Earlier today, the developers of the horror game Devotion announced it would return to sale via GOG on Friday. It’s been unavailable for purchase since early 2019 due to an in-game joke at the expense of Chinese president Xi Jinping. Hours later, GOG have released their own peculiar statement reversing their decision to release it.

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Much like the phantoms that materialise and disappear within the dusky corridors of Devotion, the game itself felt like an apparition. Launched in February, the solid Taiwanese horror game vanished from Steam just weeks afterwards, due to the discovery of in-game talismans that contain derisive references to China s President, Xi Jinping. Facing a firestorm of criticism, its studio, Red Candle Games, hurriedly hunkered down, announcing that it was putting the game through rounds of quality checks before releasing it again. But it’s now four months later, and the game still hasn t been restored on Steam. But Red Candle aren’t the only studio that has to wrestle with China’s strict censorship.

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The makers of Devotion today said they might re-release their really-quite-nice horror game at some point, if the controversy dies down, but Red Candle Games have no plans for a re-release “in the near-term”. Devotion was pulled from sale after some Chinese players were upset by it containing a forbidden meme comparing Chinese president Xi Jinping to fictional honeyguzzler Winnie the Pooh, which has since led to that government cancelling its Chinese publisher’s business license. It is a good’un so fingers crossed we’ll get another chance to play it. And fingers crossed for the government retribution to end, obvs.

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The tragic tale of Red Candle’s horror game Devotion only gets sadder. Originally pulled from stores after it was discovered to contain a joking comparison between Winnie The Pooh and Chinese president (and Winnie The Pooh lookalike) Xi Jinping. Now it appears it has cost its Chinese publisher everything. As shared via Twitter by Iain Garner of Another Indie and confirmed by PCGamesN, the Chinese government has revoked the business license of the game’s Chinese publisher Indievent.

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Editor’s note: You can’t buy Devotion anywhere currently, for reasons discussed in this article. But we’re reviewing it anyway.>

In my younger years, my parents brought me to a Chinese shaman called a jitong. These visits both unnerved and fascinated me. The jitong, who lived in a grimy, dimly lit apartment that smelt of incense, would let herself be possessed by a spirit that spoke through her, sharing advice and predictions for visiting devotees. I remember seeing her go into uncontrollable spasms, murmuring indecipherably about what I assumed was divine expression from the spirit itself. An assistant was interpreting her gurgled speech. The visit culminated in the jitong snapping out of her trance about an hour later. She eventually collapsed into a chair, wearing an expression of both shock and relief as the colour returned to her face.

Such occult sights can seem terrifying, but these, along with years of Chinese cultural upbringing, embedded in me a sense of fear and reverence for the afterlife. It was this strange mix of emotions that gnawed at me as I played Devotion, a first-person horror game set in a derelict Taiwanese apartment complex in the 1980s.

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Taiwanese studio Red Candle Games had a very bad weekend. After the launch of their 80s-set horror game Devotion, players noticed a scrap of paper in-game which invokes the names of Chinese president Xi Jinping and Winnie The Pooh. Xi (who looks much like the cuddly cartoon bear) being a reasonable man able to take a mild joke, Winnie The Pooh and associated properties are restricted in China – see John Oliver’s breakdown here.

The reference in the game, however innocuous, sparked a review-bombing campaign against the game by aggrieved Chinese players. This led to an apology from the studio, followed their Chinese Weibo social media account being shut down, and the removal of the game from Steam in China. Now it’s just gone altogether, globally.

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There are few niches as specific as the one Red Candle Games have carved out with Detention and its successor Devotion, launched just yesterday. Both are sharp, unsettling but grounded horror stories that blend the supernatural with tales of real life in Taiwan in the not-too-distant past. While Detention was a side-scrolling adventure set in the 60s, Devotion is a first-person psychological study of a deeply religious family in the 80s. See the launch trailer below.

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