Congratulations World of Warcraft players in China!...Well, perhaps, congratulations is a bit too strong a word. Anyway, it turns out China's General Administration of Press and Publication and WoW's new operator in the region, NetEase.com, have reached an agreement over what content changes will be implemented in the massively popular MMORPG in order to get the game up and running again after being down for over a month.
As Gamasutra reports, NetEase.com was forced to make some rather ridiculous changes to the game before gaining approval to relaunch it. Currently, the game is only playable to existing WoW players in the form of a free closed beta, and so far, users have been noticing some rather amusing changes to the game they knew and loved.
MMOSite has documented some of these changes, which include bone piles being replaced with sandbags, and the color of blood being changed from red to black. More amusing are the new talent tree icons, some of which have magically transformed from severed heads, skulls and blood to boxes, satchels and crates. Because if there's anything more offensive and socially devious than cartoony depictions of skulls and bones, I haven't seen it.
Then again, WoW players in China make up around 50 percent of the game's worldwide user base. So I guess if a few bones need to be removed, or the biological color of blood needs to be altered, to get those millions of players back online, then unfortunately that's what has to happen.
I'm currently waiting to hear back from Blizzard to see what it has to say about all of this, so I'll let you know if I hear anything.
Source
Comments are Closed
Comments
Displaying 1–12 of 12
ParanoiDave
Whoa whoa whoa, step back there Joe McCarthy. But really. Abusive? So what this website is telling me is that it's pro-high-school-history-level- ignorant-anti-communists? I guess G4 is the true American hero.
RyantheWondergamer
I blame the government issued cheese
konpatchi
Stupid Communists don't they have better things to do
ParanoiDave
ParanoiDave's comment is abusive and has been removed.
komradkyle
wow Chinese government way to fail
implodinggoat
50 million Chinese players were playing the game already and didn't have any problem with it. What you are seeing is the communist party imposing its will upon its people. This isn't a change being made for the sake of cultural awareness its a change being made to appease a totalitarian government.
endy_n_omni
It's a different culture. I know some parts of the world consider bone and skeletons sort of taboo since it's disgraceful to their dead. In their culture, anyway. Sure the younger people of the world might not care as much, but it's just a diffrent culture. It's not like it changes the game.
h4x121
Ive never understood how changing the color of blood makes it somehow less violent....seriously what? just because its black suddenly everyone is fooled into thinking its motor oil? I just really don't get it. If they want it to be less violent they should make them spray rainbows or something, just saying.
RedRingsOfDeath
China*
RedRingsOfDeath
when its to much fail for even the word fail or epic failure...made up a new word or changed the letters....how about....phalure??? lol that sounds good. i havent played WoW in like 3 months since my card ran out so this is all new to me. but this is really stupid... stupid chine and their dumb communistic laws
RiceBunny15
Wow, as a Chinese born dude, I'm glad I moved away fro these Communist idiots. I mean seriously, come on, I can understand them blocking porn sites and all, but this is too far. Worst failure ever. Guy in China, just play on a private server or move to a democratic country ;)
Chunky_2336
will gold still be 8 bucks for 1000g?
Displaying 1–12 of 12