Chinese Regulators Tell Kids They Can't Play More Than 3 Hours of Video Games a Week
The government appoints itself the nation's parent.

Beijing has just delivered a blow to the gaming industry, and a blow to Chinese children's freedoms. Starting September 1, minors in China will be allowed to play video games (including those played on mobile devices) only from 8 p.m. to 9 p.m. on Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays, and holidays. So: one hour per day, with a cap of three hours per week.
Former regulations had less restrictive caps, allowing an hour and a half of gaming per day with up to three hours allowed on holidays (for a total of 13.5 hours per week). It's unclear how these new restrictions apply to console gaming, or whether parents could feasibly override these rules by allowing kids to use an adult's gaming account. (Other workarounds, such as VPNs, could also potentially work.)
This applies to online games / platforms, which is technically every game officially released in China, but console platforms fall into a grey category.
Consoles do have parental controls, like the West, but there is no forced limit at this time.
— Daniel Ahmad (@ZhugeEX) August 30, 2021
The regulations—which require that people use their real names to register, instead of using anonymous accounts—state that they aim "to resolutely prevent minors from becoming addicted to video games, and to effectively protect their physical and psychological health." This will allegedly "lead minors to form positive habits in the use of the internet."
"Teenagers are the future of our motherland," said one government spokesperson, according to the state-owned news agency Xinhua. "Protecting the physical and mental health of minors is related to the people's vital interests, and relates to the cultivation of the younger generation in the era of national rejuvenation." (It's no surprise that the Communist Party sees young people not as autonomous individuals but as resources to marshal, to extract from, to serve the interests of the state.)
China's underage gaming force is about 110 million strong, and gaming is a source of joy for many people. Though tech leviathans such as Tencent say their bottom lines won't be terribly threatened by the state's imposition—a little less than 3 percent of the company's gaming-related revenue comes from minors, which is on par with what competitors report—the new rules could still hurt the industry while stripping kids of a hobby many hold dear.
Regulations such as these have been threatened for years, but Beijing's recent crackdown on the tech sector makes now a ripe time to go after gaming companies. State-controlled media have rolled out predictably fawning coverage of the move, calling video games "spiritual opium" in now-retracted comments.
Moral panics about video games seem to cycle around every few years, at home and abroad. But critics routinely sell short the value many kids, teens, and unemployed young men get from gaming.
"I was…a deeply depressed, closeted gay teen at the darkest, cruelest point of the AIDS crisis, terrified that if anybody found out I'd get the crap beaten out of me, and if I ever acted on my urges I'd get sick and die," wrote Reason's Scott Shackford in 2018, when the World Health Organization declared "gaming disorder" a psychological addiction. "It's not difficult to imagine why I might have wanted to distract myself in a candy-colored world of maze-dwelling Pac-people, bug-shaped invading space aliens, and pixelated spy games. I'm not sure if I would have survived my 1980s puberty without video games as an omnipresent distraction."
As Reason's Peter Suderman wrote in 2017, games
don't put food on the table. But they do provide, at least in the short to medium term, a sense of focus and success, structure and direction, skill development and accomplishment. Spend any time reading video game reviews, and you'll find that two of the most common terms of praise are that a game made the reviewer 'feel powerful' and that it provided a 'sense of achievement.' Games, with their endless task lists and character-leveling systems, their choice architectures and mission checklists, are purpose generators. They bring order to gamers' lives.
Even the most open-ended games tend to offer a sense of progress and direction, completion and commitment. In other words, they make people happy—or at least happier, serving as a buffer between the player and despair. Video games, you might say, offer a sort of universal basic income for the soul.
It's wrong whenever anyone attempts to restrict what people do to themselves without harming others; it's worse still when the authorities remove parental autonomy over household decisions, all while trying to chasten and deflate tech companies the Chinese Communist Party perceives as having grown too independently powerful. But video games are an easy scapegoat for all manner of social ills, whether you're a public health official, a concerned op-ed writer, or the government of China.
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Yeah better to keep the kids indoors locked away with their masks on playing video games. That's the sign of a vibrant society.
A vibrant society would limit blog commentariats to three two minute hates a day.
Muh private company nothing to see here.
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"The government appoints itself the nation's parent".
If American progressives had their way, they wouldn't just limit game time. They'd limit sugary soft drinks, and social media access, too, and they'd limit it for adults. They're trying to limit the number of miles we drive, and they limit our access to restaurants during a lockdown.
