Recently, the State Administration of Press and Publication issued the "Notice on Further Strict Management to Effectively Prevent Minors from Being Addicted to Online Games". In response to the problem of minors' excessive use of or even addiction to online games, it further tightened management measures, resolutely prevented minors from being addicted to online games, and effectively protected the physical and mental health of minors.
Subsequently, major game manufacturers responded one after another.
Recently, popular games such as "Honor of Kings", "Genshin Impact", "Arknights", and "Peace Elite" have issued announcements to upgrade anti-addiction measures.
"Honor of Kings" and "Peace Elite" anti-addiction upgrade
On August 31, King of Glory announced on its official website that it would gradually upgrade its anti-addiction measures in accordance with the "Notice on Further Strict Management to Effectively Prevent Minors from Addiction to Online Games" issued by the State Administration of Press and Publication. In terms of game time limits, minors can only play games from 20:00 to 21:00 on Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays and statutory holidays.
In terms of game consumption restrictions, users under the age of 12 are unable to recharge games; for users aged 12 and above but under 16, the single recharge limit is RMB 50, and the monthly recharge limit is RMB 200; for underage users aged 16 and above, the single recharge limit is RMB 100, and the monthly recharge limit is RMB 400.
The iOS guest experience mode is completely closed (the previous rule was that in the iOS guest experience mode, the cumulative game time on the same hardware device within 15 days shall not exceed 1 hour, and recharge is not possible.)
After the update on August 31, the stand-alone mode is temporarily closed.
It is worth noting that on August 4, King of Glory released a health system upgrade announcement, showing that underage users are prohibited from playing from 22:00 to 8:00 the next day, and are limited to 2 hours of play per day on national holidays and 1 hour per day at other times. Users under the age of 12 cannot recharge the game; users aged 12 (inclusive) and above but under 16 are limited to a single recharge of RMB 50 and a monthly recharge limit of RMB 200; underage users aged 16 (inclusive) and above are limited to a single recharge of RMB 100 and a monthly recharge limit of RMB 400.
On May 15 this year, the official website of King of Glory announced the "Notice on the Access to New Rules for Anti-addiction for Minors " , which shows that restrictions have been imposed on minors playing games again, stipulating that minors cannot play games for more than 1.5 hours a day, and can only play for 3 hours a day during statutory holidays. Those under the age of 8 are prohibited from recharging in the game, and users between the ages of 8 and 16 are limited to 50 yuan (including 50 yuan) per recharge, and the total recharge amount is limited to 200 yuan (including 200 yuan) per month. Adult users are limited to 100 yuan (including 100 yuan) per recharge, and the total recharge amount per month is limited to 400 yuan (including 400 yuan).
In addition, the game has modified the restrictions of the guest mode. In the guest experience mode of the iOS version, the game time on the same device cannot exceed 1 hour every 15 days, and recharge is not allowed.
Recently, popular games such as "Peace Elite", "Genshin Impact", and "Arknights" have issued announcements to upgrade anti-addiction measures.
The number of underage game users has exceeded 100 million
In April this year, iResearch Consulting released the "2021 China Gaming Industry Minor Protection Research Report", which showed that the scale of underage Internet users in China in 2019 was 175 million, with a penetration rate of 93.1%. Compared with 2015, the user scale increased by 41 million, an increase of about 31%.
Gaming is quite popular among minors and has become their main leisure activity. In 2019, the number of minor game users reached 107 million, a 16% increase from 2015. As the penetration rate of minor netizens reaches saturation, the growth of the number of minor game users will slow down further.
The "2021 Mobile Game Crowd Insight Report" released by the China Mobile Game Industry shows that as of June 2021, the number of monthly active mobile game users in my country reached 548 million, with an average monthly usage time of more than 20 hours per person. Mobile game users are mainly male, with a significant younger demographic, and Generation Z has gradually become the mainstream of mobile krypton gold players. Nearly 50% of paying users are under 30 years old, and nearly 30% of users are under 24 years old. Geographically, third-tier and below cities are the main gathering places for mobile game users, accounting for nearly 60%.
The "China Game Industry Report from January to June 2021" shows that as of the first half of 2021, the number of Chinese game users reached 667 million, a year-on-year increase of 1.38%; the number of e-sports users reached 489 million, a year-on-year increase of 1.13%. On the other hand, the rapid development of the game industry has also brought many problems, among which minors' addiction to games is a phenomenon that the outside world is very worried about.
