Pokémon Unite launches in mainland China
Niko Partners
The Leader in Asian and MENA Games Market Intelligence. Local experts with a global perspective.
Tencent Games published Pokémon Unite in mainland China on November 7, 2024, with the title debuting at #1 on the iOS game download chart and entering the top 20 on the iOS game revenue chart on its first day. Pokémon Unite is a free-to-play strategy MOBA game developed by Tencent's TiMi Studio Group in collaboration with The Pokémon Company. The game initially obtained an import game license for mobile and Switch on December 28, 2022, with a number of closed tests run over the past year. The MOBA game goes up against heavyweights Honor of Kings and League of Legends: Wild Rift, both of which are from Tencent and top grossing titles. The game also launches at a time when Pokémon Quest is being shut down by NetEase. The free-to-play action-adventure game originally launched on May 13, 2022, in China and performed well at launch. The title grossed approximately $20 million over its lifetime which is why it is being shutdown at this point. We expect Pokémon Unite to generate higher revenues, but we do not expect it to match Wild Rift revenue.?
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MPL Indonesia Season 14 sets new viewership records?
The overall streaming data released by Esports Charts showed that Mobile Legends MPL Indonesia Season 14 has drawn in 3.9 million peak viewers, 511,000 average viewers with total hours watched over 117 million. These numbers are higher than the previous season, with a 79% increase in peak viewers. Alexey Borisov, the Lead Esports Editor at Esports Charts stated that this record was set due to two things. First, the final match involving popular esports organizations RRQ Hoshi and Team Liquid was able to attract a large audience.
?Another aspect that Borisov highlighted is the increase viewership on TikTok. With over 1.2 million peak viewers, it has become a new global record with a 6.5% increase compared to the previous record. TikTok also set more importance of the role of streamers who livestream their reaction to the match real-time. Although they only contributed 24% of the total hours watched, the audience is interested in watching the match from the creators' point of view.
?Niko Analyst Edward Tien will attend the Mobile Legends M6 World Championship in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia in December – reach out to us if you want to connect with him. ?
British International School Riyadh partners with Nesma Esports to advance esports education in support of Saudi Vision 2030?
The British International School Riyadh is partnering with Nesma Esports, an esports company that offers a range of services such as arranging tournaments and events, overseeing esports teams and players to offer educational programs in areas like coaching, board games, game design, data analysis, esports ecosystem insights, and competition management. This initiative supports Saudi Arabia's Vision 2030 and the National Gaming and Esports Strategy. Niko Partners believes that Saudi Arabia should cultivate math, computer science and game industry educational components to build a ready workforce to support the National Gaming and Esports Strategy, and that this partnership with Nesma Esports is part of that.?
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