[Vigilous]

I debated about here or Other Games, but, whatever.

GameSpot Article

Tl;dr: Two Chinese government cabinets are in a pissing match and somehow it affects WoW. WoW shutdown until further notice or until Activision/Blizzard asks Big Uncles Eisner and Gates to step in. Big Uncle Turner will be too distracted by the new Barney holiday video to care.

[Cruzandercerberus]

Not a shock. There is an undercurrent of trade war in our relations with china. First the Nylon Tariff, and now they start to put the clamps on the real american export, decadent culture.

[Kleiner]

This has more to do with WoW, it will affect all MMORPGs in china that originate outside of the country.

In a nutshell, china doesn't want MMORPGs from outside the country to be in their country, unless they are entirely maintained and operated by a chinese company (along wit ha few other requirements). Not only that, but no foreign MMORPG can be updated without having the update data reviewed and accepted by a government authority.

Now, there are 2 government authorities battling over who has control MMORPGs in the country, and everything is just going haywire.

[Cruzandercerberus]

No doubt that Chinese government ministries will clamp down hard on anything not suitably Chinese. I'm just wondering if the timing of this has to do with with trade relations beyond just the intent of boosting Chinese nationalism/industry.

[Concernedasuran70]

This is just another reason to hate china. However, it is just WoW so who cares. They did the world a favor.

[Kleiner]

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However, it is just WoW so who cares. They did the world a favor.

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This has more to do with WoW, it will affect all MMORPGs in china that originate outside of the country

[Sanders]

Concernedasuran70, on 03 November 2009 - 12:44 PM, said:

This is just another reason to hate china. However, it is just WoW so who cares. They did the world a favor.

Triple truth.