuing to grow as it used to.
    • While there are a lot of people in China, the disposable income per person in China is much lower than in the US and Europe.

  • Best Plan Ever? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Monkeedude1212 ( 1560403 ) on Thursday November 19, 2009 @01:33PM (#30160576) Journal

    How about I develop a game that caters EXACTLY what the Chinese government would like, and then they use their overpowered censorship and propoganda to promote it and only it...

    Question Marks

    Profit?

    • How about I develop a game that caters EXACTLY what the Chinese government would like, and then they use their overpowered censorship and propoganda to promote it and only it...

      Question Marks

      Profit?

      That's a very profitable idea but you might want to consult with IBM [ibmandtheholocaust.com] about how history views those who comply with fascism for monetary return.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Improv ( 2467 )

        I don't think you know what fascism is if you're suggesting that the Chinese government fits the label.

        • Re:Best Plan Ever? (Score:4, Informative)

          by tnk1 ( 899206 ) on Thursday November 19, 2009 @03:37PM (#30162802)

          I disagree with your assertion. China, with its definite nationalism and its growing corporatism, really is starting to look a lot more National Socialist than socialist. There are some facets of historical fascism that China does not match, but not even all of the reputedly fascist regimes had all of those facets. For instance, strong racism was more of a specialization of Nazi Germany. Fascist states likely Italy and Vichy France, pretty much followed the German lead on racism. Spanish fascism was much less racial and more of a religious/corporatist alliance.

          The great hallmarks of fascism are totalitarianism, nationalism and coordination of the economy by cooperating with big business instead of taking it over. There is also a concept of strength being its own goal. China does not really have a long history of corporations like the West does, but once it does have this sort of basis, it could well turn into something very close to the structure of the fascist countries of the 20th Century. Certainly, China is very much looking to increase its strength in as many ways as possible, and is certainly not against doing so at the expense of other nations.

          Needless to say, with a country as big as China and the fact that it is rapidly becoming a gigantic market that the old fascist countries could never dream of being, China's system may well merit its own label, but I think fascist is certainly a more accurate term than communist, or even socialist. After all, as someone pointed, there are socialist states and parties that are democratic and not overly nationalist.

      • Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Reason58 ( 775044 )

        That's a very profitable idea but you might want to consult with IBM [ibmandtheholocaust.com] about how history views those who comply with fascism for monetary return.

        I would definitely compare IBM's assistance in identifying, tracking and cataloging people for the Nazis during the Holocaust to PvP restrictions in World of Warcraft.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by geekoid ( 135745 )

          I wouldn't call providing hardware to assiting.

          Does Google assist in every crime someone does using a gmail address?

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Eevee ( 535658 )
        I can assure you that no matter how history views IBM, it hasn't affected IBM's stock prices one bit.

  • Huge Market, really? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by FunkSoulBrother ( 140893 ) on Thursday November 19, 2009 @01:47PM (#30160824)

    There is a software market in China? I mean one that generatess actual money, and doesn't just pirate everything?

    I guess 2% of a billion is a pretty big number.

    • If the Chinese consumer was anything like the U.S. consumer I would think this was another cloaked embargo/tariff and argue we should try our luck with the WTO. However, they're not. Most are pretty close to slave status which is why it's so hard for U.S. labor to compete with them.

      I'll lean more toward the government corruption angle.

  • ...none of those regulations apply to their goldfarming services targeted to large First World markets.

  • How to enhance socialist values in games (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward

    1. If you are playing the Call of Duty campaign and you pick up an ammo pack, you only get 1/10 of the ammo and the rest go to your NPC squadmates. If you point out that they are idiotic clowns that never pick up ammo to give to you in return, it's "Game Over" as you are sent to a reeducation camp to rid you of your bourgeoiseity.

    2. In Resident Evil, all the money you collect to buy items will instead be melted down to produce a golden plow. Instead, which weapons you get in the store depends on how badly y

    • sorry to talk semantics, but that those most of those are more about Communist values, not necessarily socialist values.

