Videogames are serious business in China. The country’s online game market will reach 41 billion yuan ($6 billion) by 2010, accounting for half the global market, according to newly released data from Cnzz.com, a Beijing-based data analysis firm.
The Cnzz.com report says that almost two-thirds of China’s 338 million Web users are now online gamers. The online-game industry, which currently accounts for more than half of the total Internet economy, will see strong annual growth at a rate of 20 percent in future years, the report says.
The turf battle between two Chinese bureaucracies appears to be escalating, with NetEase and the World of Warcraft videogame at its center.
According to a statement, China’s General Administration of Press and Publications said it rejected NetEase’s application to operate Burning Crusades, the latest version of World of Warcraft.
by Gus Mustrapa, Contributor, Game|Life, Wired.com
The common perception of World of Warcraft is that the immensely popular online game is a haven for obsessive nerds–folks with no lives and little to contribute to society.
You might think that starting a brand-new, high-quality, full-glossy magazine in one of the worst publishing environments in years would be a suicidal business idea.
Are you spending wakeless hours trying to master World of Warcraft? Would you rather send a friend a text message than meet in person? Do you sometimes fall asleep at the keyboard?
If you answered yes to any of those questions, you may have an Internet addiction. But now there’s help.
The relaunch of the popular online game World of Warcraft in China, where it has already been offline for six weeks, still faces an indefinite delay as it awaits government approval for its content.
by Robert Lemos, Technology and Science Journalist
Brian Green’s experience with not-so-secret questions began when he logged on to his World of Warcraft account in March of this year and found all of his characters in their underwear.
My World of Warcraft account is now more secure than my bank account. It is harder to steal 5,000 fake Warcraft gold from me than $5,000 real U.S. dollars. Why? Because unlike my bank, my computer game supports two-factor authentication.
For years, Western governments have used supercomputers to model weapons of nuclear war. Now a company in China uses the powerful machines to tend the fantasy realms of World of Warcraft.
Based on publicly available data, it looks like an Internet milestone will be passed by the end of next month: World of Warcraft will lose its undisputed status as the most popular massively multiplayer online world. It’s struggling to defend that title as Habbo Hotel, the Web-based, social MMO from Finland’s Sulake Corp., is nipping at its heels.
by Tom Chatfield, Assistant Editor, Prospect Magazine
Mogwai is cutting down the time he spends playing World of Warcraft. Twenty hours a week or less now, compared to a peak of over 70. It’s not that he has lost interest–just that he’s no longer working his way up the greasy pole. He’s got to the top.
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