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China Reviewing Game Consoles Ban
jones_supa writes "The Chinese government is discussing whether to lift its 12-year ban on game consoles which was established due to fear of harming the physical and mental development of the young. Even during this period consoles have been sold illegally and things like Kinect can be sold for other purposes such as medical treatment and education. Major game console vendors across the world made several attempts but failed to find a way to enter the Chinese mainland market officially, even though they have solid manufacturing bases there. 'We are reviewing the policy and have conducted some surveys and held discussions with other ministries on the possibility of opening up the game console market,' a source from the Ministry of Culture, who asked not to be named, said."
You're one of the few enemies we can still put into our video games without any real backlash. If you start exerting the kind of leverage over our console makers and developers that you exert over our movie studios, then all we're going to be left with are North Korea, Iran, and a few of them stan countries. And even the stan countries are starting to bitch.
What political party do you join when you don't like Bible-thumpers *or* hippies?
PC games are common in China for this reason. There is no point in banning consoles.
Or so I heard on NPR this morning. They're probably salivating at the prospects right now.
Occasionally living proof of the Ballmer peak.
Even for China, this doesn't make much sense nowadays. PCs and smartphones can be (side) loaded with games similar to those found in consoles.
What? If you did that the US empire would crack down on you? Label you as some unpatriotic terrorist? Disregard the First Amendment?
Well, there's your proof that the US is evil.
I doubt the government will label you anything, but most Americans won't buy your game.
China only likes NK as they don't want to deal with them falling and having to deal with all people coming over the boarder.
Also they are tell NK to back off on the nuke tests.
Has there been some recent studies disproving the causal effect of games leading to mental retardation?
I m pretty sure my sister brought 2 DS (on two different trip) from china, the first one of those being gifted to her by our cousin (someone living in china). Second one was pretty easy to find too. I actually had no idea that this ban was in place Maybe they're just reviewing it because the law is unenforceable ?
You know what else is bad for young minds? Bullshit propoganda, lies, arrests for virtually no reason, and ruining the environment. As for my amazing proficiency at programming and solving IT problems with critical thinking, you can blame 15 years of video games for that.
What? If you did that the US empire would crack down on you? Label you as some unpatriotic terrorist? Disregard the First Amendment?
Well, there's your proof that the US is evil.
I doubt the government will label you anything, but most Americans won't buy your game.
Yeah you'd miss out on the fat Americans with their fat fuckin dollars.
I currently live in Beijing. I can have a new console in my living room in less than a half an hour. They're for sale in every major market here. And not really marked up much more than the US price. It was a piece of cake to get a 220V power supply for the Wii when we moved. I think I got it for 40 kuai (about $6) Sure, they'd sell a ton more of them if I could go to Gomez or Sunning..... but the "ban" is surely not keeping them out. Like most regulations here... not enforced at all... or selectively at best.
I was visiting Shenzen in Summer 2007 when it was still quite difficult to find a Wii on the shelf back in the USA. I saw them for sale at all of the computer/electronics markets. For about the same price as back home, they were chipped and came with any 10 games.
I'd actually say that 'Spec Ops: The Line' was one of the best shooters in years, and it got my money. And all my friends' money too. Reviewed wonderfully, but didn't sell anywhere as well as it deserved, and nowhere near the level of whatever the most recent Modern Warfare / Call of Duty games are.
Judging by the fact that it's inspired a fair bit from Apocalypse Now, I guess the pattern is that if you make a movie/game about killing US soldiers, you'll receive rave reviews and lots of awards... but it won't necessarily translate to making money hand-over-fist.
Aren't they also having trouble filling vacancies toiling in the iFactories? Consider it as training.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
>which was established due to fear of harming the physical and mental development of the young.
but, what if they're right about this? American kids aren't as physically fit as we were when I was young, and gaming is likely part of this worrying trend.
It's also possible that the problem-solving in games makes you smarter, so maybe the lack of fitness is a reasonable trade-off.
It's probably something they will use to throw the book at you if you break any other crime.
If they're worried about stunting the emotional development of their youth, have they banned Atlas Shrugged yet?
they are allowed to create games and "probably" create console as well but not allowed to sell it in their own country ??? wow ???
If they let video games run crazy all over the place, they're going to have more school shootings.
Even if you argue that video games destroy young minds, what more damage could be done? I'll remind you of the toddler that was run over (twice) and then passed by numerous times by its fellow countrymen. The unedited video is not for the faint-of-heart, but ABC had a nicely summed up version... http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2011/10/chinese-toddlers-hit-and-run-mother-praises-rescuer/
Surely the problem is in the games, and not the game consoles as such? Yes, there is a lot of violence, a lot of mindless grinding, but there are certainly also more interesting games than the typical FPS.
They are realizing that they need drone pilots and our gamers are the best in the biz. So they too want to get some of that training for their current and future drone pilots.
China only likes NK as they don't want to deal with them falling and having to deal with all people coming over the boarder.
I have read a number of times that all of the surrounding governments are terrified that North Korea will collapse. Basically they are all concerned about having to deal with 24 million starving North Koreans.
Large electronics and appliance stores. You will never see a crowd of people there.
On the face of it, they are talking about lifting a ban on console sales inside the country. But what they're really looking for now is not to increase people's access to these devices, but to spur domestic console game development. China by now realizes what a huge market this is, and that they've essentially locked themselves out of it because of their official stance. Meanwhile the gray/black market (or "market" as its known in China) for these items has already penetrated the country. So they essentially lose little by dropping the official ban and opening the doors for Chinese developers (who have already delivered AAA titles under contract for Western studios) to vie with the rest of the world as a gaming superpower. They have the knowledge and infrastructure, much of it supplied by external investors, and now they just need the law to follow to cut out the foreign middleman.
it's easy to counterfeit game cds, so they don't have to worry about chinese currency leaving the nation in the form of trade deficits or lowered trade surpluses in the case of pc games or software. But counterfeiting game consoles is harder, so a much greater percentage of chinese hard currency would be leaving the country even though the consoles are manufactured there. So it benefits China the longer they can prevent console sales. It seems that a permanent ban isn't practical any longer.
The most likely explanation for their potential willingness to allow these console now is that they have finally figured out how to copy the games.