The authors of the action RPG managed to settle the scandal. According to sources who spoke to Bloomberg, Diablo Immortal will debut in China on July 25, 2022, one month after its worldwide release. However, the release date is still liable to change.
The release of Diablo Immortal in China was reportedly postponed indefinitely back in June while local publisher NetEase completed “several optimizations to the game.”
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However, Bloomberg claims that the month-long delay was brought on by a now-deleted social media post that was perceived as equating president Jinping with Winnie The Pooh. Diablo Immortal is currently scheduled to launch in China on July 25.
Since 2017, Winnie The Pooh has been prohibited in China due to the government’s perception that similarities between the bear and Chinese presidents amount to state slander.
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According to Bloomberg, NetEase’s Weibo account was suspended for “violating applicable laws and regulations,” most likely in connection with the Winnie The Pooh tweet. Weibo is a well-known social media platform in China.
According to a story from earlier this month, by postponing the release of Diablo Immortal in China, Blizzard was possibly losing millions of dollars in revenue every day.
Microtransactions, the game’s primary source of income, have drawn loud criticism from fans since the game’s introduction last month, who said it provided players with a pay-to-win system. However, blizzard refuted these assertions in July, asserting that most gamers weren’t making real-world purchases.
Following a contentious post on Diablo Immortal’s Weibo profile, the game’s initial release date was postponed. The professional in charge of looking after the account wrote in it, “Why doesn’t the bear leave?” in a post.
A substantial amount of criticism has been leveled towards Diablo Immortal’s “predatory” microtransactions, which gamers claim are intrusive and pricey, despite the game’s financial success.
Blizzard’s lowest user-rated game is Diablo Immortal, but Mike Ybarra, the company’s president, has defended the game’s in-game purchases.