On August 18, Tencent released financial data showing that of the 138.3 billion yuan in revenue in the second quarter, the unaudited revenue of the value-added service business segment to which games belonged was 72.013 billion yuan, accounting for 52% of the total business revenue. This is equivalent to a daily revenue of more than 800 million yuan. The financial report also showed that minors under the age of 16 accounted for 2.6% of the turnover of online games in China, of which minors under the age of 12 accounted for 0.3%.
The latest data shows that the average daily usage time of "Honor of Kings" is more than 140 minutes per person, making it the product with the longest average daily usage time among domestic apps with a DAU (daily active users) of more than 10 million, surpassing other video and information apps.
The statistics agency Tower recently released the latest "TOP 10 Global Popular Mobile Game Revenue in July 2021" report. The top three are "Peace Elite" + "PUBG.M", "Honor of Kings", and "Genshin Impact" respectively.
Store intelligence data shows that in July 2021, Tencent's "Peace Elite" and "PUBG" earned more than US$299 million in the Apple App Store and Android Play in the global market, an increase of approximately 26.7% compared to July 2020, ranking first on the global mobile game best-selling list.
In addition to "Peace Elite", Tencent's "Honor of Kings" ranked second on the list with revenue of US$231 million, an increase of 2% compared to July last year, of which revenue from the Chinese App Store accounted for about 94.7%, and revenue from overseas versions accounted for 5.3%.
As of March this year, Tencent's "PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds" (including the domestic version "Peace Elite") has accumulated global revenue of US$5.1 billion, of which Chinese iOS players contributed more than half, with a total recharge of US$2.8 billion.
"Anti-addiction" also needs to block "game account rental"
According to a Beijing Daily report on August 28, although the game platform has introduced a game addiction prevention system, the adult game account rental industry chain has become a large-scale industry chain, making the "addiction prevention" of minors' games virtually ineffective. A game industry insider told reporters that identity recognition is the key to the implementation of the game addiction prevention system. This means that once a minor enters the game by renting an adult's real-name authenticated game account, it will be difficult for the addiction prevention system to fully supervise them. "Even if there is a face-based screening, it will miss a lot."
At present, the mainstream game account rental platforms on the market are mainly divided into two categories: one is operated by enterprises, and the platform has a complete APP and web page, and users can place orders directly on the platform. Take the "ZuXwan" game account rental platform as an example. The platform claims to have more than 50 million registered users and high-end game accounts worth more than 5 billion. The other is operated by small and medium-sized studios and individuals, mainly relying on e-commerce platforms to engage in transactions. In addition, some merchants use keys and other forms to bypass the platform and "hand over money and goods" with users.
After entering the "ZuXwan" game rental platform from the web page, the reporter saw that a large number of popular mobile game accounts such as "Honor of Kings", "Peace Elite" and "QQ Speed" were being rented. Taking "Honor of Kings" as an example, the hourly rental price of a V9 account in the QQ Apple area is 5.5 yuan, the daily rental price is 71 yuan, and the overnight price from 10 pm to 7 am the next day is 25.6 yuan. However, when the reporter placed an order, the website popped up a "real-name authentication" page, requiring the reporter to enter his name and ID number, and stated that minors are not allowed to place orders.
To bypass this authentication, you only need to go to Taobao to find a merchant to rent one. Under the "guidance" of a minor, the reporter successfully contacted a seller. The seller said that the minimum rental period for a game account is 2 hours, and players can directly trade in the form of red envelopes without having to bid for any products.
After selecting the corresponding game account and paying the red envelope, you can successfully obtain the login key of a certain login APP and successfully log in to Honor of Kings with someone else's account.
Regarding the behavior of renting game accounts, the reporter noticed that Tencent, Alibaba, NetEase, Sogou and many other game companies have emphasized in the "User Agreement" of their games that it is prohibited to sell, rent, transfer or share game accounts with others without the permission of the company. Tencent has also recently sued more than a dozen third-party game trading platforms such as Taobao Mobile Games, DD373, and 5173, demanding that they stop trading. For all relevant departments, if they want to prevent minors from becoming addicted to online games, they also need to fill in obvious regulatory loopholes such as "renting accounts", increase penalties for illegal network operators, and create a deterrent effect.
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