Why Garena Free Fire removed from Play Store, iOS Store? China angle or Krafton could be factors

Garena Free Fire players were stunned over the weekend after their favourite battle royale vanished from the Google Play Store and Apple's App Store in India. While initially, the reason as to why it happened was not clear, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology has announced a ban on 54 more apps as its crackdown on "Chinese" apps widens. Interestingly, Garena, whose parent company is Sea Limited, is not a Chinese company.

Post the removal of the battle royale game from the Google Play Store and Apple's App Store, the speculation was strong that the government has issued a fresh ban on a number of apps that have a Chinese association. But because Garena's parent company, Sea Ltd, is registered and headquartered in Singapore, it was a little doubtful, especially in the absence of formal communication. The owner of Sea Ltd, Forest Li, was born in China and then moved to Singapore.

The first wave of banning apps and firms with association to China began in 2020 when PUBG Mobile, along with over 100 apps, was blocked in India. With the fresh entry of apps into the list, the total number of banned apps stands at 324, but the strangest thing would be the mention of Garena Free Fire, which is not an app by a Chinese firm.

The Google Play Store no longer lists Free Fire, but surprisingly, Free Fire Max is still available for download in India. Apple's App Store, on the other hand, has delisted both Garena Free Fire and Garena Free Fire Max. The list that MeitY has issued does not include the name of Garena Free Fire Max either.

The fresh blow makes things worse for Garena, which is already facing allegations over imitation. Krafton, which owns the intellectual property rights to Playerunknown's Battlegrounds (PUBG) and games related to it, recently filed a lawsuit against Garena recently, alleging that its Free Fire battle royale is a blatant copy of its PUBG games. The lawsuit compares elements of Free Fire like the vehicles, landscapes, names of locations on the map, weapons, and skins with its own that you see inside a range of PUBG-related games, such as PUBG Battlegrounds, PUBG Mobile, Battlegrounds Mobile India, Game for Peace in China, and PUBG New State. It also said that Garena Free Fire has grossed huge revenues and become popular because it resembles PUBG Mobile.

There is no information on whether or not a ruling was reached in the court in response to Krafton's lawsuit, but the delisting of the apps might as well be self-imposed censorship by Google and Apple since the name of these two companies is also in the lawsuit. Krafton accused Google and Apple of promoting Garena Free Fire on their app marketplaces without verifying its originality.