Dying Light developer Techland raised the Tencent flag today, announcing that the Chinese gaming conglomerate Tencent will soon become the company’s biggest shareholder.
“Today I am happy to announce the partnership with Tencent who are in the process of becoming Techland’s majority shareholder,” Techland CEO Pawel Marchewka said. “Teaming up with Tencent will allow us to move full speed ahead with the execution of the vision for our games. We have chosen an ally who has already partnered with some of the world’s finest videogame companies and helped them reach new heights while respecting their ways of doing things.”
Marchewka described Tencent as “like-minded friends and strong partners, who share the same vision, passion, and have the willingness to back it up with their knowledge, experience, and capabilities.” The goal of the deal, he said, is to help ensure that the open-world ARPG Techland has in development “will live up to the expectations for our first new IP in almost a decade.”
“We will retain full ownership of our IPs, maintain creative freedom, and continue to operate the way we believe is right,” Marchewka said. He’ll also be staying on as Techland’s CEO.
We’ve said it before but it’s worth repeating for emphasis: Tencent is a huge player in the global gaming industry, with investments in (or outright ownership of) Riot Games, Epic, Grinding Gear, Supercell, Yager, Ubisoft, Activision Blizzard, Fatshark, Turtle Rock, Remedy, Klei, and others. But publicly, at least, it seems to have taken a largely hands-off approach with all of them, and assuming that pattern continues it means that fans of Techland and its work shouldn’t have to worry too much about any abrupt, unexpected changes in direction.
Tencent is one of China’s biggest tech companies but it suffered a real downturn in fortunes through 2022, wrought by a combination of the country’s crackdown on the tech industry, strict Covid-19 restrictions, and an overall economic slowdown. Its share price has bounced back considerably since then, though—not to where it was during the heady days of early 2021, but close to double what it was in late 2022—and a new investment in a Western studio could be seen as a signal that Tencent is at least starting to return to form and action.
Techland declined to comment further on the specifics of the deal.