Tencent, the Asian giant that owns a large part of shares from the biggest video game companies, has begun to collaborate with the Chinese government authorities to limit the daily playing time of the minors.
It is an unprecedented measure in the world of digital entertainment and it will limit the access to the company's games according to the age spectrum of its audience.
Tencent has confirmed that it has taken this decision after observing the large number of hours that millions of children in the country connected to their video games have come to spend. Among which the famous MOBA Arena of Valor.
From September 15th, players who want to connect to any of their titles must provide their real names to play. These names and credentials will be checked against the Chinese police database, which will confirm the age of each player.
In the case of being a minor, the game will be limited. Minors between 13 and 18 can play a maximum of two hours a day, while those under 12 will be limited to one hour. Tencent has already started testing this method in July 2017, but since many users were lying on their profiles, it has decided to take action on the matter in collaboration with the local authorities.
In fact, these measures will only be applicable to the Chinese market, which in recent months are focused on controlling addictions and diseases that, according to their own studies, would be related to video games.
A few days ago, the government began to restrict the necessary permits for the publication of video games in the region, according to the authorities as part of a collaborative effort of various agencies in the country to curb the short-sightedness in children.
The Ministry of Education of China published an extensive statement in which it defended these measures to protect the children's eyes, devising a new regulation that proposes that "the use of electronic products with non-educational objectives should not exceed 15 minutes in a row and must not exceed a total of one hour a day."
Arena of Valor is available for Mobile and Nintendo Switch.