BEIJING, Jan. 13 -- One of the attractions of computer games is they're fantasy-based and the normal rules of behavior don't apply. Shoot-em-ups and fight games are fun and an antidote to the banality of our daily lives.    

    It's surely no coincidence that there has been a huge surge in demand for multiplayer games on social network platforms like Parking Wars, House Buying and Slave Manor. These kinds of sites have become a cause of lost productivity in the office, as worker drones seek an online buzz by creating mischief in Wonder Hospital, or "stealing" crops on a Kaixin001 farm.

    Correction: The word "stealing" has been replaced by "picking", "harvesting" or "plucking" - depending on which online farm you log on to.

    In November, the Ministry of Culture issued a notice calling on online game companies to adhere to "cultural values". Well versed in reading between the lines, some of these organizations last month voluntarily changed the terms of their games, so that taking someone else's produce was an agricultural act rather than an illegal one.

    Despite the best efforts of these game operators to elevate the tone of their sites, the government is expected to introduce fresh legislation and clean up or "harmonize" the online environment this year.

    What this means is that the same rules of conduct that govern our daily lives will increasingly apply to our online selves too. In our sanitized virtual spaces there will be no stealing, spitting, or ritual humiliation.     

    This has already happened to some extent. While farm games have been successfully reproduced in China, borrowing from Farmville on Facebook, the gangster-inspired Mafia Wars is forbidden. It's a similar story in the arena of MMORPGs (massively multiplayer online role playing games) where, for example, World of Warcraft fans are waiting with bated breath, fingers on buttons, for a revised version of the massively popular game.

    The argument for censorship has been well rehearsed. Shoot-em-ups promote Columbine-type massacres, fight games turn well-behaved kids into violent malcontents, and tasting forbidden fruit could provoke the same in grocery stores.

    Promoting social values is something all governments do and it could be argued the online environment should reflect this reality. But where's the fun in that?

    If online games are so innocuous nobody's interested in playing them the market will suffer; and without an outlet in cyberspace for submerging our anti-social feelings they may bubble up to the surface and cause real harm. And lest we forget, games are supposed to be fun, not PC (politically correct).

    The trick to harmonizing online gaming and deleting anti-social elements will be to ensure that legislation cleaning up virtual farms, for instance, does not kill the goose that lays the golden egg.

    (Source: China Daily)