Battlegrounds Mobile India launched without much fanfare

(Image credit: Krafton)

After long contemplation and theories over when Battlegrounds Mobile India might launch, the developer Krafton has finally officially launched the game in India. The game is now available for download on Android devices with no mention of when it might come to iOS devices yet.

The game was launched without any fanfare by Krafton on brings to an end a long attempt to predict and understand when the launch date could be. There were wild theories, leaks and even some assumptions leading up to this point.

There were multiple theories on when the game might launch and some of them were, frankly, fascinating. People even attempted to analyze images and posts on Krafton's social media channels.

The game went for pre-registration on May 18, and the developers gave it more than a month before it will be launched. This practice of a month's gap between the launch and pre-registration is pretty common with big publishing houses.

But the time from the pre-registration of the game to the launch has not been uneventful and Krafton has seems many issues regarding security. When the game was launched in early access it was reported that it was communicating with Chinese servers, the reason PUBG Mobile was banned.

With the reveal of the China data sharing issue, Chairperson of the Parliamentary Committee on India’s Data Protection Bill and BJP Member of Parliament, Meenakshi Lekhi has asked MEITY "to look into it" in her tweet. While MEITY had previously clarified that it can't ban a game before launch this new development along with pressure from other politicians might push it over the edge.

This was followed up by an update to the game, which seems to fix the issue of data sharing with China. And Krafton even issued a statement regarding the data-sharing issue assuring that it is "implementing the industry’s toughest standards for data security".

Krafton made some heavy investments in big players in the Indian gaming ecosystem as well in the meantime, which we can only assume is to get a stronger foothold in the market before officially launching BGMI. And now that Krafton has officially launched the game we expect that it has covered all bases so as to prevent a repeat of the past.