Hearthstone was available on Tablets a month after its initial release. It was only a few months later that the game came to mobile phones. The biggest hurdles they had were certification on the platforms(which isn’t surprising since many mobile games have certification issues on IOS) The game was 100% designed to go onto mobile devices.
Hearthstones largest revenue stream is from mobile devices. When they left China they lost two thirds of their revenue stream. Consequently the HS team took multiple hits and the Tournaments scene basically disappeared. There’s a reason MS worked quickly to get back into China. Why Bobby had a hissy fit with China and left is still a big mystery.
Ya, HS was initially released on PC, but tablet and phone releases quickly followed suit.
This all occurred after the incredible success of Mobile games like Candy Crush and Angry Birds, so one has to think that the first HS devs developed HS with the intent of it being a mobile game, especially considering that HS was developed around a F2P model.
I found a very early announcement video if anyone’s interested (from 2013). Search youtube’s “PAX East 2013 - Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft Announcement”.
They don’t mention mobile; they mention it’s F2P because of microtransactions; so it’s mobile-ADJACENT but it’s not like microtransactions don’t exist on the PC.
It was clear that prior to the Netease deal falling through with China, that HS was gearing up to capture as much of the Chinese moblie market as they could.
They thought, and now that the Chinese market has reopened, they probably still think that the Chinese mobile represents the best opportunity for increased profits. But I will say, to realize such an opportunity, they need to improve the mobile play experience: