Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

The effectiveness, timeliness and standardization of the release of version numbers are worthy of re-examination.

Since the release of the version number in December last year, the author has obviously felt that the mentality of the practitioners around me has become cheerful. The previously pessimistic and repressed industry atmosphere has also been relaxed. A piece of news of layoffs that may have caused a sigh in the past has also become an after-dinner joke in the industry.

An internal employee of Guangzhou Shiyue Network, which developed games such as "Song of Cloud Upper City" and "flashing Light", reported that the company's "Juvenile Zongmen" project team was notified to be disbanded on December 23 and its members were collectively laid off. However, only a day later, the project got a long-awaited version number.

This may be the only case where the program is full of results like Juvenile Zongmen, but it is not the only game in which the version number has been launched. NetEase, byte and Gaia all have products that have encountered such hell jokes.

Can not beat the opponent, can not survive the version number in 2020, "Voyage King: hot Blood Route" as the first byte of the first serious popular style, helped its game business fired the first shot. And the game depends on the Sea Thief King IP obviously played a big role in the user level. From the result, the adaptation of Big IP seems to be worth the byte investment.

As a result, the mobile game "King of the Thief: dream pointer" (hereinafter referred to as: dream pointer), authorized by Dongying Animation and developed by Dongying Animation, released its official PV product in April last year and plans to launch it in 2023.

In order to distinguish it from IP's sibling products, the game has been designed differently in many ways. The most intuitive is the visual presentation and interactive form. Dream pointer takes the form of vertical screen 3D, which claims to use 40,000 surfaces for ultra-high precision modeling. With the parkour-style game process and one-handed card operation, it brings players a very different operation experience.

It is worth mentioning that most of the Thief King mobile games on the market will be adapted from scratch according to the timeline of animation. This is also the routine operation of most of the cartoon works. On the other hand, the Dream pointer puts the adaptation of the plot into a major turning point in the original work, "3D2Y".

In the original work, 3D2Y is the communication code between the main actors, meaning to change the original assembly time from 3 days to 2 years later. Two years later, the protagonists gather together again with new shapes and new abilities to set sail again, which can be regarded as the opening of the second half of the whole work. From this point of view, it is quite reasonable to take this node as the beginning of the adaptation.

At the same time, the project team also promoted 3D2Y to the level of important product label and promotion. Whether it is the game website (https://3d2y.nvsgames.cn) or the offline lighting activity in July last year, it has been highly bound to the product itself.

Unfortunately, this expensive lighting activity has also become the final appearance of the game in the public eye. Since then, the game official WeChat has not made any updates, and the official website and TapTap home page have been cancelled and removed from the shelves without a sound. If it hadn't been for the import number, the product might have disappeared so silently.

The author observed that before the disconnection of the game, the number of Tap followers was 160000, and the official WeChat fans were only 11000. In this case, the game reservation, which was opened in June last year, may differ greatly from the team's expectations and indicators in terms of data results, or one of the reasons for its gloomy removal. It also reflects the innovation in the above presentation and plot adaptation, which may not be acceptable to players.

Another reason may be the failure of the dream pointer in internal horse racing, making its team and resources a nutrient for another product. And this product is the ARPG mobile game "code name: partner" developed by byte's Chengfeng studio.

The same sea thief king IP, the same high-precision 3D modeling. After the dream pointer fell silent, Code: partner was released at the speed of light in August last year, and its first test was launched in November. And, this test has been recognized by many players, the current Tap score of 8.7, in the data feedback should be passed the internal byte level. However, the version number is still the number one issue for the successor of this model.

Optimistically predicted that if 2 batches of imported version numbers can be released at the end of this year, and the game will be selected in the mid-year batch. It is expected to be online in H2 and become a key product of byte games in the domestic market.

Together, Waterloo is also hard to escape compared to the disappearance of the whole platform of the Dream pointer. Strictly speaking, the mobile game version of "Wizards of Kunte" (later referred to as: Kunte Mobile Games), which is also issued with the imported version number, cannot be said to have disappeared.

Born out of the 3A masterpiece "Wizard 3", Quint is a side game embedded in the game by developer CDPR. The original intention is to bring game rhythm changes and spiritual relief to players in intense fighting, as well as long-term tasks and development. At the same time, it carries an important link in the construction of the hunter's world.

With the improvement and enrichment of the mechanism, the built-in Mini Game, which was brainstormed by two designers over the weekend, became a favorite of the whole team during the game production period of Wizards 3. The project team even spent more time playing Quint from top to bottom than the game itself.

And after the game is online, the feedback of the majority of players is the same as that of CDPR. With the popularity of "Wizard 3", Quint has quickly become a hot topic among players. The spread of a series of network traffic, such as "Quint Simulator" and "Wizard 3: wild Gambling", once made it more popular than the game itself.

CDPR, which is receptive to good advice, will officially operate it as an independent game, and launched the PC version of the national service in April 2017, handing it to Gaia Mutual Entertainment as a full agent. This choice was also seen as a successful partnership at that time.

