Westerners translate Chinese video games in a labour of love
Some dedicated fans have banded together to bring Chinese games to a wider audience
Magical swords, martial artists and a mystical setting – these all form the basis of The Legend of Sword and Fairy, a Chinese video game series.
Eighteen years after the first game was released by Taiwan-based Softstar Entertainment, The Legend of Sword and Fairy games continue to win praise in a local market that makes over a trillion yuan each year. Despite their domestic success, however, Chinese video games are largely unknown to international audiences, a puzzling fact considering the country's recent drive to push its culture abroad.
But this hasn’t stopped a dedicated group of non-Chinese enthusiasts from promoting games like The Legend of Sword and Fairy online.
Dying Chinese man, 61, leaves US$43 million fortune to young wife, enrages ex-wife’s family
New partner, who is almost 3 decades younger than terminally ill husband, says relationship is based on ‘love not money’ amid gold-digging jibes
A terminally ill Chinese man left 300 million yuan (US$43 million) to his wife who is 28 years younger than him, causing a dispute with his ex-wife’s family.
The 61-year-old from the southern Chinese island of Hainan, surnamed Hou, reportedly left all his fortune to his young wife, Liyuan, who is 33.
Liyuan said she had been with him since she was 21. They married 10 years ago and have a five-year-old son.
In November, the couple announced on their social media account, which has 44,000 followers, that Hou had been diagnosed with terminal lung cancer.
Liyuan said she grew up overnight, from a little girl wanting to be looked after, to a cancer patient’s carer.
She received many comments speculating that she would run away when her husband was ill.
But she said his illness and her reaction to it were a test that they are destined to overcome together.
“People said our marriage is a sand castle, but they did not know my husband raised me up in my journey from naivety to maturity. He gave me the best love a man can give to a woman,” she said in a video.
She stayed with him while he went through five rounds of chemotherapy and other treatments.
Liyuan met Hou while working at his logistics company. He was single and pursued her with expensive gifts and meals.
As a migrant worker from an ordinary family with a gambling father, she said she was shocked by his lifestyle and once hesitated to date him because of his age.
She said he supported her by giving her broader horizons and his networks.
Liyuan started off as an accounting assistant at his company and later the boss of a clubhouse in Beijing.
When they got married, Hou asked Liyuan to sign a prenuptial agreement, because his two children he had with his ex-wife worried about their inheritance of his property.
After his diagnosis, Hou reportedly transferred all his fortune, worth 300 million yuan in total, to Liyuan.
Hou said his Liyuan became his spiritual anchor while he battled his illness.
His biggest worry will be his wife and young son when he dies, so he made the decision to guarantee their life without him.
But he also reassured her that he will “watch their son grow up”.
It has been reported that the decision met with strong opposition from his ex-wife and her children.
Liyuan said the decision was made by Hou independently and insisted that their relationship is based on love not money.
Some online observers supported ex-wife’s children: “It is true when people say that when you have a stepmother, you will also have a stepfather,” one person said, criticising Hou’s indifference to his other children.
Another understood Hou’s decision: “It is normal that people leave money to those who actually take care of them.”
