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[brian0057]

The hits just keep on coming.

After gaming giant Activision Blizzard banned a pro gamer who expressed support for Hong Kong protesters, the company has taken heat on all sides. Players boycotted Blizzard games. Employees walked out of work. Lawmakers lambasted the company for caving to pressure from China. And Blizzard faced another problem it didn’t reveal at the time: a sponsor pulled out of its pro gaming league amid the controversy.

Two days after the company announced that it would ban Hong Kong-based professional Hearthstone player Chung Ng Wai, Mitsubishi Motors Taiwan ended its sponsorship of Blizzard’s esports events, according to Erica Rasch, a spokesperson for Mitsubishi.

The company declined to comment further, and Blizzard did not respond to requests for comment. Speculation that the car company had pulled its dollars first began on Reddit when users saw that the Mitsubishi logo had seemed to disappear from the backdrop of an official tournament broadcast.

Coca-Cola and the computer manufacturer ASUS, which sponsor the collegiate Hearthstone league, did not respond to requests for comment. A spokeswoman for the livestreaming company Twitch said “nothing has changed” about the company’s relationship to the collegiate league. Three collegiate players protested Blizzard’s treatment of Chung during an official broadcast and were later suspended for their conduct.

During a post-game interview in early October, Chung, who uses the handle “blitzchung,” said “Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our times,” on a live broadcast out of the Hearthstone Asia-Pacific Grandmasters tournament. The event, held in Taiwan, is an elite competition comprised of the game’s best players in the region.

The day after his statement, the company barred Chung from pro play for a year and withheld his prize winnings, though it later reduced the sentence to six months and allowed him to collect the money. Blizzard’s president J. Allen Brack said the player could not go unpunished for “taking the conversation away from the purpose of the event and disrupting or derailing the broadcast.”

Blizzard has struggled to appease players in its two biggest markets, the U.S. and China, while still complying with Chinese censorship laws. According to Blizzard’s most recent earnings report, the company made 12 percent of its quarterly revenue in the Asia Pacific market. Chinese tech giant Tencent owns a five percent stake in the company.

Blizzard’s president has attempted to dispel any appearance of impropriety. “The specific views expressed by blitzchung were NOT a factor in the decision we made,” Brack said. “I want to be clear: our relationships in China had no influence on our decision.” But one current Blizzard employee previously told The Daily Beast, “I think that it's a flat-out lie that our relationships in China had nothing to do with the decision.”

Source: The Daily Beast.

 

[Spukc]

nice gesture from Mitsubishi Moters good on them.

i guess i won't be able to have that Mitsubishi skin in diablo 4 xD

 

[Hudo]

Weird that a corporation like Activision Blizzard needs sponsorships.

 

[Von Hugh]

Mitsubishi was partnered with Blizzard?

 

[Codes 208]

Weird that a corporation like Activision Blizzard needs sponsorships.

Its probably activision talking, They’ll take all the money they can get. They’ll have you pay $60-250 for an unfinished game, $50 for the season pass, indefinite amounts for MTX’s and sometimes an additional $20-30 for unannounced dlc for a certain annual series.

 

[Hudo]

Its probably activision talking, They’ll take all the money they can get. They’ll have you pay $60-250 for an unfinished game, $50 for the season pass, indefinite amounts for MTX’s and sometimes an additional $20-30 for unannounced dlc for a certain annual series.

Well, if you put it that way... it makes sense. Why pay for a convention by yourself when you can have others paying it for you. Well, I stand corrected.

 

[iconmaster]

 

[Pejo]

Good on ya, Mitsubishi. I always assumed they were a Japanese company for some reason.

 

[Heebie Jeebies]

Good on ya, Mitsubishi. I always assumed they were a Japanese company for some reason.

They are, this is the Taiwanese arm of the company that probably sponsored local esport events.

 

[01011001]

I literally thought I had a stroke reading that title...

the fuck did Mitsubishi have to do with Activision? lol?

 

[nkarafo]

Weird that a corporation like Activision Blizzard needs sponsorships.

Bobby needs another golden statue near his pool.

 

[Virex]

Good on ya, Mitsubishi. I always assumed they were a Japanese company for some reason.

They are

 

[Starhowl]

I think it's a good move.

 

[Fuz]

Good.

Fuck activision.

 

[CuteFaceJay]

Mitsubishi = best cars!

 

[Portugeezer]

Honourable Mitsubishi

 

[Krappadizzle]

Hey Blizzard,

Must suck to be fiscally punished because your politics doesn't agree with everyone.

 

[newtypepilot]

mitsubishi motors aint doing too well themselves anyways. They killed the Lancer, and the evo

 

[The Elite]

mitsubishi motors aint doing too well themselves anyways. They killed the Lancer, and the evo

They killed the Lancer?

Fuck'em.

That's my favourite car in Rallisport games.

 

[Lupin3]

Weird that a corporation like Activision Blizzard needs sponsorships.

Won't somebody please think of the corporations!

 

[Ban Puncher]