Chinese gamer sued for using WoW add-on

by Shawn Schuster Oct 11th 2008 at 7:00PM

Filed under: World of Warcraft, Fantasy, Business models, Culture, Events, real-world, MMO industry, Politics

What if World of Warcraft had no add-ons, would you still play? Worse yet, what if they had the add-ons, and you were aware of them, but it was actually illegal to use them? That's the state of the game in China right now, thanks to the country's licensed WoW distributor, The9.

As part of The9's ongoing war against add-ons, they introduced anti-plugin software in 2004, and have threatened to close down any accounts that circumvented that software. In fact, the company just recently won a lawsuit that stemmed from a player who got their account closed when they were shown to use an add-on. In an article discussing this subject over at Virtually Blind, they suggest a server made just for add-ons, for anyone who wishes to participate. Taking into consideration the fact that China would probably never allow this, what are your thoughts?

EDIT: It seems there was some confusion in the original article's translation, attributing legal add-ons to illegal plug-ins or hacking software. Our apologies for the misunderstanding in quoting the Virtually Blind article, and thank you to all who pointed this out.

Tags: add-ons, china, lawsuit, plugin, the9, virtually-blind, world-of-warcraft, wow

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Coldbrand said on 7:51PM 10-11-2008

...What?

jeckelbros said on 7:53PM 10-11-2008

Translation issue.

"As part of The9's ongoing war against add-ons, they introduced anti-plugin software in 2004."

"Game plugins are to add plugin programs to game programs to improve all the functions by intercepting and recomposing the data sent to game servers from games. The plugin software can help game players to upgrade to a higher level easily."

This would refer to haxx and bots.... not addons.

You may want to click all of your links.

That was from your link "anti-plugin software in 2004"

Shawn Schuster said on 9:14PM 10-11-2008

From the article:
"A plugin (or “addin”, “addon”) is a computer program which resides on the user’s computer that interacts with a host application (a web browser or virtual world interface, for example) to provide extra functionality. Game plugins like those associated with World of Warcraft improve gameplay by intercepting and recomposing the data sent to game servers from games. Hundreds, if not thousands, of plugins exist for the U.S. version of World in Warcraft. Of course, choosing whether to use a plugin is left to the discretion of the gamer. Many gamers swear by the increased functionality provided by plugins…after all, only n00bs would use the user interface provided by the software."

Dudar said on 8:09PM 10-11-2008

No sir, I would not... Adding to my massive amount of add-ons without breaking the entire thing is just another layer of game play to me.

I just love tweaking my interface. The move to WAR has left me with an empty feeling in that regard.

Reader said on 9:03PM 10-11-2008

Curse has quite a few addons up. I am running nearly 20 atm. I can't imagine playing a WP without Squared, Whiny Spell Timer, Vertigo, etc.

Dudar said on 3:43AM 10-12-2008

I know, I'm running those as well. It's just not nearly as good as I'm used to in WoW. Even with several mods running, the interface is still clunky.

Reader said on 10:57PM 10-12-2008

True that. It's meh, but hopefully it'll improve.

jeckelbros said on 11:52PM 10-11-2008

http://www.dailywarcraft.com/world-of-warcraft/chinese-gamer-sued-for-using-wow-add-on/ should be the actual source for the article as it is a verbatim copy.

Your source you quoted is using addon in the term we in America and EU do. The actual translation is Plug-in which often and usually encompasses bots and cheats.

If you're going to copy another blog verbatim, at least verify it.

Shawn Schuster said on 12:10AM 10-12-2008

Actually this is a leech site copying us. If you mouse over their links, you'll see they're all pointing back to Massively.Thanks for pointing this one out though, so we can take proper action.

recursive said on 5:57AM 10-12-2008

You honestly do not, at any point, think translation may be the issue here? Even though the so-called anti-plugin software has written Warden all over it? Wow O_o

jeckelbros said on 8:08AM 10-12-2008

Sorry about confusing the leech site, but it is a translation issue.

"As part of The9's ongoing war against add-ons, they introduced anti-plugin software in 2004,"

This coincides with the release of Warden.

The original article describes "plug-ins" correctly, but your source stretches the translation to include UI addons.

We'll just call this reverse Engrish.

ScytheNoire said on 9:01AM 10-14-2008

I was about to say that this is insanity, but obviously something was lost in translation.

Addon's are legal, so that's good, I support them and their use.

Botting though, spank those jerks in court.