Iraq is the latest country to ban PUBG and Fortnite

People in Iraq have been banned from playing PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds and Fortnite.

According to Thomson Reuters (thanks, GI.biz), the Iraq parliament voted to ban the two battle royales “due to the negative effects caused by some electronic games on the health, culture, and security of Iraqi society, including societal and moral threats to children and youth”.

“What will you gain if you killed one or two people in PUBG?” said Iraqi Shi’ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. “It is not a game for intelligence or a military game that provides you with the correct way to fight.”

PUBG was also recently banned in Nepal, although it stopped short of doing the same to Epic’s Fortnite. The Nepal Metropolitan Crime Division went to the Kathmandu District Court to file a Public Interest Litigation after parents and school leaders complained about “the effect” the game was having on children, citing the battle royale game was making people “aggressive in real life”.

“We received a number of complaints from parents, schools and school associations regarding the effect of the game on children,” Metropolitan Crime Division chief Dhiraj Pratap Singh told the Kathmandu Post. “Parents and schools had complained that the game was affecting their children’s studies and making them more aggressive,” Singh added. “When we consulted with psychiatrists, they also said that the violence in the game can make people aggressive in real life.”

In other PlayerUnknown’s Battleground news, its creator, Brendan Greene, recently stepped down from the battle royale’s development team. In a tweet posted to his personal Twitter account last month, Greene – who’s Twitter profile now lists him as “director, Special Projects @ PUBG” – said he was moving away from active development on the hugely successful battle royale game and relocating to Amsterdam for his new venture. From what he says, his next project is unlikely to be another battle royale.

“The past five years of my life has been all about battle royale. From the early days working on a mod to getting the chance to create my vision for a battle royale title, PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds,” Greene said. “It’s been an incredible journey and our game has reached heights I never thought possible. Seeing the game grow into what it is today has been a dream come true and I can’t thank our fans and the incredible team at PUBG Corporation enough.”