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Clash of Clans has been one of the mobile online gaming phenomena that since its 2012 release has helped catapult the genre into a billion-dollar industry, with successful imitations and sequels such as the Clash Royale Now, the Clash of Clans is in the news for being banned in Iran following a psychological study commissioned by the Iranian Department of Justice.
The game, set in an indeterminate pseudo-medieval era, recounts the struggles of different clans for the control of the territory, something that must sound very familiar to the authorities in Iran, a country that has been twitness of endless fights between different ethnic groups and tribes Perhaps that is why they accuse the game of “inciting tribal violence” and being “extremely addictive «, and strictly prohibit their use and download.
History of Pokémon Go repeats itself
Someone could look for authentic sociopolitical reasons for this prohibition as a specific case in which misinterpreted or exaggerated the context of a video game, if it weren't for the fact that just six months ago, exactly in August, history repeated itself : Pokémon Go, without a doubt the game with the most media coverage of the year, was also banned in summer following the verdict of the Supreme Council of Virtual Spaces in Iran, who vaguely stated that the game was a problem for “the security of its citizens”.
The pen alties related to the use of this video game are not clear , but we must remember that Iran is not characterized by lax justice nor proportional, executing a thousand people per year for a wide variety of causes. It is surprising in this way that violence is condemned in a video game with cartoons in a country where violence is legitimized and normalized
There are known cases of users who have evaded censorship through foreign servers, but they were not specific cases of mobile applications, so that we lack data to know the success of "resistance" to the decisions of the Iranian government. A 64% of mobile game users in Iran play Clash of Clans, so there may be some resentment of this measure, of which it is not known whether it will be definitive, temporary or subject to some type of condition.
The real reasons for this ban in Iran will never see the light, although we assume that there is an ulterior motive that has to do with the digital leisure culture in the country, or simply because of the open-mindedness that the use of of online platforms. The network of networks does not arouse sympathy in the regimes dominated with an iron fist, and that is that freedom of expression is not demanded until it is know different opinions from their own or the 'official' ones. The Internet, whether through social networks or online games, is a crack through which the light of freedom escapes, and therefore, most likely more games will join to this unfortunate list in the future.
