'PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds' News: Tencent to Release Localized, Altered Version in China
"PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds" is heading to a huge potential market in China, after Chinese Tech Giant Tencent won the rights to publish the game in the region. "PUBG" will only officially launch in the country, however, after more than a few alterations.
South Korea-based PUBG Corp., a spinoff of Bluehole that now solely administers "PUBG," has signed a publishing agreement with Tencent to release the "Battle Royale" shooter to the Chinese market. It looks like it will be Tencent, not PUBG group, who will be making the adjustments to "PUBG" ahead of its China launch, according to Reuters.
"[Tencent] will make adjustment to content... and make sure they accord with socialist core values, Chinese traditional culture and moral rules," Tencent said in a statement on Wednesday, Nov. 22.
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In terms of potential unit sales, China is considered the world's biggest video game market today.
The announcement came in the wake of reports that Chinese regulators have deemed "PUBG" not suitable for release in the country due to its violent content and anti-socialist ideas, as reported by Venture Beat.
Chinese content authorities were said to have considered blocking "PUBG's" release because the game "severely deviates from socialist core values". Similar "Battle Royale" style games released by Tencent's biggest rival, China-based NetEase Inc., were already given alterations to get through these content checks.
Among other things, the developer studios for their survival games have added red banners that read, "safeguard national security, safeguard world peace."
Tencent has recently been headlined for their new "PUBG" derivative game called "Glorious Mission," which it is developing for mobile to go against NetEase Inc.'s "Terminator 2" and "Wilderness." These two survival games that are also their "Battle Royale" versions are currently the first and third free mobile games in China in terms of downloads.
