Bioware's Issues with China

[iggie]

This is my first draft at this, so please post some constructive feedback so I can strengthen it before posting on swtor.com

Ever been denied access to a game because the company just doesn't want your business? Chinese gamers have. Since SWTOR's release in 2011, Chinese gamers have been unable to access swtor's website and patch server. Local gamers in my city of Hangzhou speculate Bioware is trying to curb gold farmers/phishers. While that may or may not work, it's also denying swtor the biggest online market who is hungry for a new MMO with Cataclysm's blunder and Mists of Pandaria being delayed in China. Obviously, the threat of gold farmers and the headaches they bring need to be dealt with, but a simple block does little as a detterent. Since Blizzard introduced their system to identify compromised accounts (aka your login system has detected a change in your access pattern) and Rift's successful coin lock system, farming companies have been using VPN's in order to gain American and European ips for quite some time.

Can Bioware really continue to ignore the Chinese market who have been eating up free games like League of Legends and Heroes of Newerth? The impending release of Dota2 and CS:Global Offensive should have every company eyeing the Chinese market in cold sweats. Currently, the original dota and CS (1/6/CSS) are still going amazingly strong. Enough so that I can walk down the street to one of the cyber cafes near me and see teams of college students practicing and gaming, or even watch tournaments with decent cash prizes. I regular three different guilds on WoW toons, each consisting of 800-1200 members. I can count on one finger the amount of players who tried TOR... me! Out of all of those people a handful even knew what swtor was.

My own experience with Bioware has left a sour taste in my mouth for sure. After ordering on my Canadian credit card via VPN, they revoked my purchase as I tried logging into the website with my Chinese IP. From that, my card is now blacklisted on Origin and SWTOR.com. Chinese payment methods (CC/paypal) are also not accepted, yet why do they even allow you to select "China" as a country on account creation? Bioware has stated and I quote "We are not blocking players from any country. There are no regional restrictions placed on our servers to access the game or the website." Perhaps Bioware is instead ISP blocking, which happens on a variety of websites. Sadly, there are only two mainstream juggernaut ISP's here, and I know for a fact the farming operation where I last lived uses the same ISP as I do, China Telecom.

Most of you will make a common mistake of leaping to the conclusion that the Chinese government is blocking the game/website, which is simply false. In the western media, the government gets a bad rep, especially for it's tussle with gaming giant Blizzard over Wrath of the Lich King. What most people don't know is that during this, a large portion of the players migrated to Taiwanese servers, which remained unaffected. No websites were blocked, all China did was force the local Chinese company to cease operations by order. They didn't kick down the doors to the servers and unplug everything. Like a lot of things they do, taking on Blizzard was a statement by the government. Do keep in mind, this incident only came about because of physical servers on Chinese soil with a game in Mandarin. Why are so many obscene and political websites not blocked? The goal of the government is to control the masses, and the masses do not speak and sort of fluent English. Those that do are typically educated enough. Now, here are some trace routes to blocked websites as a user inside of China (all of them done one after another)

Tracing route to facebook.com [159.106.121.75] over a maximum of 30 hops:
1 1 ms 1 ms <1 ms 192.168.1.1
2 97 ms 49 ms 24 ms 122.235.160.1
3 108 ms 106 ms 104 ms 61.164.17.221
4 67 ms 110 ms 99 ms 61.130.121.61
5 21 ms 23 ms 23 ms 220.191.143.61
6 99 ms 136 ms 102 ms 202.97.68.118
7 * * * Request timed out.
8 * * * Request timed out.
9 * * * Request timed out.

Tracing route to twitter.com [159.24.3.173] over a maximum of 30 hops:
1 1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.1.1
2 34 ms 23 ms 23 ms 122.235.160.1
3 155 ms 108 ms 137 ms 61.164.17.221
4 199 ms 187 ms 168 ms 61.130.125.73
5 362 ms 348 ms 349 ms 220.191.143.161
6 30 ms 55 ms 61 ms 202.97.68.118
7 * * * Request timed out.
8 * * * Request timed out.
9 * * * Request timed out.

