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Tencent, the world’s largest video game company and partial owners of PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds Corporation, have set the inaugural season of the PUBG Mobile Global Championship (PMGC) for late November with a record-breaking US $2 million prize pool.
“Proud to announce the PUBGMOBILE Global Championship season ZERO! Where all the Top Professional invited teams across all regions will participate, including China to crown the Global Champion this year 2020! The event will host a prize pool of 2 million USD,” read the announcement on Tencent’s Twitter account.
The PMGC is the result of Tencent’s decision to merge the PUBG Mobile World Leagues (PMWL) and PUBG Mobile World Championship (PMWC), which were postponed and reshaped due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The new event features the largest prize pool in PUBG Mobile history. The $2 million kitty is almost five times the previous best of $476,000 at the PUBG Mobile Club Open Fall Split Global Finals and ranks among the top 35 esports prize funds of all time.
The move from Tencent mimics a similar play made by the Electronic Sports League (ESL) in March, when it was announced that the ESL One Rio Major for Counter-Strike: Global Offensive would merge with the 2020 Fall Major to form a single CS:GO Major with an increased prize pool.
The PMGC will feature 20 leading teams from all regions of the world, including China, South Asia, Southeast Asia, Middle East, Americas and Europe.
Teams will have the chance to qualify for the event via the ongoing PUBGM Club Opens (PMCO) and PUBGM Pro Leagues (PMPL).
Not many details about the tournament have been revealed as yet, but it is expected the inaugural season of the PMGC will use a similar format to the PMWL. There are also plans for the tournament to be held across multiple venues with live audiences if the COVID-19 situation becomes more manageable by November.
Alongside the announcement of the PMGC, Tencent also unveiled the upgraded 1.0 version of PUBGM, which is scheduled to go live on Tuesday, September 8 and will feature new technology to go along with the improved gameplay features.
Updates include improvements to characters and their movement, the game’s main lobby environments, weapons, maps, and the gameplay itself with the addition of detailed particles, smoke, air blasts, and other lightning and shading effects for a more realistic feel.
