Armies of Dragons on WeChat? China's Tencent teams up with Hong Kong-based Animoca to tap Asia's 760 million-plus gamers

Tencent Holdings, Asia-Pacific’s largest internet company, aims to bolster its slate of mobile games for distribution outside mainland China through a major new deal with Hong Kong games developer Animoca Brands.

Under an exclusive agreement announced on Wednesday, Tencent will distribute Animoca Brands’ popular Armies of Dragons mobile game across its WeChat social messaging service in Hong Kong, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand.

“The agreement with Animoca Brands feeds into an ongoing push from WeChat to diversify its offering and expand into new vertical industries, including gaming,” an Animoca Brands spokesman said. 

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WeChat, known as Weixin in mainland China, is the country’s most popular messaging service, with a service footprint that extends well beyond its home market’s borders.

It added more than 50 million new accounts in the quarter ended June 30 to reach 600 million monthly active users, according to Tencent.

Armies of Dragons, which Animoca Brands originally released in August last year, is a free medieval-themed “tower defence” strategy game that runs on both Android and Apple’s iOS devices.

Hong Kong-listed Tencent and Animoca Brands, which trades in the Australian Securities Exchange, agreed to distribute the game on the WeChat platform for a period of one year, with a revenue-share arrangement from in‐game purchase options.