Tracing route to youtube.com [159.106.121.75] over a maximum of 30 hops:
1 1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.1.1
2 110 ms 60 ms 109 ms 122.235.160.1
3 289 ms 293 ms 301 ms 61.164.17.221
4 22 ms 46 ms 49 ms 61.130.121.61
5 49 ms 20 ms 75 ms 220.191.143.61
6 97 ms 79 ms 117 ms 202.97.68.118
7 * * * Request timed out.
8 * * * Request timed out.
9 * * * Request timed out.

Notice how the issue pops up on 202.97.68.118 on hop 6 every time?

Now lets look at swtor.com and cdn-patch.swtor.com


Tracing route to swtor.com [159.153.92.41] over a maximum of 30 hops:
1 1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.1.1
2 56 ms 92 ms 103 ms 122.235.160.1
3 29 ms 24 ms 73 ms 61.164.17.221
4 66 ms 59 ms 110 ms 61.130.125.73
5 226 ms 161 ms 217 ms 220.191.143.61
6 53 ms 78 ms 24 ms 202.97.68.137
7 146 ms 111 ms 76 ms 202.97.50.242
8 93 ms 91 ms 94 ms 202.97.35.18
9 235 ms 243 ms 234 ms 202.97.50.90
10 294 ms 238 ms 237 ms 202.97.50.78
11 219 ms 316 ms 259 ms xe-2-3-0.mpr4.sjc7.us.above.net [64.125.12.33]
12 194 ms 236 ms 241 ms xe-4-0-0.cr2.sjc2.us.above.net [64.125.24.5]
13 194 ms 176 ms 215 ms xe-1-2-0.cr2.lax112.us.above.net [64.125.31.234]
14 221 ms 272 ms 271 ms xe-2-3-0.cr2.iah1.us.above.net [64.125.25.17]
15 354 ms 264 ms 364 ms xe-2-1-0.cr2.dca2.us.above.net [64.125.28.49]
16 246 ms 236 ms 274 ms xe-1-0-0.cr1.dca2.us.above.net [64.125.28.249]
17 265 ms 282 ms 403 ms xe-0-0-1.er1.iad10.us.above.net [64.125.31.206]
18 526 ms 295 ms 338 ms 64.125.199.186.t00673-01.above.net [64.125.199.186]
19 * * * Request timed out.
20 * * * Request timed out.
21 * * * Request timed out.
22 * * * Request timed out.

Tracing route to easwtor.vo.llnwd.net [208.111.148.6] over a maximum of 30 hops:
1 1 ms <1 ms 1 ms 192.168.1.1
2 31 ms 56 ms 61 ms 122.235.160.1
3 76 ms 21 ms 20 ms 61.164.17.225
4 118 ms 134 ms 55 ms 61.164.8.65
5 139 ms 80 ms 28 ms 61.164.9.217
6 26 ms 25 ms 83 ms 202.97.47.58
7 102 ms 102 ms 164 ms 202.97.50.234
8 123 ms 88 ms 90 ms 202.97.34.102
9 313 ms 351 ms 302 ms 202.97.58.190
10 432 ms 513 ms 449 ms 202.97.50.58
11 539 ms 672 ms 629 ms 218.30.54.118
12 356 ms * 435 ms 64.214.150.94
13 * * * Request timed out.
14 * 376 ms 477 ms cdn-208-111-148-6.sjc.llnw.net [208.111.148.6]

Finally, when attempting to access swtor this comes up
Access Denied
You don't have permission to access "http://www.swtor.com/community/forumdisplay.php?" on this server.
Reference #18.cf210e6b.1344679206.5069245c

While accessing twitter/facebook/youtube gives a blank page OR a No data received page.

Seems to me it's completely totally different from other blocked sites in China. Swtor also isn't on Wikipedia's mega list of high profile blocked websites (link below). It's quite possible I am unable to interpret these trace routes precisely, so please if you are trained in this sort of thing, feel free to comment on them.

