WHAT: "How China Plays: the history, future and global context of digital gaming in China," NOTE: this online event by veteran gamer Jesse Young is adapted from his earlier, in-person presentation on the same topic

WHEN: Wednesday March 27, 2024 from 7-8 PM (Beijing Time) on Zoom

MORE ABOUT THE EVENT: Jesse Young, a gamer for the past 30 years, will tell us all about the digital gaming scene in China – a massive industry drawing in over $60 billion in revenue and more than 600 million players. Jesse will present a capsule history of gaming in China, and discuss perspectives on its future. He will describe how gaming in China compares with gaming elsewhere and how his personal experience fits within the broader global narrative. Internationally, organisations such as Video Game History Foundation have helped mainstream the importance and challenges of video game preservation, as academic interest has broadened to include social history, material culture and regionalism. Yet gaming in China has largely been obscured by language barriers, stigma surrounding bootlegs, heavy-handed regulation and complex dynamics between Hong Kong, Taiwan and the mainland. Local gaming history has been ignored even in China in favour of a focus on the big global players – Japan and the US. But things are changing, as a China chapter of DiGra (Digital Games Research Association) established a decade ago has led to archives, museums, collections and publications appearing across the Sinosphere.

MORE ABOUT THE SPEAKER: Jesse Young is an independent researcher and freelance writer/translator/artist with published work in Sixth Tone, The World of Chinese, Beijing Review, Spittoon Literary Magazine, Chaoyang Trap and China XYZ. His primary outlet in recent years has been as host of Happy Gaming House (欢乐游戏之家) – an online video channel covering retro gaming and gaming history in China. His areas of interest include retro tech and niche cultural obsessions. He hopes to write a book on the history of music in games.

HOW MUCH: free for members of RASBJ; RMB 50 for members of RAS branches in London, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Seoul; RMB 100 for non-members. If you experience difficulty paying via Wechat, please try Alipay instead. You can also pay by credit card.

Interested in becoming an RASBJ member? Please sign up at https://rasbj.org/membership​

HOW TO JOIN THE EVENT: Please click "Register" or "I will attend" and follow the instructions. After successful registration you'll receive a confirmation email with a link to join the event online. If you seem not to have received it, please check your spam folder.

REFUND POLICY: If the organiser cancels or postpones the event, registrants will be refunded.