      Still funny, though.

  • You could make a video game of getting guy developing and publishing a video game in China.

    Oh the Onion'y of it all.
  • Any respectable company should boycott the Chinese market over this. It isn't a gamble to sell games to china that meet their criteria, however it does mean that you sold out your conscience for more profits. Personally I'd refuse to make changes from a piece of artwork to appease the establishment.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Dan667 ( 564390 )
      actually, in providing the game even neutered, the Chinese will probably be forced to change over time. They will never really be able to keep a lid on cultural control and anyone that plays the actual game will be pissed that they are not allowed to play the good version.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by clem ( 5683 )

      Any respectable company...

      We'll let you know if we see any.

  • Now, if we can only get Jack Thompson to learn Chinese and move to Beijing, we could finally get him out of our hair and inflict him on someone else. It would be a career move in keeping with his past "crusades". Of course, the Chinese may consider such a move an act of war.

  • Blah blah blah from the government (Score:5, Insightful)

    by DNS-and-BIND ( 461968 ) on Thursday November 19, 2009 @02:11PM (#30161244) Homepage
    I suppose y'all should have figured it out by now, but if not I'll spell it out and use small words. The Chinese government loves to pass new laws and announce new strategies. There is usually great fanfare, the press bleating like the contemptible sheep they are (the Chinese state-controlled press bleats too) and great discussions on the net as millions of electrons give their last and break up into neutrinos and photons. Then, six months later, nobody has heard of the act or law or whatever, because it's not enforced. This is the "secret" (pretty freaking obvious) of the Chinese government.

    They want you to be in violation of something. With all the legislation, it is impossible to comply with every single law without driving yourself out of business. Everyone knows it, and the Chinese government (at central, provincial, city, and district levels, which are all different and have little relation with each other) knows it too. They like knowing that they can shut you down at any time, but are usually content to let things go as long as you play ball. This kind of ball-play can be laissez faire for years or it can be an "I am altering the deal, pray I don't alter it further" kind of situation. You really have no way of knowing how it will turn out, and the government likes it like that. This is why it's so important to have buddies in government who can warn you of upcoming problems or give you some lamb's blood to mark yourself so the inspectors pass you over. I had one high muckety-muck vice-director of the municipal propaganda ministry hold my product in his hand as if he were weighing it, and said it was about 80% legal. I couldn't puzzle it out, either it's legal or illegal, how can legality be a percentage, and a guess at that! Later I got it...I felt pretty dumb. It was obvious, only my cultural blinders kept me from seeing it.

    And to those of you who are already hitting "reply" to say "durr, just like my country only my country is much worse", do you have a ministry of culture whose job it is to enhance socialist values? With lawyers and truncheons if necessary? You can joke all you like about capitalism taking over but there are plenty of true-believer Mao-worshipping socialists in the government.

  • Desireable means their profit and agenda first. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Bob_Who ( 926234 ) on Thursday November 19, 2009 @02:16PM (#30161324) Journal
    Its called a dogmatic National Interest. Welcom to international super power politics and self interest. Its how we all feel indignantly justified in our ethnocentric human nature. If the media is from a "foreign" undesirable culture then please feel free to steal it since we won't let you buy it, and you are a criminal anyway. But the legitimate stuff that they sell, first and foremost. America just can't seem to wrap their minds around the fact that China, the most populous nation by far, is not a democracy. If it we're, they'd out vote us every time. Which is exactly how they handle us anyway. Its like trying to push a sleepy grumpy Yak up a mountain with a twig. Moooooo.

  • The worst part is that in order to qualify for operating in China, you face a maze of conflicting bureaucracy and regulation. Well, it just got a little worse. Now, if you want to operate, you need to hire a 'specialist' to oversee content, and you need to 'enhance socialist values' in your game. They also want to limit in-game marriages and how many player-versus-player combat sessions one can engage in. The circular issued from China's Ministry of Culture contained all the vague verbiage giving them easie

  • Have 20 million Chinese WoW addicts have their game taken away.

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