Chinese gamers are devastated after losing access to their favourites games. Blizzard Entertainment just shut down its servers in the Middle Kingdom. “I cried all night because the game was down,” one player wrote on the Chinese social network Weibo.
Blizzard is withdrawing from China. Players have lost access to the games
At midnight from Monday to Tuesday, the licensing agreement between Blizzard Entertainment and Chinese partner NetEase expired. The American game publisher tried to get along with NetEase or establish cooperation with new entity in China, but these attempts were not successful. Ultimately, after more than 15 years, Blizzard had to abandon Chinese players.
Thus, the Chinese lost access to their favorite games, including to the hugely popular World of Warcraft, Overwatch 2, the StarCraft series and several others. As CNN writes, many players grew up on these productions and describe their dissatisfaction on the web.
“When I woke up, I still couldn’t accept it news. I cried all night because my game was turned off,” one player wrote on Weibo CNN. Another Chinese netizen called World of Warcraft his “first love” that he can’t forget.
Until the last moment, Blizzard tried to reach an agreement with NetEase on, even a temporary extension of the contract. The two sides were supposed to talk last week over a six-month transition period where players would not lose access to their titles. However, the former Chinese partner did not accept any of the proposals.
Of course, it is not excluded that Blizzard will eventually get along with NetEase or another Chinese company, and American games will return to Chin. Signing the agreement is necessary because foreign publishers have to work with local partners to offer games in this country.
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