Popular online game "World of Warcraft" is to be relaunched by the end of this month after a two-month suspension because of a transfer of operator.

The game will initially be limited to players who already have game accounts, an official of the General Administration of Press and Publication, the industry regulator, told the Xinhua news agency yesterday.

"World of Warcraft," developed by Blizzard Entertainment, is a multi-player online role-playing game that has about 14 million subscribers in China.

In April, United States-based Blizzard licensed NetEase.com Inc as its Chinese mainland partner for the game for three years.

Its license agreement with The9 Ltd expired on June 7.

(Shanghai Daily July 23, 2009)