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 Wednesday, 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 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.