Microsoft’s Xbox Series X/S is coming to China. The console was approved last December by Chinese regulators, according to Niko Partners analyst Daniel Ahmad, and will soon receive an official release date. Details on that release date are set to come later this week.
That’s not the only big announcement Microsoft has for China today. Xbox Game Studios also just announced a strategic partnership with Timi Studios, a developer owned by Chinese media conglomerate Tencent. Timi makes Honor of Kings and Call of Duty Mobile and is currently working on Pokemon Unite as well as a new AAA shooter running on Unreal Engine 5.
The strategic partnership likely means that Xbox Game Studios will have at least some of its games altered to be more palatable for Chinese regulators. China has an extremely tightly controlled video game market and every game sold must be approved by the Chinese government. No further details of the partnership were released, so we can’t say for certain.
Xbox rival PlayStation will release the PS5 on May 15. Ahmad noted in the announcement that pre-orders sold out in 10 minutes and the remaining consoles are being sold using a lottery system. That’s all due to an ongoing supply shortage that might last until 2022 at least.
China is an enormous market for any video game publisher, as recently proven once again by the release of Call of Duty Mobile, which brought in as many new players as the rest of the world combined. But because of tight industry controls, publishers looking to release in China have to partner with a Chinese company, ensuring that at least some of those profits remain in China.
In other Xbox news, head of gaming Ben Decker recently revealed that Xbox has a brand new IP coming that “we haven’t even talked about yet that’s gonna blow your mind.” So keep an eye out for that.
