Out of their league? China’s online gaming conundrum

China is home to 661 million online gamers, easily the world’s biggest market. Cities like Shanghai now boast some of the world’s most talented game developers. Yet the Chinese government has long been uncomfortable with online games, fretting about Internet addiction and young people wasting their energies on ‘spiritual opium’, leaving their schoolbooks for seedy Internet cafes. To explore how China is coping with the tension between molding productive citizens and cashing in on a hugely lucrative gaming industry, Louisa and Graeme are joined by game developer Allison Yang Jing, who writes about Chinese video games, Hugh Davies from RMIT, a video game curator, and Pace College’s Marcella Szablewicz, author of Mapping Digital Game Culture in China.

Image: Game On, Hugh Davies

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