Founded in 2014, Gaia Mutual Entertainment is currently involved in the production and distribution of games, as well as the operation of the player community. Its main products are "Convex World" developed by Seven Chuang Society, and IP adapted games such as "Captain Winglet: the strongest 11" and "Game of Thrones: crossing the desperate situation".

In the player community, APP's "planeswalker camp" is like a tiger pounce on basketball fans. It can be said that it is a standard product for card game enthusiasts. In addition to Kunte brand, "hearthstone Legend", "Shadow Poetry", "Wanzhi Brand" and other established products, "Marvel:Snap", "Bao Ke Mengka" and other industry rookies are covered by it. It is the core user pool at T0 level under the TCG category.

Highly matched core users, perfect player ecology, rich issuing experience, Gaia mutual entertainment and Kunte card under the three-pronged approach were once favored by the industry for a long time.

However, the core method of competing points and the more monotonous card mechanism obviously affect the strategic depth and long-term replay of the game. CDPR, which focuses on R & D of 3A masterpieces, obviously does not devote too much energy to the update and filling of game content.

Therefore, the Kunte card as the icing on the cake of "Wizard 3" can be said to be very outstanding, but as an independent game dedicated to long-term operation, it is still too thin.

On December 5 last year, the national server of the PC game "Wizards' Quint" announced that it would stop operation at the end of the year. However, a heavier blow came after CDPR released an update plan for 2023 for the whole of 2023 on December 7, and announced that it would stop updating the content of Quint by the end of this year and transfer the project team to the new project.

Although CDPR said firmly that stopping the update does not mean outage, the Quint mobile game, which has lost its new content iteration, has entered the countdown to death before it is launched. Even from an economic point of view, choosing not to go online may be the better choice. This legendary card game will probably not be able to meet the players.

Large and small factories are equally cold in winter. in fact, in the process of waiting for the version number, it is quite common for developers to shut down operations, expire agency agreements, and quickly fade in the popularity of the game. These irresistible external forces are often not influenced by the status and background of domestic agents. Even if it is as powerful as NetEase, it will encounter the situation that the product will be dragged to death.

Fantasy Life, developed by Level-5 Studio, a well-known Japanese game developer, is a portable mobile game featuring simulated operation and RPG play, which was launched in Japan in July 2018. The game is adapted from the million-selling hit "Fantasy Life" of the same name on the 3DS platform, and has been greatly simplified in terms of play, with more emphasis on the social experience of mutual help and cooperation between friends.

Relying on the shadow of the popular previous work, "Fantasy Life" performed well at the beginning of its launch, but the subsequent growth was weak. In order to expand the scale of users and revenue, Level-5 Studio handed over the agency rights of national service and Hong Kong and Taiwan service to NetEase Baoyao in March 2020.

NetEase Treasure ship, founded in 2018, initially worked full-time for the domestic operation of the Moba mobile game Vanity. Although Vanity was suspended in July 2020 because its performance could not match NetEase's expectations and positioning. However, NetEase treasure ship as NetEase agent game distribution business line has been retained, the scope of business covers the mainland, Hong Kong, China, Taiwan and other regions, and made a distinction with the self-developed game distribution line.

In terms of industrial and commercial relations, NetEase treasure ship's main body Shanghai net Yi Mo Pu Network Technology Co., Ltd., 99% owned by Ding Lei, is separated from NetEase's system and has an independent office space. In the development of business, NetEase Baoshan has an independent account system, and its official website and TapTap home page show that it is a treasure ship game, with no mention of NetEase. The ICON corner tags of the released games also use their own logo instead of NetEase logo.

However, due to the current situation of the industry, even if Level-5 Studio chose a domestic giant in its partners, the game has been unable to get the version number for a long time, and the localization has gradually lost the follow-up news.

To make matters worse, the dynamic Sen, which exploded in early 2020, not only failed to make the similar "fantasy life" popular, but even further compressed the living space of the latter. The Taiwan service data that went online first also made NetEase's confidence in it greatly reduced.

After that, the situation was the same as that of Quint mobile games. Level-5 Studios announced in December 2021 that the daily game service would stop operation, and naturally there would be no new game content. Accordingly, there is a high probability that NetEase's treasure ship will not put it online.

From this point of view, even if he got the version number of "Fantasy Life" and "raid: shadow Legend" at the same time, NetEase, as an agent of the game business line, may not be able to come up with a new work with enough weight this year.

The author believes that it is obviously unfair to blame the disappearance of these three products entirely on the version number policy. There are great differences in their product types, the market conditions at that time, and the decisions made by manufacturers behind them. But what is common is that these three products did miss their best launch date while waiting for the version number.

What is more sad is that behind these hell jokes, the painstaking efforts of developers are often destroyed, the costs invested by manufacturers are wasted, and the livelihood of the project team is lost. Now, with the warming and stabilization of the version number policy, such cases may really become history. According to past precedent, the State Press and publication Administration may also give the industry a big red envelope with a version number before the end of the year.

Dawn has come, and 2023 may be the beginning of the industry's recovery.

This article comes from the official account of Wechat: ID:Coreesports, author: Wu Di

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