On homosexuality in Chinese gaming culture

Sex is a topic that comes up a lot when you talk about video games in China, because it is by far the most popular marketing tool in most domestic developers’ arsenals. The domestic games media is arguably even worse—regardless of when you’re reading this post, I bet you can open up the homepage of Sina Games and you’ll be greeted by a big image of some busty, scantily-clad models whose connection to video games is, at best, tenuous.

But over the past few years, there has also been an increase in marketing targeted at homosexuals and China’s fujoshi women—women who enjoy stories and games about homosexual love.

Homosexuality is still controversial in China. Same-sex marriage is a topic of public conversation, but it isn’t legal. China doesn’t have the sort of religious background that causes people to oppose it on those grounds, but it is still considered improper or irregular by many, especially those in China’s older generations.

So when I came across this article on Chinese gaming site 17173 about homosexuality in China’s gaming industry, I knew I wanted to translate it. While I don’t agree with everything that’s said, and some the phrasing is a bit disturbing, I think it’s a valuable (and rare) window into a side of China’s gaming culture that’s rarely discussed publicly.

Again: what follows is a translation of this article. It is not my opinion, and personally I have quite a few issues with it, but I think it’s worth sharing anyway.

“When internet gaming is full of gay culture, straight men should not despair”

Recently, the internet is full of all kinds of jokes mocking homosexuals. “Pick up the soap”, “gay guy” and “anus” have all become common phrases, but [at the same time] actors and singers are constantly coming out of the closet via social media. Many say that society is moving forward, and we can accept different sorts of subcultures.

But is having jokes about burning gays and Billy Harrington really progress? Naked homophobia is still one kind of prejudice, but pretending to be fond of gay culture while secretly being disgusted is another. When a real gay person is standing next to you, will you be so calm?

A screenshot from the Chinese game Tianyu

For many, the answer is no. Because along with the general proliferation of gay culture, it has even spread to the world of online games and created a beautiful new environment while at the same time eliciting disgust from some fans.

The most classic domestic example is [2009 Kingsoft MMORPG] Jianxia Qingyuan 3, everything from the storyline to the character design is infused with gay culture, and it has helped this game to successfully stand out in the intensely-competitive sector of MMOs […]

After that, homosexuals and gay marriage became increasingly popular in domestic online games, with many games even using it as a selling point. For example, one domestically developed game called “Something-Yu” [Netease’s Tianyu -Ed.] recently advertised gay kissing as a selling point, and the island-nation-developed game “Something Something 14” [Final Fantasy 14 -Ed.] also has a gay marriage system, and often comes out with difficult-to-look-at gay screenshots.

Many people think these companies are very clever; as the government works to eliminate lewd materials, they’re unexpectedly winning by using gay marketing to fly under the radar. In doing so, they’ve also found a new selling point, so it could be said they’re killing two birds with one stone. But I must remind these developers that blatant homosexuality has long been considered to be in the category of “pornography” by the government, as the writers of homosexual online erotica have discovered. Don’t play with fire…