This is just a polite suggestion as it's 2020 and having a land based around fantasy 'exotic oriental' themes and calling it literally the name for China in Mandarin could possibly come across as insensitive and kinda appropriationy.

Having far eastern inspired lands in a fantasy game is fine and there's a rich vein of myths, imagery and philosophical ideas there to explore- but maybe we could hold a competition or something to crowdsource a better name for it that just China please?

And considering all the real world stuff China is associated with too, I doubt many of us want the name of a beautiful fantasy location in our escapism world of Subeta to be mentally tied to stuff like Chinese communism, concentration camps, the genocides of Uyghurs and Tibetans and of female babies, LGBT/QUILTBAG folks being illegal, illegal organ harvesting of prisoners, the current power struggles for 'global dominance' amongst the USA, China and Russia etc.

Sorry to be dense, I don't get your meme's context here?

(It's autism btw, not me being an asshole trying to start something by 'claiming not to get it' or something)

From one with Asperger's: it's really not that deep. It's a fictional land in a fictional place, it's not meant to dismiss any real world context but rather to separate the two.

So why call it China? I get it's supposed to be fantasy far east land but when it's literally called China, it kinda feels- I don't know, like nice washing, appropriation and a bit lazy tbh.

I'm sure we can do better. I mean how many users on this site are queer and or differently abled and opposed to genocides and torture? Because those first two are prime candidates for those last two options in China. But yeah cool, our fantasy China doesn't do that so it's ok?

But Shengui Guo and Zhong Guo are not the same words, so they are not the same name. I don't understand why you're saying this fictional land is literally called China.

I actually don't like Shengui Guo's name either - and learning that it's really close to China's actual name makes me dislike it even more.

Also, replying to a heartfelt suggestion with "It's not that deep" memes is kinda a dick move. I expected better from people on that site, can we not belittle others' concerns?

Even if you disagree, it's not that hard to do so in a respectful way. Just because it's not a concern to you, doesn't mean it's not to OP.

Google the pronunciation of Zhōngguó and tell me it doesn't sound exactly like Shengui guo. And Zhōngguó is just the approximate spelling of the actual name with a Latin alphabet. It could just as easily be written as Shengui Guo as it is pronounced the same way.

Would it be racist if we had a land named Maphrika where all the NPC's were black and sold animal skins, 'tribal' drums and beautifully patterned fish tail dresses? I mean Maphrika just looks like Africa, it's not the same. Right?

“Guo” is super common, no? I know several people irl with that surname.

Idk where it is, but the Subeta explanation for coming up with “Shengui Guo,” seemed reasonable to me back when it came about. I’ll try to find the quote.

China has many serious problems, but so do the Western cultures Subeta borrows from. “Escapism” world of Subeta is fairly subjective to the individual user playing the game. No support for this suggestion. [edit] I agree with ’s posts on this thread.

I'm Chinese, and I know what Zhong Guo sounds like. Guo means country in Chinese. I don't agree with the name of this land, but I don't think that the name is "the same as China's name." I do think that this naming convention is lazy and uses the Chinese language as a crutch, whereas none of the other lands in Subeta use non-English languages as part of their names.

You know what, nevermind, I’m not touching this game

Is this really necessary? I'd rather see staff focus on fixing the site and introducing new content than worrying about whether a fictional land is racist or something.

I'm Chinese too. 'Guo' is just used in every country's name:

Zhong Guo = "Middle Country" = China Ying Guo = "English Country" = UK Mei Guo = "Beautiful Country" = America Fa Guo = "Lawful Country" = France De Guo = "Moral Country" = Germany

As you can see, the names are all quite respectful to each country. I find Shengui Guo = "Old Turtle Country" to be pretty tasteful as well and I am not offended in any way. It takes less than 2 minutes to type each of these into google translate and hear that they sound completely different. If you try, it's actually possible to find good things about China. Why let a politicized echo chamber illusion of a country irritate you instead?

