Apple removed more than 90,000 games from the Chinese App Store

The purge continues on the Chinese App Store. In 2020, Apple recalled 94,000 games from its store in China, nearly three times more than last year, according to Sensor Tower figures. relayed talk Wall street journal. This is the result of a measure taken in July, which requires game developers to obtain an ISBN number from the General Administration of Press and Publications of the country (read: The Chinese App Store will only accept games validated by the government).

In early December, Apple informed developers that premium games and those that include in-app purchases have until December 31 to present the Chinese government’s Imprimatur on the App Store. In fact, only a small part of them can comply with the rule, especially foreign publishers for whom it is very difficult to get the go-ahead from Beijing. In fact, we can expect more deletions in the coming weeks. In 2019, there were 272,000 games on the Chinese App Store.

Despite these obstacles, the iOS game is doing well in the country: the income from this activity has represented 13 billion dollars since the beginning of the year, a figure higher than 13%. But growth is less and less important: the turnover of iOS games had increased by 21% in 2019 and 26% in 2018.

The games are not Beijing’s only goal. According to a study by Campaign for Accountability, around 3,000 apps around the world have no subscribers in China. A third of them are related to sensitive issues with the Chinese government, such as the demonstrations in Hong Kong, the rights of gay and transgender communities, Buddhism, Tibet … 5% of the banned applications in China refer to pornography (although this “genre” is forbidden throughout the world) and gambling. Games are pretty much everything else.

Apple explained again to WSJ that he had to respect the rules of each country, which sometimes means withdrawing certain applications. ” Apple carefully studies requests every time we receive them »Explains a spokesperson. ” We often disagree with them and dispute them. While the final decision sometimes goes against our wishes, we believe that our customers receive better service when we stay in the country, providing them with access to products that promote self-expression while protecting privacy. ».