China’s Online Gaming Ethics Review Committee has banned PUBG, Fortnite, and other popular Battle Royale games for having Blood and Gore, and Vulgar content. A total of 20 games were reviewed by the Ethics Review Committee, 11 of them were asked to do corrective action, and 9 games were ordered to be removed from the marketplace or prohibited from sale.
An interesting list of 20 Games has appeared on the Reddit along with a caption “China Bans 20 Most Popular Games”, and surprisingly PUBG, Fortnite, and some of the other trending games have found a place in the list. Surprisingly, not one developer or publisher have come out and neither confirmed nor denied the news which has raised a big question mark on the legitimacy of the list. To clear this mystery we decided to dig a bit deeper, and here’s what we found.
In December, China formed an Online Gaming Ethics Review Committee and asked them to examine the first batch of 20 games which includes PUBG, Fortnite, Paladins, and many others. It is reported via NGA, a popular Chinese Gaming Forum, that the findings of the Online Gaming Ethics Review Committee has been leaked and they have asked publishers of 11 games to remove “ethically questionable content” in their games, and have ordered to remove the 9 other games (which includes Fortnite and PUBG) from the marketplace or prohibited from sale.
You can check out the list in Chinese and English (translated) below.
The Reddit user who translated the above list has this to say: “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 fact that these 20 games are still playable in China raises a big question mark of the legitimacy of the list. Also, Reddit user “zestybaby” put forward this interesting point on this controversy.
“Blizzard purportedly posted an announcement on their official Weibo (China’s version of Twitter) account denying that they’ve received notice for action needed on their games. However, this has since been deleted. Now there could be many reasons for this, for example not wanting to draw attention to rumors, or even miscommunication between social media staff. The latter happened when JD and Huawei released official statements calling news of their execs arrest in America and Canada “fake news.” Furthermore, the Chinese community has since been somewhat divided, with some accepting the list as believable, and others saying it’s probably fake since anyone can make this in Excel. That’s certainly true, and the nature of rumors over censorship in China means it’s unlikely there will be a firm answer either way. I’d agree it’s the role of the OP to substantiate their allegations, but since this topic is itself currently subject to censorship, that’s now impossible regardless of whether they have more info or not.”
What is your take on this? Share your opinion with us in the comment section below.
1: Arena of Valor (Tencent)
- Cause: Overly revealing female characters, rewards given based on rank, distorted concepts of history and culture.
- Action: Corrective.
2: League of Legends (Riot)
- Cause: Overly revealing female characters, rewards given based on the rank, inharmonious chatroom.
- Action: Corrective.
3: Blade & Soul (NCSOFT)
- Cause: Overly revealing female characters, inharmonious chatroom.
- Action: Corrective.
4: Chu Liu Xiang (NetEase)
- Cause: Overly revealing female characters, inharmonious chatroom, game missions include fraud.
- Action: Corrective.
5: Overwatch (Blizzard)
- Cause: Game visuals promote incorrect values, inharmonious chatroom.
- Action: Corrective.
6: Diablo (Blizzard)
- Cause: Inharmonious chat, game missions include fraud.
- Action: Corrective.
7: World of Warcraft (Blizzard)
- Cause: Overly revealing female characters, inharmonious chatroom.
- Action: Corrective.
8: Westward Journey (NetEase)
- Cause: Overly revealing female characters, inharmonious chatroom, distorted concepts of history and culture.
- Action: Corrective.
9: Code: Eva (Tencent)
- Cause: Rewards are given based on rank, distorted concepts of history and culture.
- Action: Corrective.
10: The Legend of Mir 3 (WeMade)
- Cause: Inharmonious chatroom.
- Action: Corrective.
11: Swords of Legends Online (Aurogon)
- Cause: Inharmonious chatroom.
- Action: Corrective.
12: PlayerUnknown’s Battleground (Bluehole)
- Cause: Blood and gore.
- Action: Prohibited/Withdraw.
13: Fortnite (Epic)
- Cause: Blood and gore, vulgar content.
- Action: Prohibited/Withdraw.
14: H1Z1 (Daybreak)
- Cause: Blood and gore, vulgar content.
- Action: Prohibited/Withdraw.
15: Alliance of Valiant Arms (Red Duck)
- Cause: Blood and gore, vulgar content.
- Action: Prohibited/Withdraw.
16: Ring of Elysium (Tencent)
- Cause: Blood and gore, vulgar content.
- Action: Prohibited/Withdraw.
17: Paladins (Hi-Rez)
- Cause: Overly revealing female characters, blood and gore, vulgar content.
- Action: Prohibited/Withdraw.
18: Free Fire Battlegrounds (Garena)
- Cause: Overly revealing female characters, blood and gore, vulgar content.
- Action: Prohibited/Withdraw.
19: Knives Out (NetEase)
- Cause: Overly revealing female characters, blood and gore, vulgar content.
- Action: Prohibited/Withdraw.
20: Quantum Matrix (NetEase)
- Cause: Blood and gore, vulgar content, inharmonious chat
- Action: Prohibited/Withdraw.
