Newzoo has released a new report on the top 100 grossing Android games in May for the Chinese region and game publisher Tencent accounted for an amazing 44.5 percent of the Chinese mobile revenues.
Publishing 23 of the top 100 titles, Tencent’s MOBA (multiplayer online battle arena) King of Glory continues to be the company’s top performing title in terms of revenue, second only to Mojang’s Minecraft. The most installed title from Tencent was Happy Lord, a popular card game that is playable across both low and high end devices.
Tencent recently acquired Clash Royale developer Supercell and the investment is paying off. In May, Clash Royale landed the No. 3 spot in top downloaded games on 360 mobile assistant and No. 6 on the Baidu Mobile Assistant store. Action game Huo Ying Ren Zhe climbed into top 10 grossing games after being released only two months ago. In May, Tencent published 10 of the 20 top grossing titles.
Kent Wakeford, the chief operating officer of Kabam who brought Marvel Contest of Champions to China, attributes Tencent’s success to its social element. “In-app chat is extremely popular in China,” Wakeford told [a]listdaily in a recent interview. “Tencent is often in the top 20, and a large part of that is because they have the power of WeChat, which is the largest social platform in China. It’s the power of that channel that can drive consumers into games and drive installs. We’ve been doing a lot of work with WeChat. We’ve spent marketing dollars there, and have seen the impact and benefits of marketing through those social channels.”
Sandbox titles like Minecraft are giving Tencent a run for its money, and with Terraria coming to Chinese markets in the near future, the two games may be competing for the top of the charts. With Southeast Asia representing 45 percent of the $99.6 billion dollar video game industry, brands are turning to the region to reach this lucrative market.
