Gold farmers in China may not be out of business after all as it turns out. In the wake of the news that the government of China has now officially banned the gathering of in-game virtual money comes the clarification that there is no such desire on the part of the government to curb this activity.

Keen on curbing the growing industry of Gold Farming in online games like the famous World of Warcraft, China has now set up a leaner definition of the terms "gold farming" as well as officially banning its practice, and limiting the use of virtual currency only for virtual goods and services.

With the World of Warcraft subscriber base climbing to an impressive 11.5 million just last December, it seems there's no stopping Wrath of the Lich King from conquering everything he sets his eyes on. That is, until the almighty warlord ran into a force much greater than him - the Chinese government. To this day, the extremely popular MMO has yet to receive a license from the Chinese government to operate in mainland China.

The Chinese government has now implemented a new registering policy for online gamers - one requiring them to use their real names. Gone are those supposedly-witty-it-shows-character types of aliases from this day forth. Could it be to curb cyber-crimes, or more magically, curb game addiction?

Gotta love a media blitz! Today via press release, Funcom's let out a whole big batch (and by big, I mean "a huge number of" and "hugely insane resolutions of") screenshots, screenshots, and more screenshots for Age of Conan. We get to see the expansion teaser art too, as well as comparisons of Age of Conan on DirectX10 vs DirectX9. Plus a sneak peak at the free content that's coming within the next few months! It's thumbnail enlargement time!

Funcom has revealed a new teaser image forAge of Conan's first ever expansion pack that's set to be released next year. The concept art itself won't be released until tomorrow, but Eurogamer did give a description of what the concept art shows. Check it out in the full article.

Chinese video game publisher The9 was happy to announce some very positive sales reports according its recently released second quarter financial statement. A significant portion of these numbers owes its success to the company's flagship title in the country - namely, Blizzard's World of Warcraft. More info in our full article.

Like it or not, gold buying, selling, and powerleveling have become rather lucrative businesses, particularly with the stratospheric rise in popularity of the MMORPG. *cough*WoW*cough*. So what is it? Is it legal? Ethical? Dangerous? Sally forth dear reader, and find out for yourself!

The guys over at Mgame International contacted us with a new event they were running for their free-to-play MMORPG: Hero Online. They also provided us with a number of keys, which give free items to those participating in the event itself, to give out to our readers. To find out more about this promo and the game head on over to the full article.

Download: Hero Online Client

If you played any of the Dynasty Warriors or Romance of the Three Kingdoms games, you'd know how rich in both story and culture that period in China was. Sega took that idea to the next level and made an MMORPG set in that period. More in the full article.