Occam's Razor asked you to select from among competing hypotheses that which makes the fewest assumptions. Is it more likely that China, although they block some websites, is singling out TOR which is an English game not targeted at the Chinese market with no physical servers and isn't in Mandarin.

OR

Is it more likely Bioware is trying to stop botters/phishers/farmers from gaining access to the game. Chinese payment methods aren't accepted. There was no Chinese retailer at launch. Accounts logged in from China had preorders cancelled (happened to two others that I met on swtor.com). However, Bioware has stated that they don't region block on a few occasions. Why do they have the error on the launcher saying "You are logged in from a region we do not allow people to play from". Seems an obvious giveaway to me.


Final thoughts time. First off, thanks for reading, please give me some feedback. I don't see swtor being as successful as it could be without the Chinese market who thrives off F2P games. I just can't fathom why the Chinese government would single out swtor as the first non Chinese game to block, therefore I disregard the possibility.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...ublic_of_China

[MerinPally]

They block Twitter over there? Wish they would do that worldwide.

On topic, the chinese (and russian) playerbase is renowned for botting/cheating/hacking and with a game that was as broken at launch as SWTOR was, the damage that could have been done (and still possibly?) would be as huge as with what happened with D3 bots, which for a subscription based game would absolutely ruin it.

[iggie]

They block Twitter over there? Wish they would do that worldwide.

On topic, the chinese (and russian) playerbase is renowned for botting/cheating/hacking and with a game that was as broken at launch as SWTOR was, the damage that could have been done (and still possibly?) would be as huge as with what happened with D3 bots, which for a subscription based game would absolutely ruin it.

Twitter/youtube/facebook/blogspot are the big names that are blocked here. Oddly enough China blocks google.com but not google.ca. I guess us Canadian's don't matter

My experiences on games in Taiwan/China is identical to that in North America, all be it with a bit more greediness (they LOVE to need on everything).

The thing is Merin, SWTOR is still accessible. All you need to do is use a VPN to bypass the login server, then deactivate it and press "play". That's it. As I mentioned above as well, companies who sell in game currencies have switched to using American/Euro VPNs in order to help bypass auto lock systems. How do I know this? My friend worked teaching some of the staff members of a notorious EU Warcraft gold selling site German.

[yurano]

Quick question, can you play any EA games from China?

The only EA MMO I know of is Need for Speed World.

Can you access it from China?

Some companies are obligated to block connections to certain countries. In my experience, you can't connect to Maplestory servers outside of your region. EA might have sold SWTOR to a Chinese company (like Netease) and as part of the agreement, they're required to block connections from 'Netease's' region. An obvious explanation would be that 'Netease' is taking its sweet time in converting it into a Chinese version but the connection block is already in effect.

[iggie]

Quick question, can you play any EA games from China?

The only EA MMO I know of is Need for Speed World.

Can you access it from China?

Some companies are obligated to block connections to certain countries. In my experience, you can't connect to Maplestory servers outside of your region. EA might have sold SWTOR to a Chinese company (like Netease) and as part of the agreement, they're required to block connections from 'Netease's' region. An obvious explanation would be that 'Netease' is taking its sweet time in converting it into a Chinese version but the connection block is already in effect.

For it to be marketed to the masses, the sale to netease would have to pass the governing bodies here. Given how story based SWTOR is, I don't see it being translated into Mandarin, at least not for a few years. My Chinese credit card can't buy anything off Origin store, digital or physical. Do you think they'd of sold the rights before the game even launched? The website's been inaccessible single around September. It was accessible for a week or so in late October, then went MIA again.

Why were AOC, Warhammer, Rift, GW2 betas, Aion, and wow during the WOTLK fiasco all accessible? I'm flabbergasted thinking why China would bother singling out TOR.

Need for speed world? Never heard of it... however, it's website is perfectly accessible.(http://world.needforspeed.com/)

[Victus01]

Im not sure if this is true, its just a theory of mine. but your problem could be from distribution rights. EA / bioware does not have distribution rights in china for SWTOR. maybe to protect other asian / chinese mmos??

since its EA< im sure if they could they would force SWTOR on you guys.

