Where is China's Nintendo?

This is a question that has been dogging me for a while, but, well, where is China's Nintendo?

Meaning, where are the large Chinese game companies that are as big and influential as Nintendo, Bioware, Valve, Square Enix etc, rather than just keeping to themselves in their own market? Why hasn't one appeared yet? There can be many ambitious large Chinese game projects that could be made based on Chinese culture and history, yet the only Chinese game that is internationally known at the moment is having that status for all the wrong reasons: Final Combat, the blatant Team Fortress 2 ripoff.

Is it because of the Communist Party's strict censorship that hampers China's other media, or something else? I ask that last point because if it really is a censorship thing, why haven't we seen a game company of the kind mentioned above come out of Hong Kong or Taiwan?

Technically, Nintendo does have a Chinese division, albeit one that uses several loopholes to get their portable systems to the masses. They even made a plug-and-play version of the Nintendo Sixty Four.

edited 17th Mar '12 5:25:47 PM by MrW

For Nintendo, they actually have that weird Nintendo64 knockoff, and I think a Game Cube variant, too. I think it's a deal similar to Mc Donald's and Coca Cola to sell their stuff there.

As for other companies, they mostly do their own stuff, mostly knockoffs of American media. You can see a lot of cheap knockoff of products not released in china in Stuart Ashen's show.

edited 17th Mar '12 5:46:46 PM by ThatOneGuyNamedX

Two words : media conservativity

Like many countries out there on planet Earth, they're not part of the high end of the media rope, and being the culture heritage ridden China, it's going to take a long long time before the soil can see things like Akihabara and foreign animators. From this alone we can see that likeminded people are forced to operate without companies, sticking to plagiarisms and imitations to sate their Fan Wank

The problem has a larger, sinister shadow: Moral Guardians that threaten to harp down on gaming as a form of mind control, and other kinds of accusations. What I hear from older Chinese and China Chinese all the time is that 'Japan uses cartoons and games to brainwash the next generation' , and I can never be angrier hearing that kind of shit. Before there can be a Chinantendo, the cultures have to match the level of entry. In a nation loaded with food poisoning issues and whose official stance is solidarity / counter Amerijapan ? Not gonna happen soon

edited 17th Mar '12 9:09:03 PM by Cassie

Last I heard, video game consoles are largely banned in mainland China. This pretty much limits the country's gaming market to personal computers, so for the most part a company like Nintendo wouldn't really have any good reason to sell its products there.

edited 17th Mar '12 9:24:44 PM by Fuschlatz

Game consoles are indeed banned in China, with Nintendo (through iQue) selling altered versions of the GBA and DS, and a N64 plug and play system through loopholes. I've heard though, that it isn't really enforced, and you can easily find and buy consoles though the grey market.

Also, piracy is rampant in China, which is a big reason a lot of games other than MMO's don't get released there. I'd think these would be a deterrent for Chinese-made games. Censorship is of course, pretty strict as well, which limits things more than elsewhere.

As such, Chinese gaming, including Chinese-made games, is mostly Computer MMO's and online games.

Probablly due to government controls on media and such. It's hard to make a game if the government needs to approve everything about it.

That's why the US Army gave their game idea to a company and said "build this"

China would control/censor most aspects of it.

edited 17th Mar '12 9:41:32 PM by Joesolo

Eh Cassie, people do use cartoons to brainwash the next generation and foreigners trying to turn the Chinese population into their personal market for centuries makes them wary. The Chinese are not completely innocent themselves but it is nice when they try to do right by their own. Their moral guardians may block animation or video games but they allow schools for theater and literature, they don't block all artistic expression.

I'm aware of that. The issue here is about China's media execution. They don't block expressionism, that's for sure. But their range of allowed tropes, themes and target audiences are severely limited. Like for example, if it's for kids it HAS to be straightly-played hero wins and villain loses story. If it's for teens it must not contain 'government doubting'. If it's for adults it has to glorify communism

And it doesn't help that China's latest arrest bill has passed that allows stealth arrests without trial and bail. Until it is rescinded I won't put my bet that gaming in China will be in discs and consoles for years to come, since obviously the media scrutinizers will just pick only the purest of things that don't insult their image the slightest, and that is very LESS