China To Force Changes To 20 Popular Games, Ban 9 Including Fortnite and PUBG

[exetras]

According to BBC.com https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-46507894

 

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A panel of censors set up to vet mobile video games in China has signaled it will be hard to please. State media reports that of the first 20 titles it assessed, nine were refused permission to go on sale. The Xinhua news agency added that developers of the other 11 had been told they had to make adjustments to remove "controversial content." The authorities have voiced concerns about the violent nature of some titles as well as worries about the activity being addictive.

It was announced in August that a new body -- the State Administration of Press and Publications -- had taken over responsibility for approving games and that it would limit the number of online titles available. And although it has not been specified, some experts are assuming that the new panel will operate under its auspices. Xinhua said it is comprised of gaming experts, government-employed researchers, and representatives from the media and video games industry. But it provided no other information about who they were or the titles they had already examined.

Personal thought: seems china really doesn't like any unfiltered chat or chats that allow any critisms of the Regime. This seems to be targeted to the majors players and will trickle down to other games.

 

And more from Reddit.com https://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/a4w3ux/chinas_ethics_board_reviews_20_popular_online/

 

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In December, China established an Online Gaming Ethics Review Committee to examine a first batch of 20 games that were assessed to contain "ethics risks," with the publishers of 11 games instructed to make changes and remove "ethically questionable content," and 9 games to be either pulled from the market or prohibited from sale.

Recently the list of games and the content of their review was revealed by users on NGA, a Chinese gaming forum. I've translated the list here, with titles everyone would be familiar with highlighted, and some of these are quite interesting.

 

 

 

**** The Information Below is leaked and not from official sources ****

 

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Quote

Below is the Translated table.

 

Game	Cause	Recommended Action
Arena of Valor (Tencent)	Overly revealing female characters, rewards given based on rank, distorted concepts of history and culture.	Corrective action
League of Legends (Riot)	Overly revealing female characters, rewards given based on rank, inharmonious chatroom.	Corrective action
Blade & Soul (NCSOFT)	Overly revealing female characters, inharmonious chatroom.	Corrective action
Chu Liu Xiang (NetEase)	Overly revealing female characters, inharmonious chatroom, game missions include fraud.	Corrective action
Overwatch (Blizzard)	Game visuals promote incorrect values, inharmonious chatroom.	Corrective action
Diablo (Blizzard)	Inharmonious chat, game missions include fraud.	Corrective action
World of Warcraft (Blizzard)	Overly revealing female characters, inharmonious chatroom.	Corrective action
Westward Journey (NetEase)	Overly revealing female characters, inharmonious chatroom, distorted concepts of history and culture.	Corrective action
Code: Eva (Tencent)	Rewards given based on rank, distorted concepts of history and culture.	Corrective action
The Legent of Mir 3 (WeMade)	Inharmonious chatroom.	Corrective action
Swords of Legends Online (Aurogon)	Inharmonious chatroom.	Corrective action
PlayerUnknown's Battleground (Bluehole)	Blood and gore.	Prohibited/Withdraw
Fortnite (Epic)	Blood and gore, vulgar content.	Prohibited/Withdraw
H1Z1 (Daybreak)	Blood and gore, vulgar content.	Prohibited/Withdraw
Alliance of Valiant Arms (Red Duck)	Blood and gore, vulgar content.	Prohibited/Withdraw
Ring of Elysium (Tencent)	Blood and gore, vulgar content.	Prohibited/Withdraw
Paladins (Hi-Rez)	Overly revealing female characters, blood and gore, vulgar content.	Prohibited/Withdraw
Free Fire Battlegrounds (Garena)	Overly revealing female characters, blood and gore, vulgar content.	Prohibited/Withdraw
Knives Out (NetEase)	Overly revealing female characters, blood and gore, vulgar content.	Prohibited/Withdraw
Quantum Matrix (NetEase)	Blood and gore, vulgar content, inharmonious chat	Prohibited/Withdraw

Edited December 11, 2018 by exetras
Added that the table info was from leak.

[illegalwater]

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Fortnite (Epic) Blood and gore, vulgar content.

what

 

did they mix up fortnite with another game, lol

[Tristerin]

This is why I fight my Government and am involved in local politics as much as possible.  Absurd.

