China's Biggest Online Games Developer Announces Plan for Esports Theme Park

Videogame IPs such as League of Legends, Gears of War and Need for Speed could soon be coming to a theme park, after Tencent – China’s largest online games developer – announced plans to develop an 'eSports town.'

Located in Wuhu, east China, Tencent has reached an agreement with the local government to create the town, which will feature the aforementioned theme park as well as an eSports university, cultural and creative park, animation industrial park, a technology entrepreneurship community and a cloud data centre.

Tencent, which has investments in a number of videogame franchises, is a majority shareholder in League of Legends developer Riot Games. The company also holds a minority stake in Epic Games, which developed franchises including Unreal, Gears of War and Infinity Blade. Other Tencent games include the likes of NBA 2K, Monster Hunter and Need for Speed, opening up the possibility of these IPs being used in the eSports theme park.

In March, Tencent also announced plans to develop a theme park in Chengdu based on fantasy role-playing game Honor of Kings. Tencent said the park would become the home of Honor of Kings, which has gained more than 50 million daily active users since its launch in 2016 – making it more popular than 2016’s phenomenon Pokémon Go.

ESport has become big business in China and wider Asia over the last decade, with the popularity of competitions often meaning thousands of spectators come to follow the action.

Sports architects Populous recently revealed they are developing physical, purpose-built arenas in which the digital battles of the future can be hosted, saying the arrival of eSports arenas “is not a matter of if, but a matter of when.”