For two years, we have been working with Tencent to bring Path of Exile to China. After many months of Beta testing, we are proud to announce that it has entered Open Beta today. Their release includes all of the 3.0.0 content and some specific changes for the Chinese region. I attended a launch event in Shanghai over the weekend and have brought back some photos and video for you!

Tencent's plan for the event was to invite hardcore players, journalists and special guests to a heavily-themed venue to celebrate the launch of the game.



The venue for the event was this church. It was quite surprising to encounter such a large church right in the middle of Shanghai.



This was the inside of the venue before the chairs were set up. There were large screens on the floor as well as the back wall. The rest of the venue had Path of Exile/New Zealand-themed trimmings, like chalices of Kiwifruit juice, the stained glass windows from Act 5, etc.



This is the venue once full of players, journalists and guests, waiting for the event to begin. The event was recorded, so we'll make a video available as soon as it has been published. It's likely to be a few hours long and mostly in Chinese, though!



After the event, we took some photos. This one is of special guests and the journalists who were present. In the front row we have Sir Richard Taylor (founder and CEO of Weta Workshop), me, David Brevik (founder of Blizzard North, creator of Diablo) and Livy Liu (Tencent's project manager for Path of Exile).

After photos, I signed hundreds of posters, shirts and even some custom-made Ventor's Gamble rings and a tiny Mjolner!

Tencent also put together a video for their launch event, which provides an overview of the story for Chinese players. We look forward to remixes :)



All of the attendees had a great time at the event, and the players and journalists left with great excitement for the launch. We haven't really spoken about it much in our Western news, but the Chinese launch is going to be a big thing for Path of Exile worldwide. In combination with the 3.0.0 launch a couple of weeks ago and the Xbox One launch on Thursday (US time), it's certainly a big month for Path of Exile launches.

(By the way, tomorrow's news post includes information about some more upcoming changes to the Harbinger league. Thanks for your ongoing feedback, I kept a close eye on it and spoke to the NZ team often about it while in China.)