They hunt, they shoot, they torture, they kill. Their target: corrupt officials.

Welcome to Incorruptible Fighter, the latest online computer game craze to sweep through cyberspace in China.

The game was created last month by a group of civil servants as a lighthearted counterpoint to constant accusations of endemic corruption.

Designed to host 500 players at any one time, it attracted more than 100,000 trigger-happy gamers, apparently keen to take revenge on imaginary Communist Party officials – and their bikini-clad mistresses – who have enriched themselves at the taxpayer’s expense.

The game builds on the model of computer games such as Halo and Grand Theft Auto. Players who punish a sufficient number of corrupt officials progress through successive layers of vice to gain entry to a graft-free paradise. To reach that Shangri-La of upright behaviour, players can use weapons, magic and torture to capture or kill greedy officials and their sons and daughters.

The various scenarios are based on well-known incidents from Chinese history. Killing the notorious eunuch official Wei Zhongxian (1568-1627), of the Ming dynasty, earns 100 points. Players are required to bring in Li Linpu, the Tang dynasty prime minister and source of the proverb “honey in the mouth and a knife in the belly”. To advance to a new level, the player needs to enter an “AntiCorruption College” to be lectured in detail about ancient cases.

Hua Tong, who designed the game with fellow civil servants in government offices in the port city of Ningbo, said: “Through the game they will be more positive and braver about fighting corruption in the real world.”

For the ruling Communist Party corruption is a very real threat. It has vowed to root out officials on the take before its 17th congress in the autumn, when a new generation of leaders is expected to receive promotion and Hu Jintao, the party chief, will try to consolidate his power and anoint potential successors.

The party has repeatedly issued warnings that graft is a problem so severe that it could even jeopardise its grip on power. But that has failed to deter many officials from lining their pockets. Last month Zheng Xiaoyu, the former head of the food and drug safety watchdog, was executed after being found guilty of taking nearly a quarter of a million pounds in bribes to approve drugs that killed dozens of people.

Chen Liangwu, the former Shanghai party boss who was dismissed last September, was formally expelled from the party last week and handed over to the judicial authorities. He will be the most senior official to be put on trial for corruption since 1995.

However, not all players are pleased with the online witchhunt. Many have complained that there is no reason to target the children of corrupt officials. Others have said that the game is too simple and crude and uses technology from the late 1990s.

Experts have questioned whether the game targets the right audience. Wang Xiongjun, a professor at Peking University, said: “Government officials should be the ones getting anticorruption education, not local youngsters.”

Playing with numbers

17.8 million online gamers in China, each paying a fee to the their chosen game's operators

20% of them are thought to be under 20 years old and a further 10% under the age of 16

35 per cent amount the market is expected to grow this year

$1.3bn expected value by 2008

$817.5m amount staying in China as domestic producers edge out European, U.S. and South Korean firms

1.5 million number of Chinese gamers immersed in most popular game of the moment at peak times

Sources: CCID Consulting Beijing; www.gamesindustry.biz; IDC market analysts

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