China will block access to foreign-approved video games not approved by the authorities

The last few years have been very complicated for gamers in China. Not only are they checked to prove their age, as minors are only allowed to play on weekends and only for a few hours a day and only at certain intervals, but many of the games not approved by the government have been stopped or censored. . Now, however, those who used to access video games from other countries through a VPN service from Tencent will only be able to do so with titles specially approved by the authorities.

Services that provided access to games in other countries will be blocked in China

Tencent has announced that its software, used by most gamers to access online components with servers in other countries, will change its mode of operation starting May 31st. Its service, called a “game accelerator”, overcame the limitations imposed by the authorities to provide access to high speeds and low latencies to servers in other countries for the most popular video games. The Tencent game accelerator was launched in 2018 and has been running smoothly ever since.

However, it seems that starting with May 31, an update will limit the access of this service only to titles that are approved to be distributed and played in China, reports Reuters. Access to these games is not legally restricted, but the transfer speeds between the Internet in China and the servers of these games are generally very low, making them almost impossible to access without an “accelerator”. There are also alternatives to the Tencent service from other competing companies, but all of them may be limited in the near future.

However, users of social media services in China say that they are not surprised by this move:

“It simply came to our notice then. It’s harder to be a gamer in China every day. “was the message posted by a gamer on Weibo.

source: Reuters