Tencent has certainly clicked with the home crowd. King of Glory's cocktail of social media and gaming (allowing users, for instance, to add actual friends) won it some 108 million female players, according to Jiguang.
That females outnumber men in a violence-laden game is remarkable, for an industry notorious for its fraught relationship with women.
From the 2015 Gamergate harassment campaign to criticism of gratuitous sexualization in staples like Grand Theft Auto, girl gamers have seldom felt completely comfortable in the testosterone-fueled world.
While women are the majority in casual fare such as Candy Crush Saga, they are distinctly under-represented in hardcore and mid-core titles.
King of Glory is an adaption of the better-known League of Legends in which players, usually in teams of five, hack and slash their way through battle arenas. It is free to download but generates revenue from users who buy upgrades to improve their odds in battle.
Because a single session only lasts about 20 minutes, the game demands less commitment from its players, who can polish off rounds in fragmented time slots. That in turn lowers the entry barriers for female users who've had scant exposure to mid-or hard-core games, said Marie Sun, a Shenzhen-based analyst at Morningstar Investment Service.
A global market report by research group Newzoo said mobile gaming is expected to generate $46.1 billion this year, accounting for 42 percent of all gaming revenue.
By 2020, mobile gaming is predicted to account for 50 percent of the market. And gaming in China is also projected to generate $27.5 billion with most of it coming from the mobile market.
"The rapidly growing mobile gaming sector in China is fueled by a large user base, and this market will continue to grow," said Teng Hua, founder of Gamma Data.
