CDC Games, a business unit of CDC Corporation and a pioneer of the “free-to-play, pay for merchandise” model for online games in China, announced today it has received final government approvals for The Lord of the Rings: Shadows of Angmar (LOTRO) that enables Open Beta Testing (OBT) to begin later this week with commercial launch to follow one week thereafter.

The China government needs to approve all games before it can proceed into open beta and commercial launch. With a successful Closed Beta Test (CBT) now completed and these government approvals secured, CDC Games is now ready for the final testing stage before commercial launch. During its final phase of CBT, CDC Games reported a registration number of 2.2 million users accompanied by a high activation rate during the last week of testing. Playing time steadily increased throughout the CBT resulting in average play of four hours per session. During the last week of CBT, LOTRO continued to rank in the Top 10 including number 1 and number 2 rankings for the highly anticipated games and downloads categories in popular games sites and portals.

“We are delighted to announce government approvals of LOTRO by key Chinese government authorities,” said Jingqing Sun, chief operating officer of CDC Games. “With those critical approvals, our open beta test for LOTRO can now begin this week with commercial launch following shortly. Based on our CBT test results, particularly average playing time, we believe this game has potential for huge and sustainable success for the Chinese market. Our network performed steadily during the CBT and we received valuable feedback from gamers to further improve the game’s performance. Overall, we are very confident of a profitable market outlook for LOTRO in the Chinese market in the OBT and commercial launch.”

“We are very pleased that CDC Games has received the required government approvals and are now readying LOTRO for commercial launch,” said Jim Crowley, president and CEO of Turbine, Inc. “CDC Games and Turbine have worked together closely to assure the game will be appealing to the preferences of Chinese gamers and that it operates with the highest level of technical proficiency. With this thorough preparation now complete, we remain confident for the successful long-term prospects of LOTRO in one of the world’s largest game markets.”

CDC Games holds the exclusive distribution rights in China for The Lord of the Rings Online.