China to End Game Console Ban
The console ban in China may finally end.
China will end its 13-year long ban on consoles, according to the South China Morning Post, now backed up by China Daily.
The Chinese government banned the production and sale of video games back in 2000, because it was concerned about their potential mental effects on children. Of course, this ban didn't prove effective, as individuals still had access to consoles via the black market. In recent years, with the rise in popularity in iOS products, Chinese gamers have had access to app store games.
Under the new policy, console manufacturers may produce their consoles only in Shanghai's free trade zone. Of course, all products will need to seek approval from the Chinese government.
Could this move perhaps inject some life into the thus so far anemic Chinese gaming scene?

After the Snowden leaks about cooperation between M$ and the NSA I seriously doubt Sony and Nintendo are at a relative disadvantage. Consoles developed locally by Chinese companies may have an advantage but I don't know of any that exist.
The market size is definitely appealing, but the Chinese government will not simply let the foreign makers snatch up the entire market. They will likely demand technology transfer to state-owned enterprises, and in two or three generations we may see Chinese "competitors" in the console space. For proof, one only needs to look at TV industry (sapped technology off of Panasonic, Sharp, Sony, Samsung) and white goods industry (Samsung, Panasonic, LG).
also eddieroolz has a point..
Shouldn't the Chinese government be more concerned about THEIR OWN potential mental affects on children? I'm sure it's much worse than video games.
Clones of home console hardware themselves have not really been viable since the NES/Genesis. Both used off the shelf parts that could easily be recreated. Anything PS1 and up I have never seen a clone of because of the console specific hardware that is inside of it. Sure you may get something that looks like a PS1 in China... but when you flip open the CD tray there is a cartridge slot of Famicom (NES) games. Controllers could be cloned (although those are getting complicated as well). Sure the PS4 and X1 both use AMD based x86 stuff but there is a lot of custom hardware under the hood as well which would not be really profitable to clone. Not to mention that console makers always sell at a loss (except Nintendo), and get the money back from licensing games. I would not be suprised if each PS4/X1 costs something like $700-$850 in parts to make. The only real concern in my opinion is software piracy.
Microsoft Kinect comes to mind