So far, over 350 games have been approved, now including one from NetEase and two from Tencent.
Chinese regulators are slowly working their way through the backlog of game approval applications that piled up during the approval freeze that spanned most of 2018. For the first time in the month since the process started up again, the Chinese game giants Tencent and NetEase have had a handful of titles approved for release and monetization.
Those approvals are good news for Tencent and those banking on the company to see their own titles eventually released in China but, as noted by Nikkei, neither of Tencent’s approved games are notably heavy hitters.
Or more specifically, neither game is PUBG Mobile, a mobile title that launched mid-way through 2018 and has yet to be approved for monetization in China thanks to last year’s freeze. Tencent’s two approvals include a game about making Chinese fans and a game about traditional wood carving, while NetEase’s first approval is a Chinese-history-inspired RPG called War Spring and Autumn.
At this point, a little over 350 games have been seen approval from Chinese regulators since the process reopened earlier this month after a nine-month-long halt. The State Administration of Press and Publications, the government branch now tasked with overseeing that process, says it tends to work through games in the order the original applications were filed during last year’s freeze.
The South China Morning Press also reports that analysts expect to see the process speed up considerably after the Lunar New Year, which takes place on February 5, and the National People’s Congress in March.
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