my first comment illuded to the eagerness of the hacker news community to engage in china bashing.
I also pointed out that censorship is considered during the design process.
Here is a list of games we are allowed to know about before PEGI was enforced.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_banned_video_games
Games you are not allowed to know about would be sympathic to the cause of afghans, iranians, iraqis, syrians and many more things that sell newspapers and political elections.
Pointing out hypocrisy in the Chinese government's policies (competition, human rights, etc.) is not 'bashing'. Just as pointing out those things in other governments is not X bashing.
The reason it seems to occur more often with China is because China is the rising power, and probably the power of the 21st century - its actions will be scrutinised because its actions have major consequences for the rest of the world.
I will happily 'bash' my (UK) government over a whole range of things. Censorship in creative industries is not one of them. China has a long history of creative suppression and censorship.
I would assume that games sympathetic to the causes of Afghans, Iranians, Iraqis, Syrians, and others are not 'banned' or creatively stifled, just that there is no commercial interest or reward in such games. This is not censorship by a government. There's nothing stopping anybody making games on such subjects.
That's the difference between China (and other similar governments) and, for lack of a better category, western governments. China's government will intervene in creative processes, western governments will not.
