Tim Cook materializes at mobile games tournament in China

Tim Cook is in China again, where he will be allegedly attending an international political and economic forum hosted by the Chinese government.

If he’s indeed off to the 10th Belt and Road initiative meeting (alongside global executives and heads of state), the Apple CEO made a detour that no other CEO made that day: a trip to a local mobile games tournament (via 9to5Mac).

According to a Bloomberg report, Tim Cook showed up at a gaming tournament in China, and no wonder – mobile games are one of the biggest earners on the app store. He thanked gamers who were competing for the top prize in Honor of Kings, an extremely popular game in China with well over 100M daily active users. It’s so popular that some even name their babies after the game characters.

Honor of Kings and its variant Arena of Valor has been cited as the highest-grossing mobile game of all time. In it, the player controls a character with a particular set of abilities that help him kill non-player characters and opponents. That’s how one gains much-needed experience points (XP) and gold. With experience points, players can upgrade and evolve their characters’ abilities and become more efficient. Gold can be used to purchase items at the shop to change specific attributes of the character depending on the item bought.

The CEO waved and made brief remarks to shoppers and staff during a surprise visit to Apple’s Taikoo Li store in Chengdu.