As the delta variant continues to make its way to California and New York, watch for the local ICU's to fill up again and the lockdowns to follow.
Gavin Newsom shut down both beach access and restaurant access for adults!
It's always so clear when we see it in other countries. Is it that we can't see it when it's our own country, or is it that we can't see anything rationally when we see it comparison to Trump.
"The dangers of non-uniformity urge the question: If our fates are bound together in this emergency, why has there been no national stay-at-home order? Asked earlier this month whether there should be a federal order locking down the nation, Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said, “I just don’t understand why we’re not doing that—we really should be"
----The New Yorker, April 19, 2020
https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/whos-in-charge-of-the-response-to-the-coronavirus
P.S. The reason the government limiting game time for people of any age is wrong has nothing to do with the scientific merits. People should be free to engage in self-destructive behaviors--and they should be free to raise their children as the please.
But The CCP doesn’t push lgbtq so this post is invalid.
—Dee
Remember Joe Lieberman!
And Tipper Gore.
But isn’t this proof of CCP’s progress toward democracy? After all, under Mao kids didn’t play video games at all!
How the hell can they practice for the weekend raid if they only get three hours a week? Welp I guess they're whelps.
Everyone goes Leroy Jenkins. It's the only way.
All we need is for the CDC to claim video games are a public health emergency.
Utopia.
With a recommendation that kids playing online games wear a mask.
Hey! Those kids should consider themselves lucky they weren't ordered to be aborted.
Top Men have determined what is best for them and everyone else.
What on earth else could the Chinese government possibly come up with that would curb liberty?
I wonder how Blizzard views this news? I wonder how quick to bend the knee they'll be going forward?
Oh snap!
This could be a really big deal. China's influence on American companies is completely reliant on providing a massive market. If they intentionally severely limit certain markets, they'll lose that influence on those markets.
The Afghanistan War is officially over.
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/08/30/world/afghanistan-news
Now, I suppose, the war between Islamic State and the Taliban for control of the country begins.
God help any Americans who were left behind.
The Afghanistan War is officially over.
Trump paved that road.
With good intentions.
I thought I'd live to see the U.S. out of Germany before we made it out of Afghanistan.
We could have had the military there for another 20 years if not for Trump’s mistake.
Think of the jobs!
How many video game hours a week do Uyghur children get?
It's human chess, and the loser has to go on brain detail.
18, if you count building play stations, and smartphones to be video games
Ohh I ment 18 hours a day, so 126 hours a week
(It's no surprise that the Communist Party sees young people not as autonomous individuals but as resources to marshal, to extract from, to serve the interests of the state.)
No, it's not. Unfortunately, adults in the West have a tendency to do the same thing. Something to consider the next time someone talks about how "The children are our future."
The whole premise of Social Security is based on more people playing in than being payed out
What's the punishment for exceeding 3 hrs per week? Tell me it's death by snu snu..
OTOH, they also teach math in schools, not wokeness.
There will be no cap on upcoming games Drive Over Tank Man, Starve 50 Million and Invade Taiwan
These all sound like utterly beautiful sequels to Kill All Humans!
Fuck, its Destroy All Humans!
Also fuck this website
FUCK
lol
Remember Joe Lieberman! Latest Update
Bot
you praying too much a video game!!!! stopp-a now!!
In other news, the number of Chinese minors playing video games drops to 0. The number of Chinese "adults" playing video games increases by the same amount, mysteriously.
I would like to see a survey of US residents and their thoughts on this Chinese policy; I'll wager that at least 20% would approve and like to seem something similar done here.
You never know which straw will break the camel's back. When governments pass laws that people ignore, respect for the government and its laws declines.
You would think console games would provide an easy way to scoff at the law, but most of those make you log in now too.
And video games can indeed put food on the table. Kids in Korea and Japan turn pro in high school and can make 100K+ a year if they are good. But it only lasts a few years, since by the time you hit 25 your reflexes can't keep up with an 18-year-old's.
The kids say "fuck the games", and turn to drugs. REAL smart, Xi...
The foolish Chinese are not aware that many video games actually serve as learning tools? Too bad that their government has a big hand to wipe their freedoms away with. Ironically, I have been studying the meaning of Chinese ideograms by using video games that teach hundreds or thousands of words.
Even video games sometimes have health benefits to offer.
"Gorram Pigu Gose!" --Captain Malcolm Reynolds.