[Ryuukon]

A well written post, I will give you that. A VERY well written post considering (and this is an assumption) that your native tongue isn't English.

But all of that said, and reading the whole thing (including the tracerts) came down to one thing. Trying to convince people that the Chinese government isn't to blame, but Bioware is.

That is a totally understandable and agreeable position for you to take, from your perspective.

But then you need to take into perspective Bioware's position.

Bioware is totally aware that the significant majority of "gold selling" companies are from China. There is no arguing otherwise anymore so long as you actually understand that "gold selling" has become a significant industry in China. If you want to argue it, then there are thousands of websites that would like to speak with you in regards to "buymygold.com" websites being owned by Chinese nationals. That is all I will argue about in that regard.

So now you have Bioware, who actually WANTS their player driven economy to survive. They take a very simple approach to it. If you play from China, they don't want your business. That is their prerogative. It's just like any other business in the United States with a physical store with signs stating "No Shirt, No Shoes, No Service". I'm not saying that gamers from China don't wear shirts or shoes, obviously they do, but it all comes down to a companies right to NOT allow service.

In this case, Bioware doesn't want to deal with the headaches associated with the vast majority of "gold farmers", so they attempt to block service to China.

I understand that you want to play TOR. It's a fun game in my opinion, and it's a shame that you can't play it. But you don't have a right to play it. You aren't entitled to play it. As an American citizen, I don't have a right or entitlement to play it either. I can play it simply because Bioware allows me to. If at any point in time Bioware decides to restrict all American players, then I'm out of luck. Nothing I can do to prevent it. They are a business, and they have a right to restrict who uses their services.

It sucks, but it's true.

[iggie]

Im not sure if this is true, its just a theory of mine. but your problem could be from distribution rights. EA / bioware does not have distribution rights in china for SWTOR. maybe to protect other asian / chinese mmos??

since its EA< im sure if they could they would force SWTOR on you guys.

Distribution rights would probably make sense with no physical retailer (as it would need to pass government inspection) but it wouldn't stop access. I doubt Rift/GW2 had/have distribution rights yet both are playable here.

A well written post, I will give you that. A VERY well written post considering (and this is an assumption) that your native tongue isn't English.

But all of that said, and reading the whole thing (including the tracerts) came down to one thing. Trying to convince people that the Chinese government isn't to blame, but Bioware is.

That is a totally understandable and agreeable position for you to take, from your perspective.

But then you need to take into perspective Bioware's position.

Bioware is totally aware that the significant majority of "gold selling" companies are from China. There is no arguing otherwise anymore so long as you actually understand that "gold selling" has become a significant industry in China. If you want to argue it, then there are thousands of websites that would like to speak with you in regards to "buymygold.com" websites being owned by Chinese nationals. That is all I will argue about in that regard.

So now you have Bioware, who actually WANTS their player driven economy to survive. They take a very simple approach to it. If you play from China, they don't want your business. That is their prerogative. It's just like any other business in the United States with a physical store with signs stating "No Shirt, No Shoes, No Service". I'm not saying that gamers from China don't wear shirts or shoes, obviously they do, but it all comes down to a companies right to NOT allow service.

In this case, Bioware doesn't want to deal with the headaches associated with the vast majority of "gold farmers", so they attempt to block service to China.

I understand that you want to play TOR. It's a fun game in my opinion, and it's a shame that you can't play it. But you don't have a right to play it. You aren't entitled to play it. As an American citizen, I don't have a right or entitlement to play it either. I can play it simply because Bioware allows me to. If at any point in time Bioware decides to restrict all American players, then I'm out of luck. Nothing I can do to prevent it. They are a business, and they have a right to restrict who uses their services.

It sucks, but it's true.

Ugh, actually I'm Canadian, I just whipped this up and I'm pretty terrible at reading over what I type. In fact, I can play SWTOR, with sub 150 ping most of the time.

