Mon, Feb 08, 2021 – 11:48 AM
SINGTEL has partnered Riot Games Southeast Asia to offer its post-paid mobile customers zero-rated gaming bundles exclusive to the latter’s new 5v5 mobile multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA), League of Legends: Wild Rift (Wild Rift).
In a joint press statement on Monday, Singtel and Riot Games said the new zero-rated gaming bundles are the world’s first.
Singtel 5G customers including those with XO Plus plans will receive a complimentary three-month subscription to either of the new RiotGO or RiotGO+ bundles – whereas all other Singtel post-paid mobile customers are entitled to a complimentary one-month subscription to a bundle of their choice.
RiotGO comes at the usual price of S$7.90 per month, and offers S$25 worth of in-game content for Wild Rift including champions available on a rotating monthly basis, as well as cosmetic features such as icons and emotes.
For the usual price of S$12.90 per month, the RiotGO+ subscription comes with S$40 worth of in-game content and an additional one gigabyte (GB) per month of mobile data.
As part of its launch for the zero-rated bundles, the telco is offering RiotGO and RiotGO+ at the respective promotional prices of S$6.90 and S$9.90 a month for those who subscribe from now until March 31, 2021.
Wild Rift launched regionally on Google Play and App Store in October 2020. The MOBA has topped App Store and Google Play game charts in Singapore along with every other market that it was released in within the first week of its beta launch, said Singtel and Riot Games in their joint statement.
“Mobile gaming has surged in popularity in the past year as more people turned to them for fun and entertainment during the pandemic. Seventy-six per cent of our customers play games on their mobile phones and we’re excited to elevate their gaming experience with Singtel 5G and our strategic partnership with Riot Games,” commented Gan Siok Hoon, Singtel’s managing director of mobile marketing and sales.
Speaking at a virtual press conference hosted by Singtel and Riot Games on Monday morning, Ms Gan reckons some two million Singtel customers will be able to “get a taste of RiotGO experience”.
This is further enhanced for those on the telco’s high-speed 5G network, which she estimates to cut gaming latency by half to 20 milliseconds (ms) from the regular 40 ms for mobile gamers on the 4G network.
According to Ms Gan, customers who play mobile games for two to three hours daily are likely to consume about 150-300 megabytes per day. They are hence able to save up on to 10 GB of mobile data based on the unlimited data-free gameplay offered by a RiotGO subscription plan, she said.
“The next frontier we are exploring is cloud gaming, to bring the whole gaming experience even nearer to customers’ devices and significantly cut short lag time,” said Ms Gan. She added that Singtel recently completed a trial with a global cloud gaming provider and hopes to announce details very soon.
“This exciting offering attests to our commitment to constantly deliver exciting, innovative, and rewarding experiences to our players. Not forgetting with Singtel 5G, players can look forward to an off-the-charts mobile gaming experience when they play Wild Rift, be it at home or on-the-go,” said Justin Hulog, Riot Games general manager for South-east Asia, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau.
During the media conference, Mr Hulog also said the next roll-out of RiotGO gaming bundles could possibly take place on the network of “another Singtel associate”.
READ MORE: Singtel launches 5G standalone trial network for enterprises
