I hold a considerable amount of respect for the particular type of activism posited by the gaming community. Whenever we are faced with an unfair or unjust scenario, we have a tendency to speak out and fight back against the offending organizations in the places that hurt them most. Of course, sometimes in our fervour our sights can get a little off-target, but recently we've reached the point where we can affect actual change with enough support from our end. This way we have been able to prove to gaming companies that ours is a voice to be heard and that we have real power in the decision process. Almost every fight that the collective gaming community has fought have been ones that it is feasible to win. However, I find myself doubting whether that is the case with this new foe that has earned the ire of gamers. That is because this week, gamers have rallied against the most powerful country in the actual real world, 'the People's Republic' of China.
Maybe you've caught wind about this in snippets and thought; "Wow, China's in the news a lot recently. I wonder if it's all related?" To which the answer is yes, it all very much is. That is why it can be hard to explain everything in a cohesive manner. Nevertheless, I will try and promptly fail, so bear with me. (Oh, and a lot of this is general world news, so if I get some details wrong blame it on my disposition against watching TV news. BBC makes my eyes bleed.) Very basically; there was a 19 year old man who was vacationing in Taiwan and ended up murdering his pregnant girlfriend. (Gruesome, I know, but this is only the background right now.) He ended up fleeing to Hong Kong before being arrested by police. Taiwanese officials then asked for the man to be extradited back to their country, however this could not be achieved due to the lack of an extradition treaty between the two countries. A bill was drawn up; however, Taiwan, which is treated as a puppet-state by China, added a clause that would rope China in and allow them to enforce a lot of their imposing censorship laws upon Hong Kong and extradite anyone to the mainland for punishments.
At this point, the specifics of the story go into the background of Hong Kong as a city, and the weird area it sits in as an independent entity and another extension of China. This goes back to 1997, at least, when Hong Kong was transferred from British rule over to China after an expiration date, and likely a lot further back with all kinds of backroom dealings. I'm no expert of all the minute details happening over there, but I am a believer in personal freedoms and understand that surrendering more control to the most powerful tyrant in the world is a good way to lose those freedoms.
But what does any of this have to do with gaming? Well, I'm glad you asked. You see, there is this little game that goes by the name of Hearthstone; it has a modest following and even boasts some competitions with quaint prize pools. Okay I'm being facetious, Hearthstone grandmaster tournaments are some of the biggest events in E-Sports and have some of the grandest prizes. For those that like such things, I.e. not me, your yearly highlight is likely these legendary card game matches that are sponsored by Blizzard themselves. This is probably the reason why the livestreams that broadcast these events pull in millions of eyes from all over the world, all fans excited to see the best of the best duke it out for extensive prize pools.
One such contender was a fellow who goes by the name; Blitzchung. I will admit that I am unfamiliar with this man or his style, but he was good enough to win some prize money through these events so I'm sure he had some sort of following prior to last week's conundrum. What conundrum? Oh, just the livestreamed interview with Blitzchung that ended with him donning a gasmask and speaking these words in Mandarin: "Liberate Hong Kong. Revolution of our age." Hailing from Hong Kong, Blitzchung expressed how his involvement in the movement back home had got in the way of his Hearthstone preparation and he felt it was his duty to spread the word about Hong Kong on the biggest platform that he could.
The consequences were swift and harsh. Blizzard promptly removed Blitzchung from their Grandmaster tournament, seized his prize winnings and banned him from the tournament for a full year. They also thought it prudent to fire the two commentators who were present for the message and who ducked under their table when he spoke. Apparently Blizzard had concluded they must be involved due to one declaring "Say the eight words and then we'll end the interview" before his declaration. In explanation of their actions, Blizzard cited a vague clause in their TOS about 'not bringing dispute upon oneself or Blizzard' before calling it a day.
This, understandably, left a whole number of people very confused as to what just happened, and more importantly, why? The man was a citizen of Hong Kong, after all, so why would an American Company take a hard line stance about him making a political statement related to his home? Sure, they could be dissatisfied about being used as someone's platform on Blizzard's Stream, but that would only warrant a slap on the wrist, not this salt-the-earth approach. Well, the answer is quiet simple, really. Prepare thyself for business talk.
You see, Activision was bought by Vivendi back in 2008 in order to merge their subsidiary, Vivendi games, with Activision's subsidiary, Blizzard, so that they could benefit off the success of World of Warcraft. In 2013 Activision Blizzard announced their plans to buy back their shares from Vivendi and become independent, however they would need a considerable pool of money for that. Luckily, like Satan himself, Chinese company Tencent swooped in and funded the transition for an undisclosed amount. To this day, Tencent still hold 5% of Activision Blizzard's soul- I mean, stock.
In the years that have followed, Activision Blizzard have held a close, exclusive, relationship with China. Even releasing a Chinese exclusive Free-to-play version of Call of Duty which had a crappy Battle Royale system back before even Fortnite was a thing. It shouldn't come as any surprise, then, that Blizzard would be willing to censor China's attempt to seize control of Hong Kong without a moment's hesitation. "But isn't that a little bit conspiratorial? Why would the Chinese government use one of their private companies' influence to silence dissent on their political actions? I mean, I know that their censorship is legendary, but this would be taking that concept a bit far." Well, if you don't believe me, just take a look at another example of this very same thing that happened in the same week. (Amazingly.)
NBA (The real one, not 2K's travesty of a game series) has always been as big in China as it is in America. In fact, some hopeful players have come from the scene in China to America in order to make it big. The populace enjoy it too, with matches and official merch being provided to their millions of Chinese fans due to a very lucrative partnership between sports companies who's names I don't care enough to look up. That harmony came into question, however, when the manager of NBA's Houston Rockets sent out an image on his private twitter account reading "Fight for freedom, Stand with Hong Kong."