I agree with you on this kinda but I still think that with China's current history of committing genocide on neighbouring countries, female babies, LGBT folks, and any citizens for being the wrong skin colour and religion; having all the fantasy orient lands rolled into one country named in faux Mandarin to sound remarkably close to Mandarin name for China, is incredibly fucking distasteful.

Replace the Chinese aspect of this fantasy land with a mythos and name of any other well known invading, genocidal, fascist regime and no one would be defending it. What if Veta was an amalgamation of fantasy central and eastern europe and called something that sounded remarkably close to third reich land in faux german?...

Regardless, I still don't see how the two syllable word "shengui" is the same as a one syllable word "zhong."

It's also clear to me that you won't change your mind on this, which is fine, you can hold your own opinions, but I don't think its worth arguing with you over it, so I won't be responding further.

Nice bait OPee.

Lol I was so confused reading your suggestion. It's like if you didn't speak English and you were like "Why are Greenland and Switzerland literally the same name, they both end in the same syllable LAND, is this a conspiracy, are they secretly the same country??" Do you realize how ignorant (and strange) you sound?

Look, the word "guo" just means nation and it's a totally neutral word, basically the same meaning as "land" in that example. But this has already been explained to you on this thread, multiple times, and you ignored it. In particular, wrote a great post about the language and what "Shengui Guo" actually translates to, which you also completely ignored. So I'm thinking, at this point, the ignorance isn't just naive ignorance.

So... okay, maybe you just have no respect for China and that extends to its culture and language. That's a you problem and Subeta has no obligation to scrub all references to China just because you hate China.

[edit] "Shengui" and "zhong" sound COMPLETELY different. They aren't the same number of syllables. They don't even rhyme. It's a stretch to even call them similar, and to be perfectly frank I'm kinda getting the same vibes as "All Asians look the same" from that.

straight up, i'll say that as a white guy in america, my hot takes don't matter on this subject, but i will say thank you to the users who made educational posts wrt how countries are named in mandarin. this is the kind of info i'm interested in, yet wouldn't think to seek out on my own. so i appreciate the free education, lol.

but i did want to say that this is an extremely disingenuous argument. extremely disingenuous. because by those standards, i can say it's incredibly distasteful to base any fantasy culture off of the united states or england, considering those countries' histories of colonization and genocide, persecution of women, LGBT people, and people with the "wrong" skin color and religion. england colonized and destroyed the cultures of millions, if not billions of people, so glorifying english culture is extremely sus, by that argument. the united states of america was built upon genocide and chattel slavery, so it's in extremely poor taste to make a culture that emulates american culture. not to mention the ongoing persecution of minority groups and lowkey (maybe not so lowkey anymore) ethnic cleansing currently ongoing in both the US and the UK as we speak :x

just saying, i really hate to see this argument whipped out when it's concerning china, russia, iran, or other "scary" countries, but gently skirted around when we're talking about two of the most destructive nations in modern history :x

all that aside, "old turtle country" sound pretty charming.

it's true that Shengui Guo is the only one that has a non-english display name, but there are other subetan lands that have their own non-english names (though afaik none of them use real languages as their basis). Darkside's real name is Meneb, the Sacred Lands are actually Saherimos, the Arctic Frost is Ytiva, and Shadowglen's name "comes from a bastardization of the Tehb word 'skedhu' meaning 'looking glass.'"

(this is neither here nor there but it always seemed odd to me that these places get "english translations" for their on-site names while still receiving "real" names that are treated as less legitimate – even though that is how place names typically work within a given language, subeta is a fantasy world so why go through the trouble of making up native names & languages for its lands and then saying "but we're not gonna call it that, and actually, everyone speaks english Subetan, so don't worry about it"? and then why have Shengui Guo be the only one that doesn't follow that pattern?)

I meant that "Guo" is literally a Chinese word, and none of those other "real names" are drawn from other languages, as far as I'm aware.