Reports are surfacing that two media companies in China -- BestTV and Shanghai Oriental Pearl Group -- may be merging. While the merger could have potentially huge ramifications for media in China, it would also create an interesting side-effect by having the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 living under the same roof.
BesTV and Shanghai Oriental Pearl Group are both subsidiaries of the Shanghai Media Group. BesTV recently made news by partnering with Microsoft to bring the Xbox One to the Chinese market, while Shanghai Oriental Pearl Group is in a joint venture with Sony to bring the PlayStation 4 to China.
The two companies merging back together into their parent company would effectively give SMG a monopoly on the video game industry in China. The Chinese government has long had a ban on home video game consoles entering the country, with the PlayStation 2 being the last real console to be legally available. Since then, consoles have only been available on China's gray market as the Chinese government declared video game consoles as harmful to young minds.
That will officially change when Microsoft becomes the first company to release a console via the Shanghai Free Trade Zone, launching the Xbox One in China on Sept. 23 for around $600 with two games, Powerstar Gold and Neverwinter Online. A $700 version with the Kinect and four games will also be available. Reports say that the Xbox One in China is on track to meet its release date, with various parts to manufacture the consoles being approved by Shanghai customs and shipments of the console rolling out to stores. The PlayStation 4 currently does not have a release date.
Even with the lifting of the console ban, video games in China are still under scrutiny and must follow a strict set of rules. Currently games are not allowed to depict anything related to gambling, violations of the Chinese constitution, national unity, reputation, religious policies, or anything that promotes obscenity, drug use, or violence. Don't expect Grand Theft Auto to make it to China anytime soon.
How would SMG owning both Xbox One and PlayStation 4 work? It may just be that the two consoles share the same warehouses, but it could also mean that SMG would only be facing video game related competition from gray market sales, effectively allowing SMG to do whatever they want in the legal video game business. This of course also depends on exactly how much control BesTV and Shanghai Oriental Pearl Group have over setting console and game prices in the region, or if Microsoft and Sony have a strong say in pricing matters.
