Chinese publisher The9 launches site for MMO named 'World of Fight.'
We’ve been watching the ongoing saga of World of Warcraft (WoW) in China for some time now, and things just got really weird. First, it seemed that Wrath of the Lich King was running afoul of Chinese censors due to an ongoing issue with undead characters, then, existing WoW publisher The9 had the license yanked by Blizzard. World of Warcraft is in the process of being handed over to rival publisher (and Chinese Battle.net operator) Netease.
Enter World of Fight, a new MMO by The9 that has appeared as a mysterious placeholder website. Discovered by the Wall Street Journal, the site bears the address wofchina.com and features an image that seems to have been taken from Warhammer Online with text in a very WoW-esque font. As MMO-Champion points out, EA actually owns 15 percent of The9, so the use of the Warhammer image may indicate that World of Fight is actually the Chinese name for Warhammer Online.
It makes sense when taken in context. While the Warhammer franchise is relatively well known in the Western world, it isn’t in China. It is no secret that Warcraft was heavily influenced by the Warhammer universe, and so superficial similarities are prevalent. The concept of launching a clone of a game to retain customers is not new in China – what better ‘clone’ than one of the more successful Western MMOs of recent years.
While the writing may have been on the wall last year when Blizzard awarded Battle.net rights to Neatease, one doubts that even a rudimentary WoW clone could have been slapped together by The9. While there are certainly many other WoW-like MMOs that could maybe fit the role, the evidence pointing to World of Fight actually being Warhammer Online is somewhat compelling.
As the handover of the Chinese WoW operations moves closer, we can expect to see more about this mysterious replacement. While it in no way impacts us in the West, it will be incredibly interesting to see not only how well this move goes for The9, but also how WoW fares under its new publisher.
Supporting our habits:
mcgarnagle
2009.05.08 16:48
Every time I see this headline all I can think is "sum durid is for fite"
2009.05.08 17:18
Lets just hope Alamo sues then!