China has recently announced extensive regulations targeting youth gaming. For those under 18 years of age, their gaming hours have been drastically reduced to a mere three hours per week. They may only game from 8 to 9pm on Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays, and public holidays.
These new laws are a hard hit to the world’s largest market of video games. China is a gaming powerhouse with corporations like Tencent and NetEase. The former is connected with notable games such as League of Legends, Fortnite, PUBG, Honor of Kings, Clash of Clans, and many more. The younger generation of China spend hours pouring over these games, and these numbers have only been rising with the pandemic, accelerating the passage of these new laws.
To the Western world, such drastic laws may be perceived as insane and an invasion of personal freedom. However, one can’t truly understand the Chinese government’s actions without a closer examination of the Chinese lifestyle.
China has hundreds of millions of families in the lower/middle class. All of these families strive to improve their lives and rise up the societal ladder which can only be done through education. Chinese schooling is very difficult with students having to hop through many tiers. For instance, 50% of students can only test into high school through the Zhongkao test. Those that do not make the cut have completely forfeited their chance to attend a four year university. They must attend a vocational school and enter the workforce doing manual labor. For the other half that do make it into high school, they must pass the Gaokao and earn scores high enough to attend their favorite university. Eduction is critical to obtaining a stable job such as a government employee and living in a big city like Shanghai. A good job and a college degree are implicit prerequisites to finding a girlfriend/boyfriend, starting a family, and obtaining respect in society. Many parents work day and night to provide the best environment for their children to succeed academically in hopes of a brighter future. However, gaming seeks to derail that. Despite the thousands of dollars families pour towards extracurriculars, sports, and tutoring, the Chinese youth can become addicted towards gaming and ignore all of their parents’ efforts. From a parent’s perspective, watching their child lose their lives and minds to gaming is absolutely unacceptable. Many parents absolutely despise Tencent and their products; the Chinese have even termed games as an “internet drug,” citing their addicting effects over the youth.
Some of you might be thinking – why not just set limits or take away their devices? While a lot of parents have done that, some children have gone insane. There are shocking cases where kids have poisoned their own parents and even bludgeoned them to death in order to play games. Additionally, China has thousands of PC cafes, and many kids will even run away from home to inhabit them. While the majority of kids are fine with restrictions imposed by parents, some will give up anything in the world for more playing time – a frightening revelation that must be properly addressed.
With the rollout of these new regulations, many of the older generation are very content with these new reforms, even praising Xi for his aggressive tactics. On the other side of the spectrum, many of the younger generation are very displeased, considering this as an overreach of the government. Additionally, gaming company stocks have tumbled, and the future of China’s e-sports industry is in serious doubt. For instance, many Chinese League of Legends teams like Royal Never Give Up, Invictus Gaming, and EDward Gaming all scout for talents aged 15-17 usually. With these new restrictions, the pool of young talent will be significantly decreased, possibly undermining Chinese gaming might.
Personally, I think these gaming regulations are a bit excessive. While I think some sort of regulation is beneficial for the youth in the long term, I think they should be more accommodating. I think an hour of gaming from Monday to Thursday (8-9pm) and three hours of gaming on Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays, and public holidays (7-10pm) is much more reasonable. Additionally, for those that truly yield gaming talent, China should allow them to practice unlimited hours in order to continue Chinese dominance on the worldwide gaming stage.
