K-Pop's BTS now in your pocket with mobile game

Netmarble

24/06/2019 21:47

By Rollo Ross
    LOS ANGELES, June 24 (Reuters) - K-Pop stars BTS have
conquered the charts with their music and the box office with
documentary "Burn the Stage: The Movie," and now they're aiming
for mobile phones with the game BTS World.
    The seven-member boy band, which has led a wave of Korean
pop music in the United States and beyond, spent two years
recording exclusive photos, videos and music for the game.
    BTS World, out on Tuesday, allows players to go back in
time, take the role of the band’s manager and make choices that 
lead BTS to global stardom.
    Fans can also find out what would have happened if the band
members failed to find success and went back to their other
dreams, like being a strawberry farmer or Taekwondo champion.
The game comes with 10,000 new images and 100 video clips of
BTS.
    “Those alternate realities are based on some of the members’
interviews, and they said, ‘If I wasn’t in BTS band, my vision
was this’,” Simon Sim, president of South Korean mobile gaming
company Netmarble Corp  251270.KS  which developed the game,
told Reuters Television.
    The game allows fans to be involved in video calls and texts
with BTS members, including cheering them up if they are feeling
down.
    BTS first formed in Seoul in 2013 and broke through in the
U.S. pop market in 2017, becoming the first Korean group to win
a Billboard music award.
    Three new songs from the game - "All Night", "Dream Glow"
and "A Brand New Day" - were released earlier in June.
    

 (Reporting by Reuters Television; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)
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