The video
agit-prop vigorously satirizes the travails of mainland Chinese WoW players over the latter half of 2009 using the technique of
personification; the game itself serves as both stage and a
framing device. The numerous conflicts and issues addressed include:
electroshock therapy for purported
internet addiction; the Chinese government's attempts to censor the internet with mandatory installations of the
Green Dam Youth Escort filter; the corporate battle between the PRC's two primary game servers,
The9 and
Netease, over licensing renewal rights; and finally, the bureaucratic in-fighting between the governmental organs
General Administration of Press and Publication and the
Ministry of Culture over control of the game. Along the way the video also satirizes and/or parodies numerous Internet
tropes,
memes,
in-jokes,
running gags and clichés which are specific to, and endemic to, Chinese net culture as well as certain elements of American
pop culture. (Obvious take-offs on certain aspects of the
Terminator franchise, for example, bookend the main action of the story, but at one point major characters engage in poetic battle by doing
the dozens in
Chinese couplets.) Furthermore, given its production of political satire by
game engine, War of Internet Addiction counts, not only as an heir to the
roman à clef tradition, but as an influential
machinima à clef in its own right. ==Oil Tiger Machinima Team==