Pro HS Player BANNED and Casters fired (Blitzchung)
Over the weekend the Asia-Pacific Grandmasters tournament for Hearthstone went smoothly all things considered, that is until one particular post-match interview opened a wormhole of controversy. Hong Kong player Blitzchung spoke against the Chinese government. The quote in question roughly translates to “Restore Hong Kong, time for a revolution.” In retrospect this isn’t huge, while it is against the rules that Blizzard have established (comp rules), the trouble comes with the harsh penalty that both Blitz, and the casters received. Blitzchung was banned from the tourney, and did not receive a single dollar of the prize money and cannot participate in HS tournaments for a year,additionally both the casters seen in the clip were fired.
This is where Blizzard’s true colors come out, while trying to maintain their reputation in the east, which is a large portion of their player base, they enacted a pretty harsh, and inexcusable punishment. The casters in the video don’t necessarily do anything wrong, although on second look they did encourage Blitzchung to speak out (the 8 words hong kong), yet they were penalized for this. This is Blizzard attempting to Save face, and play the game they know best, keeping their all-inclusive, friendly persona intact to the public, and to this they had to redeem themselves from the Chinese masses with the ban. While they did have every right to punish Blitzchung for breaking Section 6.1 of the competition rules, it is the over the top result that brings Blizzard into the spotlight, is this a company that can be trusted? Many people are trying to boycott blizzard, and claim that they will never give another cent to Blizzard, because they clearly favor one market over the other. And just a final food for thought, when it comes to big companies like Blizzard, it is always important to take everything they preach, and say with a grain of salt, because sometimes their primary goal is to appeal to the masses.
What do you think of the ban? Was it justified? Let me know in the comments what you think. Thank you for watching, and please stay tuned for more news.
Written/Edited by: Brian Morales