Tencent Holdings Ltd. has picked Singapore as its beachhead for Asia, joining rivals Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. and ByteDance Ltd. in the race to build up their presence closer to home after setbacks in the U.S. and India.
The official PLAYERUNKNOWN'S BATTLEGROUNDS designed exclusively for mobile. Play free anywhere, anytime. PUBG MOBILE delivers the most intense free-to-play multiplayer action on mobile. Drop in, gear up, and compete. Survive epic 100-player classic battles, payload mode and fast-paced 4v4 team death. The official PLAYERUNKNOWN'S BATTLEGROUNDS designed exclusively for mobile. Play free anywhere, anytime. PUBG MOBILE delivers the most intense free-to-play multiplayer action on mobile. Drop in, gear up, and compete. Survive epic 100-player classic battles, payload mode and fast-paced 4v4 team deathmatch and zombie modes. Survival is key and the last one standing wins. Amidst the ongoing 2020 China–India skirmishes, the Indian government banned PUBG Mobile along with more than 100 other Chinese apps, most made by Tencent and Netease, on September 2, 2020, asserting the apps were 'stealing and surreptitiously transmitting user data in an unauthorized manner to servers which have locations outside India'.
Management at China's largest social media and gaming company had been discussing Singapore as a potential regional hub and geopolitical tensions accelerated its plans, according to people familiar with the matter. Tencent has been considering the shift of some business operations — including international game publishing — out of its home country, according to the people, who asked not to be identified discussing private deliberations.
China's tech behemoths are increasingly turning to Southeast Asia in the face of growing hostility from the U.S. and other major markets, setting up the region — with its 650 million increasingly smartphone-savvy population — as a key battleground. President Donald Trump has banned U.S. entities from dealing with Tencent's super-app WeChat from Sept. 20, while the company's hit games PUBG Mobile and Arena of Valor are banned in India.
Amidst the ongoing 2020 China–India skirmishes, the Indian government banned PUBG Mobile along with more than 100 other Chinese apps, most made by Tencent and Netease, on September 2, 2020, asserting the apps were 'stealing and surreptitiously transmitting user data in an unauthorized manner to servers which have locations outside India'.
Tencent said in a statement that it will open a new office in Singapore to 'support our growing business in Southeast Asia and beyond,' in addition to current ones in Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand. It's recruiting for various positions including tech and business development, the company said, without offering details. Tencent currently has dozens of job openings in Singapore for businesses including cross-border commerce, cloud computing and esports, according to its hiring site.
Singapore in particular is attracting attention as a regional base for both Western and Chinese corporations because of its advanced financial and legal system, and as Beijing tightens its grip on the city of Hong Kong. The city-state of under 6 million people has been careful not to take sides in the standoff between the world's two superpowers, with Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong pledging last year to remain 'good friends' with both the U.S. and China.
TikTok's owner ByteDance is planning to spend several billion dollars and add hundreds of jobs in Singapore over the next three years, Bloomberg News reported last week. It has also applied for a digital-bank license from the city-state's central bank, alongside Alibaba-backed Ant Group and Tencent-backed Sea Ltd.
Alibaba has splashed out $4 billion to take full control of Singapore-based regional e-commerce platform Lazada, which aims to serve 300 million people in Southeast Asia by 2030. In May, Alibaba struck a deal to buy half of Singapore's AXA Tower, valued at around $1.2 billion, underscoring its ambition to expand in the market. China's largest corporation is in talks to invest $3 billion into Singapore-based ride-hailing giant Grab Holdings Inc., Bloomberg News reported on Monday.
Tencent thus far has had a smaller footprint in Southeast Asia. The online entertainment juggernaut is largely run from its Shenzhen headquarters, though some global products in areas like music and video streaming operate in Hong Kong, where President Martin Lau is based. The company says it stores some user data in Singapore.
In recent years, Tencent has ratcheted up efforts to expand globally as the Chinese market saturates and stricter regulatory controls on gaming slow down domestic growth. Tapping into popular franchises from investees like Activision Blizzard Inc. and turning them into mobile hits marked its biggest global successes so far. In 2019's final quarter, international titles like Call of Duty Mobile and PUBG Mobile accounted for 23% of Tencent's $17 billion gaming empire, according to the company.
