The Official Behind China's Gaming Crackdown Proposal Got Sacked — Now CCTV Is Scrambling to Announce Game Licenses to Calm the Market, But Players Aren't Buying It

The official who single-handedly sent China's gaming industry into the ICU with a regulatory draft has now been removed from office. A recent NGA forum post set off a collective celebration among gamers and stock investors alike — the person behind the controversial "Draft Online Game Management Measures" (网络游戏管理办法征求意见稿) has been sacked, and state broadcaster CCTV has started airing game license (版号) approval announcements during prime time, desperately trying to inject some adrenaline into the flatlining market.

But players aren't buying the copium. The original poster, self-described as "a diamond-handed A-share bagholder who plays games, lurks NGA, and bought gaming stocks only to watch them bleed out", went straight for the jugular: they suggested authorities investigate whoever made 500x returns by shorting Tencent right before the draft dropped. While it reads like a disgruntled investor's rant, it highlights a genuinely chilling question — did someone with inside knowledge exploit the policy shock for massive profit?

The comments section became a masterclass in Chinese internet sarcasm (阴阳怪气). One player delivered the most brutal analogy of the thread: "It's like sending a 5-yuan KFC coupon to a grave — the person's been dead for years. Who do you expect to eat it, the corpse or the mourners?" Dark humor, sure — but it perfectly captures the sentiment: after the regulatory hammer nearly killed the industry, why would anyone believe a few game licenses on CCTV can restore confidence?

Others were even more blunt: "Keep falling. Fall until the draft gets fully retracted." "Retail investors are dumb, but they're not complete suckers — keep dumping." Market confidence, it turns out, can be destroyed with a single policy memo but takes years to rebuild.

Several memes circulating in the thread cranked the irony up to eleven. One commenter observed: "In China, the Iron Fist (铁拳) can literally kill an entire industry. Look at private tutoring — beaten to death. This stock crash is totally normal." The private tutoring crackdown (教培) of 2021 remains a haunting precedent, and gamers see history repeating itself.

The absurdity of the license approval process itself also came under fire. Players noticed that some games that have already shut down got approved for licenses, while live-service games are still waiting. One bewildered commenter asked: "Laigu Mixin (来古弥新), how come you still haven't gotten yours?" — dead games getting licenses before running ones is peak bureaucratic comedy.

Another player cut straight to the core problem with China's gaming industry: "A cyber brothel-cum-casino without the gambling is just a pile of garbage — no amount of PR can fix that." Crude, perhaps, but painfully accurate. When the gacha-fueled, P2W business model gets squeezed by tighter regulations, the industry's creativity takes a massive hit.

So here's where things stand: the official is gone, CCTV is pumping out good news, licenses are trickling in — yet gaming stocks keep bleeding, players keep raging, and market confidence is still in shambles. As one commenter put it: "Now you cry, after the person's already dead." Whether this is a genuine course correction or a case of too little, too late remains to be seen.