[Slottr]

That's disgusting. And what really sucks is that developers will most likely start sending out games with this censorship in mind.

 

Optimally they start developing games with the censors to only be shipped to China

[Mira Yurizaki]

I like how half of them are "inharmonious chat room." Just ban the chat feature why dontcha.

[Fasauceome]

11 minutes ago, exetras said:

Inharmonious chatroom.

this is arguably the worst offender

[Speed Weed]

There is blood in Fortnite? Da phuc. 

[exetras]

1 minute ago, fasauceome said:

this is arguably the worst offender

Yes, the lack of Winnie the Pooh filters angers his majesty so much.

 

I'm also a fan of Game visuals promote incorrect values. Which values are these?

[DrMacintosh]

It’s a People’s Republic alright. 

[Speed Weed]

We are playing banning games with US, China, and Russia. 

[DrMacintosh]

6 minutes ago, exetras said:

I'm also a fan of Game visuals promote incorrect values. Which values are these?

Incorrect values are ones that go against the state, my dude. 

[shermantanker]

Quote

Overly revealing female characters, rewards given based on rank, inharmonious chatroom.

Corrective action

That is probably the most petty communist bullshit I have seen. There could be more context to this, but at face value it is absurd.

[duncannah]

Pooh skin when?

[jasonvp]

4 minutes ago, duncannah said:

Pooh skin when?

Holy shit.  If Epic and Blue(bung)hole do that for their respective games post ban, that'll be hysterical.

[Fnige]

38 minutes ago, exetras said:

PlayerUnknown's Battleground (Bluehole) Blood and gore

Fortnite (Epic) Blood and gore, vulgar content

I think these two are supposed to be swapped, but the punishment is the same so who cares

[Arika]

But.... Dell made a big thing about how good their gaming laptops are for Chinese players because they can handle more plugins to "win more at chicken dinner" guess that marketing strategy is right out the window

[AlTech]

@exetras You should clarify in OP that the table and information were leaked and this is not 100% confirmed.

[exetras]

5 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

@exetras You should clarify in OP that the table and information were leaked and this is not 100% confirmed.

Done, Thanks.

[corrado33]

Personally? I'm happy to see legal action taken against the worst gaming features out there such as toxic online multiplayer and loot boxes.

 

Question: If "game missions contain fraud" is a category... then there goes the entire payday series, gta series, almost every RPG ever....etc.

[jasonvp]

4 minutes ago, corrado33 said:

I'm happy to see legal action taken against the worst gaming features out there such as toxic online multiplayer and loot boxes.

At no point should a legal body of any sort be involved in chat policing.  That is the definition of censorship, which is otherwise a word thrown around way too loosely on the 'net.  Chat being toxic is a thing the gaming community should be left to deal with on their own through filters, banning, etc.

[PlayStation 2]

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Communism.

[AngryBeaver]

What should happen is they should just pull these games and take the profit hit. Then after the people finally rise up and take back over the country market to them again.

 

China is shady as hell and the people that live there are often exploited or forced to suffer a pretty poor quality of life.

[DrMacintosh]

3 minutes ago, AngryBeaver said:

China is shady as hell and the people that live there are often exploited or forced to suffer a pretty poor quality of life.

The thing is many Chinese people defend the state for everything. 

[Arika]

5 minutes ago, DrMacintosh said:

The thing is many Chinese people defend the state for everything. 

To add to this. 

 

They do it because that's all they know, they don't have the outside perspective of people that have never been under such a regime and don't know how bad they have it (because propaganda). Some of them might just be scared of speaking out, but a large majority are likely happy

[corrado33]

10 minutes ago, jasonvp said:

At no point should a legal body of any sort be involved in chat policing.  That is the definition of censorship, which is otherwise a word thrown around way too loosely on the 'net.  Chat being toxic is a thing the gaming community should be left to deal with on their own through filters, banning, etc.

Yes because that's worked so well in the past.    Nearly every online multiplayer game has a toxic community, clearly indicated by the number of youtube videos of "12 year old crying in game because we did blah blah blah" People like to see other people suffer, and online gaming is an easy way for weak people to do that. Not only that, but more often than not you also have people who cheat, which I also consider toxic. I want my gaming experience to be relaxing and enjoyable, not plagued by 12 year olds trying to grief me.