After over two months’ downtime and a long closed beta, World of Warcraft has finally resumed full operations in China over the weekend, opening the doors of Azeroth once again to millions of users who’ve been waiting since the beginning of Summer. Blizzard Entertainment switched Chinese operators on June 7th from The9 to rival NetEase, hoping to earn a higher royalty rate on the game. Interestingly, Netease and Blizzard’s relaunching of the service appears to be tied to a change in Chinese government responsibilities announced late last week, with the Ministry Of Culture taking over some game-related approval processes. Note that, in China, until you use up your 60 hours, you’re considered to have an “Active” account, so there’s a great deal of speculation about what the number of “active accounts” really means, since it could mean 5 million people who bought a single 60 hour card for $4. Thus I add my hat to the ring of people who complain about Blizzard lumping NA/EU active account numbers with Chinese active account numbers, since the two represent extremely different sources of revenue. read more
[Tags]active, blizzard, china, chinese, downtime, netease, warcraft news[/Tags]
