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FULL BOYCOTT IN EFFECT. SEE DETAILS HERE.

ALERT: CHINESE MEDIA

DISCLAIMER: I cannot say with 100% certainty that this is true. However, there is enough credible evidence for me to believe it.

To put it in short, we're not just battling Infold. We're fighting the Chinese media.

Here is the post. I will outline the timeline here as well. This is directly from the thread:

As confirmed by a CN native. "state media commentary acts as a direct warning of incoming government bans." So, that's it, then. This is what caused it. Valko was being recognized by the state media. So why did Pro Valko ppl not go after the media for false reporting? On their socials? Why were we not instructed to? Timeline: June 22nd, Valko is announced. Fan Rioting pursues for 6 days straight. Company doesn't budge, continues to post normally. June 28, 1 AM: Apology, 20-pull compensation, and a promise: every male lead's story "will not change for any reason." It tops the overnight hot search marked 爆. Then watch the state media pressure. June 28, 9:08 AM: Beijing News "Six Questions" rejects that apology in print. It was 8 hours old. June 28, night: the Women's Federation's magazine — enters hours after the PV airs June 29: China Women's News named editorial June 29: China Women's News AGAIN, on the 0731 defense: "fails to convince" June 29, 8:20 PM: Guangming Daily. A central party paper. June 30: Ban Yue Tan. Xinhua-run. June 30, evening: Valko is cancelled. Permanently. With a promise to never add a male lead again. And still, to this day, they are STILL going after him, with Beijing News posting ANOTHER smear article on him JUST TODAY! Now look at PPG's attitude change. Anti's beginning riot? Didn't budge. Business as usual. Once the state media got involved? Silence. And knowing this... it makes sense. The marketing numbers didn't add up, a large portion of CN population really liked Valko. Obviously the rest of the world liked Valko.

Here is another post. I will include the screenshots from it below.

Here is a news clip posted to Weibo. THIS IS NOT FROM A GOVERNMENT ACCOUNT. On Weibo, the red V is a standard verified account. A gold V is for news, government and verified companies. This is just a random news channel, no government affiliation.

Here is a screenshot from a user on RedNote explaining the situation:

Here is a screenshot of every news outlet that has been running Anti-Valko campaigns (via this post):

So, what do we do?

Not to worry, friends! I never give info without a plan!

GET LOUD about false media in China. I mean LOUD. We have to change the narrative. Everything they are spreading is complete slander. This is where the sexual assault and predator allegations against Valko are stemming from. They're taking clips of his trailer fully out of context and changing the story entirely.

Infold is fully capable of bringing a lawsuit against these media outlets. "Under the PRC Civil Code, companies have a legally protected reputation. If a news outlet, blogger, influencer, or another company publishes false statements that damage a company's reputation, the company can file a civil lawsuit." I am hoping that their current silence is because they are taking legal action. I'm not sure how likely that is, but my fingers are crossed.

Be louder than the media. Fight back. Change the narrative. This is vital if we want to bring Valko back.

This does not mean stop the boycott. We do not need to give any money or support to Infold. We're still posting #bringbackvalko, we're still going after them, and we are still NOT logging in.

Posting under #ValkoWasFramed, as far as I know. As soon as I have more information, you will be the first to know.

I’ve seen a lot of people claim that Valko was blacklisted; that is not true. The blacklisting of a character in China does not look like this. If he were truly blacklisted, you’d be unable to find a single trace about him on Chinese socmed. The CCP does not blacklist singular characters from games from what I know. They could demand for the character to be banned but I’ll get into that more in a second, otherwise characters will be demanded to go under heavy censorship but that does not seem to be the case here, either.

Something that a lot of people believe is that the CCP are the ones who demanded for Valko to be taken down or that they’re the ones currently restricting Infold/PPG but I honestly do not believe that, at least not when it comes to Valko, I’ll explain:

I’ve been going through Chinese social media all day and the general consensus from fellow Valko lovers that I’ve noticed is that a lot of them also do not think it was the CCP who “forced” them to remove Valko.

When it comes to the 731 issue(which is very serious and I am very, very surprised something like this was missed by PPG’s team, that really isn’t a mistake that a Chinese company should or honestly even would make but at the end of the day they’re human and we don’t know how thoroughly they go through everything they release) they already issued (multiple) apologies, removed the entire WU chapter and promised to do better and go through rectification regarding national sensitivity. For a game as big as LaDs and with the amount of tax paying money they bring into Shanghai, the government would be willing to let this go. Now, the issue regarding his bond story also is not something the CCP would step in over; as much as it sucks, issues regarding feminism and women’s safety in that form aren’t taken that seriously by the government. There is simply no way they would threaten a game that makes this much money and does promote Chinese culture globally over the issue of “what’s so wrong with letting a wolf enter your house”. While I personally also do not believe that line was put in with malicious intent, the CCP would in no way care about this to the point they’d make them take down the character.

The reason the CCP stepped in, was over the (partially fabricated) outrage on social media that happened. The CCP cares about peace amongst the people and that no disturbance to daily life happens. It was about the public opinion and dispute over the game. When the haters were sending cow dung, rice grains and funeral flowers while actively blowing the issue out of proportion, but even then what we’re seeing now simply doesn’t feel right, it honestly doesn’t make sense to me. Perhaps it’s the reason they’re rerunning the WiW banner now, to show how they promote Chinese culture globally but that would seem like enough to appease them currently. From what I know, any talks with the government are already over.

And lastly, I saw a post on Weibo about someone saying they contacted the 12315 hotline in Shanghai. That is the number for the Shanghai Intellectual Property Administration and they apparently, directly asked if the government stepped in to take down Valko and the response they received was, that it wasn’t the CCP. Which means the decision to take down Valko came from PPG themselves. Obviously, there’s no way to verify whether or not this really happened and if what they’re saying is true. But to me, this seems completely plausible.

I truly do believe it was PPG’s own decision to make Valko take the fall for all the negative media attention they were receiving. There have been similar posts of people claiming to have talked to insiders and what not and they’re all saying that this decision came from PPG’s higher ups with no regard for their dev team. This makes everything significantly worse in my eyes because not only does it mean that they truly do not care about their own creatives on the team and the amount of effort they put into this character but they’re a company that is very willing to sacrifice the easiest target to get themselves out of hot waters with the public instead of standing up for the story they’re trying to tell AND that they’ve simply been stringing protesting players along for the past week. This would mean that their silence is entirely chosen and they cannot be bothered to fix something that their players want because it is simply easier to ignore it.

I have said it before, them not utilising their legal department when they should’ve and fought for their own intellectual property speaks volumes about what kind of company this is. I am incredibly disappointed in their seeming cowardice and the awful standard and precedent this sets for the game. And I cannot imagine how low on morale the workers at PPG are now. How would you feel if you spent years creating a beautiful character whom you love as your creation, just to have it ripped away by uncaring higher ups?

Again, none of this is confirmed, at the end of the day all we can do right now is speculate but there’s always past experiences and knowledge to learn from to pinpoint what might be going on. The only good thing that this might point to is the fact that if it truly is a decision they made themselves, it is entirely reversible and if they take some accountability alongside actually moving with intent and protecting their creations and staff and show actual care for their players, this might be resolved.