I understand it's well within a companies right to deny service. If Bioware came out and said they're not allowing access I'd shut my trap and play quietly. However, Bioware has stated and I quote "We are not blocking players from any country. There are no regional restrictions placed on our servers to access the game or the website." It's also entirely possible they're hosting their website/servers off of something like a facebook backup server Wouldn't surprise me at this point.

Again, nothing is stoping others from doing that I've done. Do you think the issue of using a VPN will stop companies who intend to make profit off swtor? If anything it'd just be a small deterrent to companies and a bigger deterrent to actual gamers.

I actually hope someone can prove unequivocally whether it's Bioware or China blocking. Maybe someone way smarter than me can look at the tracerts, do some investigation, and finally get it out into the open. While I'm obviously somewhat biased in the matter, I'm humble enough that if someone can prove me wrong, I'll gladly accept it.

I hope this post can enlist someone who's good with trace routes to help look into it. For example, blogspot.com is blocked yet I can get a full tracert done with it, that same with the few porn sites I also tried.

[Victus01]

it is quite hard to say. but i doubt bioware is to blame. they actually are in need of players and the benefits from more players outweighs the cost of the potential of in game money sellers for real money. those can be easily reported and banned by the community.

i would would put forward that if its not the government, it may be the ISPs in china. censorship in china is vast. and swtor may be by accident or oversight be banned along with the others. or it is the govt :P

[Ryuukon]

Distribution rights would probably make sense with no physical retailer (as it would need to pass government inspection) but it wouldn't stop access. I doubt Rift/GW2 had/have distribution rights yet both are playable here.


Ugh, actually I'm Canadian, I just whipped this up and I'm pretty terrible at reading over what I type. In fact, I can play SWTOR, with sub 150 ping most of the time.

I understand it's well within a companies right to deny service. If Bioware came out and said they're not allowing access I'd shut my trap and play quietly. However, Bioware has stated and I quote "We are not blocking players from any country. There are no regional restrictions placed on our servers to access the game or the website."

Again, nothing is stoping others from doing that I've done. Do you think the issue of using a VPN will stop companies who intend to make profit off swtor? If anything it'd just be a small deterrent to companies and a bigger deterrent to actual gamers.

I actually hope someone can prove unequivocally whether it's Bioware or China blocking.

It would have been much simpler to reply to your OP if you had said so from the beginning.

No, I don't think it will stop companies from making a profit off of SW:TOR. Of course they are willing to shell out the cash for a VPN when they stand to make more cash from it. At least initially.

But VPNs still encompass a set of IP addresses that could eventually be banned by the TOS. Is that stopping gold sellers right now? Some, but not all. Given time, Bioware will accrue a set of IP addresses that "gold farmers" use via VPN to spam and sell their wares. So eventually the "gold sellers" will be shut down.

It is unfortunate that so many people are denied the ability of playing the game, and thus Bioware is denied the profits of legitimate players. But it's pretty much a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" scenario.

Just look at Diablo 3 for example. Gold farmers are rampant there, both in the AH and the RMAH. The economy there is all but destroyed with almost no chance of recovering, and that is only the first couple of months of the games lifespan. When the recorded top D3 players are all gold farmers with random character names, it's no wonder Bioware decided to be more proactive to the defense of their game than reactive.

So to answer your question, yes, Bioware is most likely the culprit, and with good reason. They are protecting their intellectual property and profit margins (such as they are) to prevent another company from muscling in and all but stealing what is Bioware's profit margins. Bioware doesn't sell in game credits. Having someone else come in and do it for them removes part of the challenge of the game, which means people aren't going to play nearly as long as they would have otherwise.

So in my opinion, Bioware is completely in the right here. It is their game, if is their rules, they can choose to do how they see fit in distribution of said game. If that eventually bankrupts the company (not likely) then so be it. It is their choice.

It's not fair to punish legitimate gamers, but it's Bioware's decision how to handle their own software.

[iggie]

Thanks, I edited that into the OP somewhere. I agree, D3 tanked and bots have completely ruined the game.

