Last week, Blizzard banned competitive Hearthstone player Chung “Blitzchung” Ng Wai after he voiced his support for the Hong Kong protestors during an interview following Hearthstone tournament. Blizzard’s decision was met with harsh criticisms online from fans and even U.S. Senators, who believed Blizzard only took action to satisfy the Chinese government, so as to not lose investments from Chinese companies. Blizzard denied this accusation, claiming they prohibit players from making political speech of any kind on their platforms—a rule they argue Blitzchung violated. After releasing an official statement reaffirming their stance, but modifying Blitzchung’s punishment to instead give him the prize money he won and reduce his ban from competitive play from a year to six months, Blitzchung has spoken out about the situation on Twitter for the first time.
In a TwitLonger post, written in both English and Chinese, Blitzchung first thanked the people advocating for him over the past week. He’s “grateful” that Blizzard adjusted his punishment, but he explained, “I knew I might have penalty or consequence for my act, because I understand that my act could take the conversation away from the purpose of the event,” similar to Blizzard’s reasoning behind his punishment. Moving forward, Blitzchung “will be more careful” and plans to “express [his] opinions or show [his] support to Hong Kong on [his] personal platforms.”
Though Blitzchung “appreciates” Blizzard giving him his prize, after discussing the situation with “people from Blizzard” over the phone, Blitzchung admitted that a six month ban “is still quite a lot” for him. He’s more upset for the “two casters involved,” hoping that “Blizzard can reconsider about their penalty.”
Lastly, he addressed many people’s questions about whether he will play Hearthstone competitively in the future, once his ban is up, saying, “Honestly, I have no idea on that yet.” Since his next tournament would probably be next season’s grandmaster tournament, he would’ve had a few months between competitions either way, he acknowledges. “I will take this time to relax myself to decide if I am staying in competitive Hearthstone scene or not,” he said.
He signed off on a positive note, acknowledging the impact Hearthstone has had on his life, saying, “Hearthstone changed my [sic] the way I live, I really love this community. Blessing to all the players out there, and blessing to Blizzard.”
You can read his full statement here.