This fallout was even more apocalyptic than the Hearthstone's. The tweet was deleted in hours with the manager issuing an apology shortly afterwords. CTrip, China's biggest online travel website, burned all of their NBA related tickets and travel products; Dicos, a Chinese fast-food chain, suspended all marketing and publicity activities and Wzun, a skin care brand, straight-up cancelled all of their cooperation with the NBA. (That one was probably for the best. Who the heck wants skincare products with Dennis Rodman's face on them?) Then there came a slew of public statements from big NBA stars which amounted to little more than kowtowing as spineless spokespeople rattled through a laundry list of things they love about China whilst mentioning how deplorable the manager was. Rumor has it that he's going to be on the chopping block too in the next couple of days. (He and Blitzchung should start a band.)
All that is pretty wild anyway; but, believe it or not, there was yet another issue of international censorship last week, although this one came from a very likely source; South Park. Matt Stone and Trey Parker's comedy series is well known for causing controversy with it's irreverent satire and often poe-faced commentary; and their latest episode: 'Band in China' was no different. (They should win an Oscar for the title alone.) In the episode, Randy Marsh decides to expand his new business, 'Tegrity farms, into an untapped market with plenty of potential customers; China. Unfortunately, Randy's business produces and sells Cannabis, which is highly illegal in China. He finds himself being thrown into a Chinese work camp, get tortured relentlessly and have Piglet and Winnie the Pooh as prison mates. (Current Chinese dictat- I mean, President- Xi Jinping is very sensitive to the fact that people compare him to Winnie the Pooh. As such, the regime has banned Winnie the Pooh in the whole country. I'm not joking.)
The B-Story follows the children as they start a band (again), only to have a manager come in and tell them to change a lot of their act in order to better fit the Chinese market. (Holding a mirror to the way that American companies capitulate to the demands/whims of Chinese audiences. Just look at the cringeworthy China-only additions to Iron Man 3 to see what I mean.) Predictably, the episode ended up being banned in China. Actually, the entire show was completely erased from Chinese Internet sources. Forums, social media, and streaming sites were scrubbed of all mention of 'South Park'. Matt and Trey noticed all this (and were likely expecting it) so they took to the show's twitter page to issue a statement. (I wish I knew how to insert Tweets, but I'll just quote it.) "Like the NBA, we welcome the Chinese censors into our homes and into our hearts. We too love money more than freedom and democracy. Xi doesn’t look just like Winnie the Pooh at all! Tune into our 300th episode this Wednesday at 10! Long live the Great Communist Party of China! May this autumn’s sorghum harvest be bountiful! We good now China?”
Even people outside of the consumer market have weighed in, although not always verbally. Outside of Blizzard's office the company has a garish black statue that features the companies' values engraved into the floor. Some unknown Blizzard Devs, who seemingly disapproved of the removal of Blitzchung, stuck paper covering over the plaques that once read "Think Globally" and "Every Voice Matters". Even none games-industry folk have started to weigh in. United States Senator Ron Wyden tweeted; "Blizzard shows it is willing to humiliate itself to please the Chinese Communist Party. No American company should censor calls for freedom to make a quick buck." and Marco Rubio echoed similar sentiments. Does this classify as an international incident yet?
The general feeling, right now, seems to be that; those who support Blizzard are indirectly supporting the Chinese regime, and it honestly does feel that way. Many Hearthstone Vets are announcing that they're walking away from the game in disgust and Overwatch and WoW players are slowly picking up on the trend too. Modern Warfare fans seem to have completely ignored the fact that they are contributing too, (Activision and Blizzard are partners) but they already had to deal with the 'Survival mode' controversy last month, if they had to take anything else into account their brains might just explode!
All of this may not last longer than a week, except for those with a history for holding a grudge. (like me) But until the white hot fervour cools down and everyone goes back to pretending none of this happened, consumers are fighting dirtier than I ever seen. By far my favourite act of defiance has been people painting fan art of Chinese Overwatch character Mei as a symbol of the rebellion. Blizzard's Overwatch is a huge source of revenue for the company, and it's one of the few games that is allowed to be sold in China completely unchanged. (PUBG was re-named 'Games of Peace' and forced to take out the blood and rework all death animations to show players getting up and waving.) Protesters, realizing this, have drawn Mei wearing the banned gasmasks that represent the protests and donning pro Hong Kong attire. The ends of this is to turn Mei into a symbol of the protest, thus invoking the wrath of Chinese censors and forcing them to ban Overwatch in China, kicking Blizzard's bottom line right in the unmentionables. Now that's playing dirty and I absolutely love it! (Above image from u/Fish-IP)
Ultimately, I'm proud of the gaming community for taking a stand against these repressive practises, even if I think that it's an argument we'll never win. China is one of the most profitable markets in the world and arguably the most influential, what they say goes and the rest of the world are powerless, or unwilling, to stand up to them. We're talking about a regime that has been complicit with untold amounts of on-record Human Rights violations in direct response to it's own one-child policy alone, and has now introduced a two-child policy to start the cycle all over again. A regime that butchered people in one of the most brutal police actions in recorded history, (I'm talking about Tienanmen Square) and then just pretended that it didn't happen. A country who's President, Winnie JinPooh, decided to make himself president-for-life, and no world leader so much as batted an eye. I've often semi-joked about how Disney will be the first corporation to become a world-ruling sovereign entity, well, China's already half way there. They have the power and will to do whatever they want, however they want, and a small-scale, likely short-lived, consumer revolt isn't going to make them think twice. It's a fight that us gamers have no chance of winning. But I've watched enough Anime to know, that doesn't mean it's not a fight worth having.
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