PUBG Mobile, PUBG Mobile lite stop working in India

In what comes as sad news for gamers in India, PUBG Mobile and PUBG Mobile Lite will no longer work in India starting from Friday, the company has announced.

The game was banned by the central government in September and it was not available on app stores for installation. However, users who had already installed the game were able to play it.

Tencent Games, that owns the game, said on Facebook that it "deeply regrets this outcome" and thanked PUBG Mobile and PUBG Mobile Lite fans for their support in India. The rights to publish PUBG Mobile in India will be returned to the owner of the PUBG intellectual property.

"Protecting user data has always been a top priority and we have always complied with applicable data protection laws and regulations in India. All users' gameplay information is processed in a transparent manner as disclosed in our privacy policy," the company said.

On September 2, PUBG Mobile and PUBG Mobile Lite were banned by the Centre under Section 69A of the Information Technology Act.

Recently, PUBG Corporation announced that they are withdrawing their partnership with Tencent and that they will work with the Indian government to look for a quick resolution.

The game has over 600 million downloads and 50 million active players globally, with nearly 33 million users in India.

PUBG Mobile saw a global revenue gain of $1.3 billion (roughly Rs 9,731 crore) in the first half of this year, bringing its lifetime collection to $3 billion (nearly Rs 22,457 crore) with the highest number of downloads in India which ranks at the top with 175 million installs as people stayed home owing to the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdowns.

Additionally, the Indian gaming company nCore announced indigenous multiplayer action game FAU-G to fill the void of PUBG Mobile. FAU-G is slated to launch next month.