Asian Tech Press (Nov 30) -- U.S. game developer Blizzard Entertainment has been in talks with a number of Chinese game companies, including NetEase and Tencent, about returning to China, according to Chinese media outlet The Paper.

However, there is no confirmed partner or specific time frame for the return.

The Paper reported that MoreFun Studios, one of the four studios of Tencent's Interactive Entertainment Group, seemingly performed a World of Warcraft-related live broadcast on social platform Bilibili on Thursday.

In response, Tencent Games said it was "just a live test, which has already ended."

Another source close to Tencent told The Paper that the MoreFun Studios is Tencent's workshop to work on self-developed games, will not act as an agent of external products, so the rumors are not accurate.

However, Tencent did not directly respond to whether it will act as an agent of Blizzard's operations in China.

Last November, Blizzard announced that the existing license agreement with NetEase would expire on January 23, 2023.

After ending its nearly fourteen-year partnership with NetEase, Blizzard officially suspended most of its Blizzard game services in mainland China, including World of Warcraft, Hearthstone, Overwatch, StarCraft, and others.

In November of this year, Mike Ybarra, president of Blizzard Entertainment, said in an interview at BlizzCon 2023 that he hoped to return to the Chinese market.

"We're a worldwide company. I want us in every single country around the globe and China included. So as we go forward, we'll evaluate that and see what happens," said Ybarra.

In fact, in addition to the latest news, earlier market rumors suggested that Blizzard was seeking new agency partnerships with Tencent, TikTok owner ByteDance, Genshin Impact developer miHoYo and others.

There seems to be more uncertainties on Blizzard's return to China after Microsoft bought the company.