Tencent Pubg Mobile English Language Companion
In spite of Tencent's best efforts, however, geopolitical frictions are still likely to hinder its international expansion push. South Korea's PUBG Corp. has withdrawn the Chinese company's publishing rights for PUBG Mobile in India, after the country banned the popular mobile shooter alongside more than a hundred Chinese-made apps amid border clashes. Trump's Aug. 6 executive order, meanwhile, prohibits unspecified transactions with WeChat and its operator Tencent, and the Commerce Department has yet to determine whether gaming activities will be banned by Sept. 20.
Tencent Pubg Mobile Download
- Tencent has just released an official PC emulator for PUBG Mobile on the Tencent Gaming Buddy platform.
- Controls and graphics are adapted to mouse and keyboard use, but still don't compare to the original PUBG.
- The emulator is still in beta, but cross play between PC and mobile players is already available.
Without a doubt, there is a battle royale craze sweeping across the gaming world. Developers are scrambling to find the next goose that lays the golden eggs, and that's now spilled over into the mobile market.
PUBG Mobile tips and tricks: How to survive and win a battle royale
Tencent Gaming Buddy
In an unusual plot twist, PUBG Mobile, the main contender on Android, is now officially playable on PC. Mobile gaming behemoth Tencent has released an official PC emulator for PUBG Mobile, which is the mobile port… of the PC version of PUBG. The Tencent Gaming Buddy emulator and PUBG Mobile can be downloaded from its website free of charge. It supports not only PUBG Mobile, but also other hit titles like Mobile Legends, Lords Mobile, Arena of Valor, and Auto Chess.
It's still in beta, but the PC emulator for PUBG Mobile offers the exactly the same game that has been available on mobile devices since mid 2018. Controls have been remapped for mouse and keyboard, but they haven't been completely optimized. The HUD is still clearly made for touch screen devices, and still prompts users to tap on parts of the screen for certain commands.
Aiming and moving around is much easier with a mouse and keyboard, but pretty much everything else is more difficult. Vehicles are particularly unwieldy, and sometimes turn wildly without control inputs. The control options in the menu are the same as the mobile version, so inputs need to be manually set through the emulator. Much of this is more of an issue with the game being designed for mobile devices.
Performance is notably better than in standard Android PC emulators, but the controls are only marginally better. There are many options to customize the controls to your liking, and certain controls are context sensitive. This means that if you're looting a victim, the controls will adapt slightly to better suit the task at hand.
Graphics are obviously no where near the original Playerunknown's Battlegrounds for PC, and for now it's capped at 30 fps. That might be fine on a smartphone, but the standards for PC gaming are much higher. Many players are requesting 60fps support in the game's official forum, as well as fixes for texture issues and other bugs.
That said, the emulator for PUBG Mobile runs on much lower spec machines than the minimum required by the original PUBG. Combined with PUBG Mobile Lite, which makes PUBG Mobile playable on nearly any budget mobile device, this means that just about anything more powerful than a kitchen toaster can play PUBG.
Tencent Gaming Buddy: The best way to play PUBG Mobile on PC
Forget PUBG for PC, Fortnite's real competition is PUBG Mobile
Like the PC version, the emulator for PUBG Mobile features bots and a leveling system. However, players seem to be much better and there are fewer disconnects, so don't expect to win as many matches as you have in the mobile version. All of the tips and tricks for PUBG Mobile still apply to the emulated version, so with a little practice you'll still snag that chicken dinner.
Animal crossing character guide new leaf. Now that the emulator for PUBG Mobile allows cross play between PC players and mobile users, the franchise is more than capable of competing with Fortnite Mobile. It's a bit puzzling to see the PUBG franchise pushed forward by a company other than Bluehole, but with Tencent involved, nothing is off limits.
Next: PUBG vs PUBG Mobile: The 10 biggest differences
