PUBG going mobile with Tencent's help
The wildly popular game is not only coming to China, but it's about to get the mobile treatment
Last week, it was revealed that Chinese tech giant Tencent had formed a partnership with Bluehole to bring the massively popular shooter PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds to China. Now, however, we've learned through a translation of the company's official announcement that Tencent intends to also help Bluehole leverage the booming mobile games market with a mobile version of PUBG.
The survival shooter has already surpassed 21 million copies sold and it makes perfect sense for Tencent to work with Bluehole on making a mobile edition for the largest mobile games market in the world. According to IHSMarkit, the Chinese mobile games market now stands at $25.6 billion, accounting for 25% of the entire worldwide mobile market. The firm predicts that China's mobile market will eclipse $29 billion this year.
Not only does Tencent want to further boost its mobile fortunes - mobile games like Honour of Kings played a big role in helping the company's revenues climb 61% last quarter - but it's worth noting that Tencent owns a five percent stake in Bluehole, so it has a direct interest in helping the PUBG publisher succeed. It's also been rumored recently that Tencent has been eyeing a complete buyout of Bluehole.
The translation of the announcement says that work is going smoothly and more details on the mobile PUBG edition will be coming soon. It's worth noting that both the PC and mobile versions will have to be tweaked to fit with China's culture and socialist values. It's not clear, however, if Tencent will look to bring the mobile game to the West as well.