China removes skeletons from World of Warcraft

by Alexander Sliwinski { Jul 10th 2007 at 10:37AM }

The Chinese version of World of Warcraft has removed skeletons. Yup, skeletons are no longer in the game. No fighting skeletons and no skeletons signifying you've resurrected. Enemy skeletons now have flesh on them and dead players are symbolized by a tombstone. The9, which runs WoW in China said the change was made due to China's "particular situation and relevant regulations."

No real reason for the change were given, but Chinese WoW players have expressed their unhappiness with the decision. The best possible explanation the Reuters piece could come up with is that in April, China began a campaign to combat "negative online influences" on the Internet. It's aimed at fraud and illegal lotteries (wonder if gold farming is on there?). So enjoy your skeleton-less World of Warcraft China, 'cause for some odd reason the government just doesn't think a skeleton is a "healthy" thing for your body.

Tags: china, removal, skeletons, world of warcraft, wow

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Henry @ Jul 10th 2007 10:42AM

what?

horngreen @ Jul 10th 2007 10:49AM

Not really the kind of country we want becomming a super power. This is minor compared to some of the things they still do.

Matt B @ Jul 10th 2007 10:51AM

LMAO!!

Yet the Chinese govt. has 1B Tons of skeletons in their big ass closet.

tituspullo @ Jul 10th 2007 10:52AM

i would say it has something to with religion but......

moominsean @ Jul 10th 2007 10:54AM

maybe they need to replace them with jumping vampires.

dpad @ Jul 10th 2007 10:55AM

People who complain about the US government taking away freedoms and rights should thank their lucky stars they weren't born in China.

Zsavior @ Jul 10th 2007 10:55AM

*Nods* at Horngreen Yeah I Was thinking the same exact thing when I was reading this story. Same exact thing, really why is more organizations taking on china?

Jonathan Tran @ Jul 10th 2007 10:56AM

This is nothing new...

China has censored Magic and Yu Gi Oh cards, removing skeletons and demons, or changing them to just look like evil humans, forever.

Also in Guild Wars china banned the Panda as a pet you could have, because the pet could die (in combat) and China has some law against portraying dead pandas in media.

In fact Guild Wars had to remove a lot of religious references since those aren't allowed either in Beijing, even though the gods are the whole focus of the game.

I really hate the Chinese govt, it is so rediculous how little free speech there is there. Their govt is brutal. I mean look, we had some contaminated food and today they EXECUTED the guy in charge of the factories there. Talk about downsizing.

Civil liberties ftw?

Jacob P. @ Jul 10th 2007 11:00AM

Civil Liberties ftw indeed

John @ Jul 10th 2007 3:06PM

They executed the guy for being corrupt and taking bribes to approve a dangerous drug that had already caused deaths. Read the story before you allude to it next time.

Ebichu @ Jul 10th 2007 10:59AM

heh, good thing they never aired He-Man in China.

liusu119 @ Jul 10th 2007 11:14AM

No, He-man and She-Ra both were aired in china a long time ago among many other American animations such as Transformers and Robotech.

MrZ @ Jul 10th 2007 11:09AM

Those crazy skeletons have no shame - always prancing around with no clothes on. I was just about to give the next skeleton I met a piece of my mind, but this will have to do.

Shalabi @ Jul 10th 2007 11:18AM

Why is Blizzard selling out to these facists? This is just like how Yahoo gives information to the Chinese gov't so they can find who they need to imprison or execute.

Jonathan Tran @ Jul 10th 2007 11:29AM

I agree.

The real problem is that companies are willing to bow down to anything China wants, even if it destroys their vision or, in the case of Yahoo, directly leads to oppression and murder.

If companies were not willing to deal with China it would be forced to loosen the slack.

Unfortunately the market is too big there to ignore in terms of potential profit.

Shiro Sirius @ Jul 10th 2007 4:00PM

It's not like switching out a couple of models is a giant change to the game, especially compared to an entire country's worth of subscription fees. Hell, there are already mechanics in the game to bring it in line with sensitive American laws - ever tried attacking a child NPC from an opposing faction?

Censorship for individual countries isn't anything new, just look at all the stuff that's been taken out of games in order to satisfy German laws. I know China has a lot of issues, but there's no real reason why this is major news other than the fact that it's slightly bizarre.

Dr. Strangel0ve @ Jul 10th 2007 11:26AM

Skeletons: The Number One Threat To Communism

FSK405K @ Jul 10th 2007 11:41AM

I wish we would execute corrupt officials like China did with their food administrator + cash. Wouldn't everyone have a little more faith in Congress if we had the Rep who had $50,000 cash in his freezer shot in front of the Capitol?

John @ Jul 10th 2007 3:10PM

It was $90, and DC would be a ghost town

ThornedVenom @ Jul 10th 2007 12:36PM

This is just me, but I find skeletons to be a humouristic replacement to corpses. Since it's more cartoony, wouldn't it be logical to have banned corpses and to have them replaced by skeletons? The tombstone idea though is quite cute...

But on a more serious issue, it sucks to inhibit artistic expression due to laws forbidding such tiny details. -_-; Sure their intentions are good, but perhaps they're just making more harm than good. Heck, as long as games don't contain anti-communist propaganda, I don't see why they should have their panties tied up in a knot.