PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds May Be Banned in China
PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds may be banned in China. The Audio-Video and Digital Publishing Association, a monitoring organization in China, thinks the shooter is too violent.
According to the regulator in China, the game is too gory and violent to be sold, Bloomberg reports. The set-up of the game is referred to by the supervisor as a kind of gladiator fight from ancient Rome, where only one person remains alive; according to the organization, this does not fit with China’s socialist values and is too harmful for young gamers. The regulator also wants to discourage developers from releasing battle royale games within the genre.
Based on these statements, it seems unlikely that PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds will receive an official license in China, partly because the regulator has already consulted with a Chinese body that has to approve a large part of the audiovisual content in the country. The game can only be downloaded in China via a VPN connection.
From a recent chart According to Steam Spy, PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds is by far the most popular worldwide in China, where the number of active players is almost 6 million, far more than in any other region. This number is also still rising significantly, while the number of players in other regions is often stabilizing or declining.