I also agree, Bioware does have sound reasons for blocking access to Chinese gamers, lying about it to not appear discriminatory kind of ruffles my jimmies.

it is quite hard to say. but i doubt bioware is to blame. they actually are in need of players and the benefits from more players outweighs the cost of the potential of in game money sellers for real money. those can be easily reported and banned by the community.

They weren't desperate for players as prelaunch hype reached epic proportions. As for ISPs, they're all government controlled, and gamers only have 2 options really: China Telecom and China Unicom.

[Victus01]

Thanks, I edited that into the OP somewhere. I agree, D3 tanked and bots have completely ruined the game.

I also agree, Bioware does have sound reasons for blocking access to Chinese gamers, lying about it to not appear discriminatory kind of ruffles my jimmies.


They weren't desperate for players as prelaunch hype reached epic proportions. As for ISPs, they're all government controlled, and gamers only have 2 options really: China Telecom and China Unicom.

its probably the GOVT then. even if they say they are not they probably are. corruption are rampant in asia.

[iggie]

its probably the GOVT then. even if they say they are not they probably are. corruption are rampant in asia.

You should reread my OP then. I go into why swtor isn't even on the government's radar. How do you suppose this corruption has lead to swtor being inaccessible?

[Alvito]

They block Twitter over there? Wish they would do that worldwide.

You mean you dont care what J Lo had for lunch after a morning of shopping or what some athelete thinks about during the day?!?!

[iggie]

You mean you dont care what J Lo had for lunch after a morning of shopping or what some athelete thinks about during the day?!?!

Social media like twitter was being used by minority groups to organize potential meetings and protests, this lead to twitter/facebook being blocked. Youtube was unwilling to censor videos offensive to China, so they got blocked.

Maybe the government is afraid of lightsabers? not likely haha!

[Auguine]

You should reread my OP then. I go into why swtor isn't even on the government's radar. How do you suppose this corruption has lead to swtor being inaccessible?

This entire thing sounds to me like Bioware/EA are just flat out lying to people from China/elsewhere. Saying it is not blocked, then blocking it, is pathetic.

[Joey Ray III]

Twitter/youtube/facebook/blogspot are the big names that are blocked here.

now THAT's fucking awesome

[Redblade]

So to answer your question, yes, Bioware is most likely the culprit, and with good reason. They are protecting their intellectual property and profit margins (such as they are) to prevent another company from muscling in and all but stealing what is Bioware's profit margins. Bioware doesn't sell in game credits. Having someone else come in and do it for them removes part of the challenge of the game, which means people aren't going to play nearly as long as they would have otherwise.

There really isn't enough need of credits in game for farmers to make any real money out of it, could still be BW blocking obviously but I really can't see why it's necessary from a prevention standpoint.

---------- Post added 2012-08-12 at 02:25 PM ----------

End of my trace for swtor.com [159.153.92.41]
abovenet-ic-136943-ffm-b2.c.telia.net 213.248.94.150 11 41ms
64.125.22.197.available.above.net 64.125.22.197 12 47ms
xe-3-3-0.mpr1.lhr2.uk.above.net 64.125.24.85 13 54ms
xe-5-2-0.cr1.dca2.us.above.net 64.125.26.21 14 124ms
xe-0-3-1.er1.iad10.us.above.net 64.125.29.6 15 128ms
64.125.199.186.t00673-01.above.net 64.125.199.186 16 119ms
* Unknown Host * 159.153.92.82 17 124ms
* Unknown Host * 159.153.92.41 18 130ms

Looks to me that you're blocked by BW/Hosting company of the server.

[SirRobin]

now THAT's fucking awesome

While I concur, I would rather have them not blocked than have their local varieties as censored and monitored as they are.

---------- Post added 2012-08-12 at 09:32 AM ----------

Ever been denied access to a game because the company just doesn't want your business?

I do recall having members of a previous guild being blocked from WAR because they were gaming out of Kuwait. Don't recall what the tracers showed but it boiled down to concerns over intellectual property rights.

[Profyrion]

This issue is likely much more complicated than you realize. Do yourself a favor and stop trying to boil it down to 1 or 2 root causes. Occam's Razor need not apply.