RogueXanter: 1: Yeah posting about it on social media, much less Chinese social media, was a very bad idea. They should have just put it up on the store with no more fanfare then any other game, or release it as part of a bundle of horror games and not do anything special to draw attention.
Agreed....which is why the claim that GOG was smart because they delisted Devotion makes less sense....if they are smart they would have done as you said or similar to that.
(tbh I think it was either a lower level staffer who thought they knew better about how to do such things, or the higher up's greed overrode common sense & they allowed the advertising/pr staff to post it anyways)
RogueXanter: 2a :Would the number of people who want this game be higher then the number of GOG customers in
China though? Sure there are many more gamers in the rest of the world but only a fraction of them would want this game.
There are over 8000 votes for the game(and since many don't bother voting for such things, the actual number of people who might've voted for the game is likely higher).....if even a fraction bought it it would likely outweigh the complaints they got, that alone likely would've outweighed the ones who claimed they would've boycotted the store had GOG sold the game.
(also it's likely that some of the ones complaining likely weren't going to boycott if GOG decided to sell the game)
RogueXanter: 2b : Would sales of the game outweigh the total sales lost if
China retaliated?
If
china blocked GOG, chinese citizens likely still would've "moved" to buy games from GOG anyways... making such moves by the CCP near pointless.
RogueXanter: 3a: VPNs cost money.
They're like 5 bucks a month for basic plans....and well worth it for many people.
RogueXanter: 3b: Are VPNs legal in
China? Because that sounds like something they would ban there to me honestly.
They likely aren't....but many use them anyways to get around the great firewall.
(for things including buying games and media their govt doesn't want them to have)