So I randomly decided to try logging into EQ from my Guangdong home without first turning on my VPN, and... I got in. It was still blocked (required VPN) when I left in January 2020, so something must have happened between then and now. Either the devs made nice with Beijing, or they changed something about the server that evades the block. Anyway, whatever it was you did, thanks a lot.
Why would China block EQ1? Is it because there are undeads in the game, or because it is American or something? Or do they just block everything just in case?
The Communist Party is generally very suspicious of anything that lets people conduct uncensored communication with the outside world. They think the opposition might hold secret meetings in Qeynos Catacombs or something. So their main gripe with EQ is ironically its chat feature, and not anything really related to the gameplay. Back in the early 2000s they also blocked Star Wars: Galaxies because it contained player cities that had democratic elections. Since SWG was also developed by Daybreak (then known as Sony Online Entertainment), it's possible that they just blanket banned all SOE titles while they were at it. I suppose if the SWG and EQ servers were located in the same place we might also have been "unintentionally" banned for sharing a similar IP address. I get the impression that SOE/Daybreak was doing some kind of "Pivot to Asia" in the mid-2000s, since EQ1 got the Japanese-inspired expansion Dragons of Norrath in 2005, and I think EQ2 had a promotion campaign in East Asia which resulted in the "anime-style" avatars. However, I don't know if they ever actually got into the mainland Chinese market, or if they had to be content with nibbling at its edges in Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan. Anyway, MMOs that want to operate legally in mainland China usually need to form a joint venture with a Chinese partner, who ensures their compliance with Chinese national security law. This is what Blizzard have been doing, which is why a censored version of World of Warcraft is available (and hugely popular) in China.
i miss plat farmers with cool names like tink tinktink tinktinktink or the best keybard smash slgjdlkgjdlkghjdiog
Surprising given the deterioration of China's relations with international community in general & the recent pressure over it's treatment of the Uyghurs. The iron-fist with which China's government regulates communications into & out of their country makes this doubly surprising.
I hope I never see a Nexus of the Winds version of EQ. I'm not sure where that came from in my mind. It's not an anime style and it's a South Korean game. Maybe they play it in China a lot. Not sure if there is a video resolution where you can scrunch up the EQ models At night when I am sleeping the Catbards Mash but no keybard mash. I guess I should have saved this mornings mash to post on here.
You probably never were blocked. Lived in China for a couple of years and EQ never went down. For starters, don't use the modem/router the Chinese ISP gives you. Buy your own US gear online (not out in town). Router goes without saying. Then you can assure ports are open since you can get into the modem's firmware. VPN's suck (too slow).
Well, there was a "localized" asian EQ2 version with completely new character models released in April 2005. It flopped and was shuttered in March 2006. But since November 2005 you can chose to use the "asian" models in EQ2. https://massivelyop.com/2017/07/22/the-game-archaeologist-everquest-ii-east/
Do you know any more info about China & EverQuest? Any other CCP gripes with EQ or what the RMT money farmer operations are like? I find this super interesting.
We seem to be partially re-blocked now. At least connecting to the login server without VPN has gotten much more unpredictable. Some days it works, other days it doesn't. I don't know a lot about IT, but I'd -speculate- that maybe it gets briefly unblocked immediately following a server reboot, but then the Great Firewall re-blocks it one or two days later.
I'm never done plat farming, so I don't entirely understand how it works, but presumably you need at least a lot of computers (and electricity to power them) and a lot of "players" to sit at those computers doing whichever tasks can't be automated. China would have been at attractive place to do this like a decade ago, since it had low equipment and power costs, as well as -due to its massive population-, low labor costs. Back when the "EverQuest East" promo campaign was going on 2005-2009, the average yearly salary in Mainland China was only about $2000 USD, compared to almost $50,000 USD in the United States. Since then China has gotten richer, and the average annual salary is now over $10,000 USD, to be compared with about $60,000 USD in the US. That is, the Chinese have gone from then like 5% American wage level to now like 15% American wage level. So it's possible that, just like the garment and toy industries, the plat farming industry has been priced out of China and moved to Vietnam, Bangladesh, or other such countries.
If they ever block it you wont hear it first from random internet denizens not able to connect. Give me a break. They dont block games in secret.
Au contraire, China frequently blocks, un-blocks, and re-blocks websites and the like with no warning or explanation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Firewall
At the risk of bursting your bubble, the PRC does many things in secret (ask the Uyghurs about that), and in many cases give little or no reason for their actions. The PRC is a totalitarian state and the leaders of that state don't appear to feel any great need to explain themselves to outsiders. They have carefully and systematically worked to control the flow of information both in, and out of the PRC. Their "Great Firewall" has been developed over several years and shows no signs of going away. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Firewall
They teach lies about basically whatever suits their position at a very young age. Unsupervised interaction with free people undermines the lies.