No more skeletons for China's World of Warcraft

black_wing79 | July 10, 2007 | Press Release | PC

In an interesting turn of event's, China has announced that there will be no more skeletons shown in their version of World of Warcraft. This change seems to have been brought about by possibly China's effort to combat 'negative online influences'.

BEIJING (Reuters) - Bones and skeletons have disappeared from the Chinese version of the popular on-line fantasy game, World of Warcraft, sparking fierce criticism from the nation's army of players, Xinhua news agency said on Tuesday.

Chinese mainland gamers have waited half a year longer than their U.S. counterparts for the upgraded version of WoW, only to find the appearances of familiar skeletons have been fleshed out.

The skeletons, regular characters, grow flesh in the new version and the bones symbolizing dead characters have been changed to graves.

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Comments

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tekmosis | July 10, 2007

So, this means that in China you can't play as undead? sux2bu
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Cruxis Mana | July 10, 2007

^{This is just stupid.
I haven't played World of Warcraft before, but I know understand that skeletons are quite a main part of the game (( I mean, how is someone supposed to know if your dead )).
Just a little far fetched if you ask me ...

... although that part of the world does have a high suicide rate - which can be linked to online activities ...}
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Wolfwood | July 10, 2007

You play as their cuddlier in-laws, zombies, I guess. China's quest to protect the minds of their citizens from unhealthy influences can lead to some strange policies, like banning the depiction of skeletons. They can't even be shown in card games like Magic: The Gathering, so new art had to be drawn for the Chinese releases.
- 0 thumbs!
  Cruxis Mana | July 10, 2007
  
  ^{Oo - I never knew that they were banned in card games as well ...
  You learn something new everyday}
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dcbake | July 10, 2007

Gotta love communism at it's best.
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Rinkydink | July 10, 2007

Then simply said it isn't truly World of Warcraft. How the hell can it be playable without skeletons? China seriously took things a bit too far here.. must suck having to play the game like this.
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Insanity Prevails | July 10, 2007

I've seen images of skeletons and I'm still mostly sane.

This feels a bit silly. Censorship should be to protect the public from things that go too far, but I hardly think this falls under that.
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Miller | July 11, 2007

Banning skeletons..

Heh, I suggest you guys look up the Great Firewall of China, if you reeally wanna see Censorship gone too far.