Hong Kong Bans Video Game Using National Security Laws (engadget.com) 39
Hong Kong authorities have invoked national security laws for the first time to ban the Taiwan-made video game Reversed Front: Bonfire, accusing it of promoting "secessionist agendas, such as 'Taiwan independence' and 'Hong Kong independence.'" Engadget reports: Reversed Front: Bonfire was developed by a group known as ESC Taiwan, who are outspoken critics of the China's Communist Party. The game disappeared from the Apple App Store in Hong Kong less than 24 hours after authorities issued the warning. Google already removed the game from the Play Store back in May, because players were using hate speech as part of their usernames. ESC Taiwan told The New York Times that that the game's removal shows that apps like theirs are subject to censorship in mainland China. The group also thanked authorities for the free publicity on Facebook, as the game experienced a surge in Google searches.
The game uses anime-style illustrations and allows players to fight against China's Communist Party by taking on the role of "propagandists, patrons, spies or guerrillas" from Hong Kong, Taiwan, Tibet, Mongolia and Xinjiang, which is home to ethnic minorities like the Uyghur. That said, they can also choose to play as government soldiers. In its warning, Hong Kong Police said that anybody who shares or recommends the game on the internet may be committing several offenses, including "incitement to secession, "incitement to subversion" and "offenses in connection with seditious intention." Anybody who has downloaded the game will be considered in "possession of a publication that has a seditious intention," and anybody who provides financial assistance to it will be violating national security laws, as well. "Those who have downloaded the application should uninstall it immediately and must not attempt to defy the law," the authorities wrote.
The game uses anime-style illustrations and allows players to fight against China's Communist Party by taking on the role of "propagandists, patrons, spies or guerrillas" from Hong Kong, Taiwan, Tibet, Mongolia and Xinjiang, which is home to ethnic minorities like the Uyghur. That said, they can also choose to play as government soldiers. In its warning, Hong Kong Police said that anybody who shares or recommends the game on the internet may be committing several offenses, including "incitement to secession, "incitement to subversion" and "offenses in connection with seditious intention." Anybody who has downloaded the game will be considered in "possession of a publication that has a seditious intention," and anybody who provides financial assistance to it will be violating national security laws, as well. "Those who have downloaded the application should uninstall it immediately and must not attempt to defy the law," the authorities wrote.
Easter Eggs (Score:4, Funny)
Re: Easter Eggs (Score:2)
"No. Because Disney would crack down on it."
Defying Dear Leader is one thing, crossing Disney is a whole 'nuther level.
Re: (Score:1)
Has he ever read a book? :p
Does he even know what they are?
Which is stronger? (Score:2)
We will soon find out which is stronger: the CCP's censorship or the Streisand Effect.
Re: Which is stronger? (Score:2)
That's not even in question. The CCP are perfectly willing to kill or imprison every single citizen who downloads the game if they decide it's a good idea. They wouldn't even bat an eye about doing so.
Re: Which is stronger? (Score:2)
You really know nothing at all about Chinese history, do you?
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Learn to troll. I know grade school kids that are better than this. Maybe go practice over at knittinghelp.com a while before you come back to where the old masters are.
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Trick question! In America you're already being monitored anyway.
Re: (Score:1)
Monitor me all you want. You will quickly become bored and move on to someone far more interesting.
Re: In America.. (Score:3)
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If a game was released that supported terrorism in the US, and was on Apple stores, etc. How long would it take before you start getting monitored.
You seemed to have missed that Counter-Strike [wikipedia.org] has been a thing for a little over 24 years.
Re: In America.. (Score:1)
And NSA rooms in telecom hubs has been a thing for a whole lot longer. That's not even mentioning the surveillance device you carry everywhere with you at all times.
Re: In America.. (Score:1)
You're talking to the wrong guy. I had nothing whatsoever to say about anything except electronic surveillance.
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Dude, troll better. This ain't even entertaining work.
won't hold up (Score:2)
Mainland China censorship laws certainly wouldn't be enforced in Hong Kong even after only a brief glance at the Hong Kong Basic Law [basiclaw.gov.hk] right?
Re: won't hold up (Score:1)
You think? Hong Kong is not by any means separate from China or free of CCP rule. Anything you hear to the contrary is either wishful thinking or base propaganda.
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Er, that's what I said. I know our education system is absolute shit lately but I figured you could at least read a couple sentences and not get the meaning exactly backwards.
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Washington State says I can smoke weed just about anywhere I want for whatever reason I want.
The Federal Government may still arrest me for it, though.
If Washington State passes a law specifically allowing TikTok to be on the Apple App Store tomorrow, Apple will still remove it if Trump ever decides he's not goin
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I don't get this "free Hong Kong" nonsense. It certainly wasn't free under the British.
Depends upon the era we're talking about. Hong Kong was controlled by the British for a very long time.
By the 1960s, the Colonial Government was well-liked by its residents, and there were literally no local movements calling for the end of imperial government.
Sure, a lot of that probably has to do with the fact that they saw the Cultural Revolution happen on the other side of the water, but they also objectively enjoyed many British rights.
Nobody in the West knows the history of the Opium War and how the UK brutally forced addictive drugs on China for profit.
Wrong. That's normal high school curriculum, particularly since t
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On 8 July, several hundred demonstrators from the PRC, including members of the People's Militia, crossed the border at Sha Tau Kok and attacked Hong Kong police officers stationed nearby. The police attempted to disperse the crowd using tear gas and wooden bullets, prompting armed members of the crowd to open fire on the police. Five police officers were killed and eleven injured in a brief exchange of fire.
Draconian British Law.
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Definitely not a distortion.
Yes, it is.
There's HK films that depicted this.
Depicted what? Depicted the '67 riots as something supported by average people? Bet it takes all of 0.3 seconds to find the funding stream from the CCP in that instance.
To say that people loved British rule in the 60s is pretty much BS.
I agree- which is why I said no such thing.
I said "the Colonial Government was well-liked by its residents". That's a fact- and one bounded by the relative nature of what was going on.
If you object to the specific wording, I'll drop it to, "The residents, in aggregate, had a good relationship with the colonial authorities, in a
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WOW. I'm talking to an AI that was trained on white supremacist pro-colonialist dogma. What's your name ?Certainly not Google gemini, That one has guardrails that prevent this kind of harmful racism from being spread.
I use LLMs quite a bit, but absolutely zero of the online services, and never for getting information. In that regard, they're about as reliable as a source of facts as you are, which is to say not at fucking all. I also have zero intention of becoming part of their training data.
So no, do try again, though.
I mean, pro-Manifsest Destiny content?
Pro? lol. I'm very much anti-manifest destiny. But being anti-manifest destiny does not justify trying to rewrite history in order make it appear more evil than it was- which is what you're trying to d
USA Bans Video Game citing Antisemitism (Score:2)