Animal Crossing: New Horizons disappears from Chinese platforms

By Aaron Mamiit April 10, 2020

Animal Crossing: New Horizons is no longer available for sale on Alibaba’s e-commerce platform Taobao — not long after the game was used by Hong Kong activists to post protest messages against China.

The hit Nintendo Switch game was pulled from Taobao and fellow digital store Pinduoduo, Reuters reported Friday. Screenshots shared by Taobao sellers showed that merchandise and other hardware related to the game have also been prohibited, according to Nintendo Life.

While there has been no official explanation on Animal Crossing‘s disappearance, the game’s takedown follows its rise as a tool for Hong Kong protesters to spread pro-democracy content while observing social distancing rules.

One of the protesters, Joshua Wong, is a well-known democracy activist who uploaded an image of his in-game island to Twitter. It featured a banner with the words “Free Hong Kong, revolution now.”

Wong also shared pictures of his island with portraits of Chinese President Xi Jinping and World Health Organization head Tedros Adhanom at a virtual funeral, with a sign reading “Wuhan pneumonia.”

China censorship

Nintendo Switch sales only launched in China in December, through a partnership between Nintendo and Tencent. However, multiplayer connections for games may only be accessed by players through foreign editions available on the gray market sites such as Taobao and Pinduoduo.

Since Wong’s tweets, there has been a crackdown against Animal Crossing: New Horizons, Reuters reported.

China censors content, including video games, if the government finds them in violation of the country’s core socialist values. However, it remains unclear if the ban on the sale of the game was ordered by China’s content regulator, or if it was a voluntary act by the digital stores.

To circumvent the action against the game, some Taobao sellers have been trying to direct potential buyers to listings that sell the game without its title in the descriptions.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics

Contributor

Aaron received a NES and a copy of Super Mario Bros. for Christmas when he was 4 years old, and he has been fascinated with…

Gaming

Animal Crossing: New Horizons fish guide for November 2022

Catching a fish in Animal Crossing: New Horizons.

One of the nifty features of Animal Crossing: New Horizons is its ever-changing seasons that are a reflection of the real world. When it's summer in real life, it's summer in Animal Crossing, meaning there are always new things to enjoy as you play. As each month goes by, the selection of fish that appear throughout the game changes, so you'll always want to be aware of the selection for any given month.

Sometimes, certain fish are only available for a few months out of the year, while others appear more frequently. It's also important to consider which hemisphere you're in, as this will impact the fish that appear in your area. For the month of November 2022, New Horizons has a lot of changes with its fish selection, and below, we'll cover everything you need to know about the new additions.

Gaming

Animal Crossing Halloween event: costumes, items, dates, more

Animal Crossing Halloween

Just like the real world, your island in Animal Crossing: New Horizons will change with the seasons. With the change of seasons also come the major holidays, which the residents of your island are always excited to celebrate with new events, items, and special rewards that only come around during specific times of the year. With Halloween fast approaching in real life, special spooky and tasty additions are already arriving.

While this isn't the first Halloween players will experience in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, it is the first since the 2.0 update added a ton of new features and items. This makes this year's Halloween festivities the biggest yet. If you're a fan of all things creepy and spooky but always in a fun and adorable way, here are all the events, costumes, and items you can look forward to picking up during the Halloween event in Animal Crossing: New Horizons.

Gaming

Disney Dreamlight Valley and Harvestella make one critical farming mistake

Donald Duck walks through a town in Disney Dreamlight Valley,

Thanks to games like Stardew Valley and Animal Crossing: New Horizons, farming and life-simulation games are back in fashion. They've also dominated September, as Disney Dreamlight Valley launched earlier this month and games like Harvestella, Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life, Fae Farm, Rune Factory 3 Special, and a brand new Rune Factory title all got segments in the latest Nintendo Direct. Harvestella even got a demo after the September 13 Nintendo Direct -- one I immediately downloaded to get my farm on early.
Getting into it though, I found that Harvestella already has a problem I've noticed in many titles that are part of the genre boom, including Disney Dreamlight Valley: they don't get to the farming fast enough, damnit!
While that might seem obvious, recent games in the genre have had long-winded opening before the player has any farming tools in hand. As players come to these games for the farming and simulation elements, developers looking to join in on the trend may want to take some pacing cues from games like Stardew Valley by trimming down their front-heavy lore drops and getting players to the fields sooner.
Let's jump into it
Part of the beauty of Stardew Valley is how quickly it immerses the player in the game's core concepts. The indie hit lets players loose to farm or build within 10 minutes before slowly expanding systems outwards and letting players get more invested in the game's world and story. You'll know whether or not you'll like Stardew Valley within 10 minutes of playing, and will already have crops that give you a reason to stick around if you do like it.
Disney Dreamlight Valley – Gameplay Overview Trailer
In both Harvestella and Disney Dreamlight Valley, it takes at least 30 minutes for any farming elements to be introduced, and even longer before players can get caught up in the gameplay loop of tending to their crops or customizing their home as the game intends. I was eager to try Disney Dreamlight Valley via Xbox Game Pass when it released earlier this month. After getting hit with an immediate exposition dump followed by slowly paced tutorials and a weapon-collecting quest, I got bored with it and dropped out just as it was opening up for me toward the end of the first hour. It didn't entice me and I had other things to do and games to play.
Shortly after, I checked Harvestella's demo out after it dropped during the September 13 Nintendo Direct. I expect I'll end up playing more when it launches, as I'm intrigued by its world and mix of action RPG and fantasy sim. That said, I found myself trudging through the demo as I had to deal with lots of exposition and simple "walk to" objective gameplay before I could actually get to any farming or RPG elements. While I'm glad I didn't stop playing the demo, I almost did due to the glacial pacing.
I wish Harvestella had more quickly gotten me into its gameplay loop before then dumping its intriguing lore on me. That's not to say the story isn't important in these kinds of games. Some of the most memorable parts of Stardew Valley and Animal Crossing: New Horizons are getting to know the residents that you live alongside. The sim elements are what draws the most players in, as well as what will get them into a routine that they can get hooked on.
HARVESTELLA - 2nd Trailer
Devoting over 30 minutes to an hour of extra playtime in a game that can last dozens of hours may seem like arguing over semantics, but the first few moments of the game can make or break an experience. And when you're in a genre with so much competition these days, players can easily move on to something equally as interesting if they aren't immediately hooked. The best simulation experiences cut the fluff, get players right into the action, and save the deeper elements for later. Future farming and life simulations game should take note if they want to potentially take off as Stardew Valley did.