The Chinese authorities have again stopped licensing online games. According to local media, since mid-April, no project has received permission to release. The regulator did not officially comment on what happened and did not explain when the new suspension would stop.
The last “freeze” with the issuance of licenses to online games lasted eight months — from the end of July 2021 to April 2022. At the end of the moratorium, the authorities allowed only 45 titles to be released, and most of them were developed by small studios, and not by giants like Tencent or NetEase. Against this background, analysts warned that one should not expect serious easing and a return to the days when up to 100 games were licensed monthly.