"The character special effects and graphics are beautifully done, and the soundtrack is also very good, but I just had a fight, and the combat gameplay has not yet been deeply experienced, but it is difficult to feel the combat (system)." A player who was guarding the computer after the "Black Myth: Wukong" was unlocked at 10:00 on the 20th Beijing time told Shell Financial Reporter.
"The picture looks good, but the copy is uncomfortable. It feels like the creator is a law of the jungle." Another player did not express all the praise. Previously, the overseas creator "Video Game dunkry" also considered the game to be suspected of borrowing from Dark Souls in reviews.
"Black Myth: Goku’s biggest advantage is that its overall quality reaches the world’s top level. In other words, the overall quality of gameplay, plot, technology, etc., gives it the ability to discuss and compare with the top product, which is the most important advantage of this product. But it is also just a’good product ‘, not a product that creates a sub-category or a new track," said Xu Fanke, a senior data analyst at Gamma Data.
Like the above players, there are millions of stand-alone players around the world who are regularly waiting for "Black Myth: Wukong" to be unlocked. According to the observation of shell financial reporters, as of 19:00 on August 20, the game had about 1.547 million real-time players on the Steam platform (a world-renowned game and software platform), and the peak online number on that day was about 1.547 million people. Bilibili has more than one million people watching the Game LIVE, and at the same time ranked first in the game LIVE platform Twitch stand-alone game playback outside Shanghai.
Screenshot of Steam platform at 17:00 on August 20. Figure | Screenshot of Steam platform.
Screenshot of live broadcast platform Twitch on August 20. Figure | Screenshot of Twitch.
A number of game industry practitioners to shell finance forecast "black myth: Wukong" present on all major platforms sales are expected to reach 5 million to 7 million sets, according to the lowest sales price of 268 yuan, the game’s buyout sales flow is 1.34 billion yuan to 1.876 billion yuan. Previously, "black myth: Wukong" pre-sale volume over 1.20 million copies, pre-sale sales over 400 million yuan, into the Steam platform August 6 to 13 global weekly sales champion.
The value of "Black Myth: Wukong" goes far beyond the game buyout revenue. Xu Fanke, a senior data analyst at Gamma Data, believes that "Black Myth: Wukong" has high IP (intellectual property) value both inside and outside the game field. "In 2023, 83% of the top 100 overseas stand-alone games will have IP, which means that if" Black Myth: Wukong "launches a sequel, its sequel will have a relatively large opportunity on the stand-alone platform. In addition, IP-related fields can be monetized, such as figures, joint licensing, cultural tourism, etc."
Game body sales or over 1.30 billion, figures, peripherals, cultural tourism on the way
In "Journey to the West", Tang Seng’s master and apprentice experienced 81 difficulties and walked 108,000 miles before obtaining the true scriptures. And what kind of "golden road" did Shenzhen Youke Interactive Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as: Youke Interactive), which produced "Black Myth: Wukong", experience?
"Black Myth: Wukong" is an action role-playing game set in Chinese mythology produced by Youke Interactive. In addition to releasing digital versions such as the PC (PC) Standard Edition for 268 yuan and the PC Deluxe Edition for 328 yuan, the game also released a limited edition of 20,000 sets of "Physical Deluxe Edition" and a limited edition of 10,000 sets of "Collector’s Edition". The prices of the two reached 820 yuan and 1998 yuan respectively.
Previously, Feng Ji, founder of Youke Interactive, revealed in an interview that the development cost of "Black Myth: Wukong" players per hour experience is about 15 million yuan to 20 million yuan, and the team estimates that the overall game time will reach more than 15 hours, while the actual development time is more than 1.5 times this time. If this rough calculation, the production cost is at least 337 million yuan to 450 million yuan.
The R & D cost of foreign 3A games (referring to high-quality, high-volume, and high-cost stand-alone games) is usually more than $100 million, and the R & D time is between three and five years. "The cost [of" Black Myth: Wukong "] should be around $100 million, and about 50% of the sales can be returned to the production side," a senior analyst in the game industry told Shell Financial Reporter. But some game company respondents said that the revenue that can be returned to the production side is 50% to 60%, depending on how the channel side and the publisher negotiate, and the degree of strength. (The cut is mainly used to pay the cost of the channel side such as the host factory and platform, and the cost of marketing activities)
A number of game industry practitioners to shell finance is expected to "black myth: Wukong" present on all major platforms sales are expected to reach 5 million to 7 million sets, according to the lowest sales price of 268 yuan, the game’s buyout sales flow is 1.34 billion yuan to 1.876 billion yuan. "Because the current number of Steam online is 1.50 million, according to the industry’s 1:2 rule, Steam buyers about 3 million, this does not include PS5, WeGame and other channels, conservative also have 5 million sets."
If the producer gets 50% of the sales roughly calculated, the game’s producer Youke Interactive can get at least 670 million yuan of gross income, and up to 938 million yuan. "The cost is about 100 million US dollars, that is to say, according to the pre-sale situation, it can not be recovered, but the current sales are good, relying on the game product buyout income can be stabilized or even profitable." The senior analyst of the game industry told reporters.
But as the first domestic 3A masterpiece, "Black Myth: Wukong" has far more appeal to consumers than that.
Xu Fanke, a senior data analyst at Gamma Data, said that "Black Myth: Wukong" has become a big IP, and the follow-up will be launched, and there are still great opportunities in the stand-alone platform. In addition, he believes that the general market trend of peripheral goods, figures and other industries in China is better than that of games, so IP licensing can also be realized. Currently, Luckin, Nvidia, Hisense TV, Lenovo Savior, JD.com and Didi Qingju plan to interact with "Black Myth: Wukong". Furthermore, IP also has the value of radiating to other industries. For example, "Black Myth: Wukong" has taken a lot of scenery in Shanxi, and the Shanxi Provincial Department of Culture and Tourism has released a number of videos, which is expected to promote local tourism consumption.
The first domestic 3A game masterpiece,Youke InteractiveHow to obtain the scriptures
The producer of "Black Myth: Wukong", Shenzhen Youke Interactive Technology Co., Ltd. was established on June 13, 2014 with a registered capital of 697,900 yuan. It is mainly engaged in software design and development, game development, system integration, network engineering, enterprise information system, website design and development; web page production; e-commerce operation; communication system development and integration; automation control system development and integration; automation engineering construction; software sales, technical services; domestic trade, etc. Feng Ji served as the legal representative, chairperson and general manager of Youke Interactive, and Yang Qi and other 6 people served as directors.
According to Feng Ji and Yang Qi in interviews with CCTV and Zhejiang Daily, after seeing that "mobile games are exploding, I feel that this is an opportunity that should not be missed." Several old colleagues, including him and Yang Qi, left Tencent together to form Youke Interactive.
From "Hundred Generations" to "Red Tide", Youke Interactive made two games before "Black Myth: Wukong", which also became their "first pot of gold". "At that time, our strategy was to find the most popular mobile game category on the market, plus first-class art, world view and story." Feng Ji explained the journey, "We all knew that sooner or later we would make a stand-alone game, but we always felt that the timing and funding were not yet mature, so we kept waiting."
The original idea was eight years ago, when Youke Interactive conducted a market survey: in 2016, nearly a third of active users on Steam, the world’s largest game publishing platform, were from China. "This is a very exaggerated data, which shows that the whole Chinese stand-alone market has enough potential," Feng Ji said. In early 2018, Yang Qi took the initiative to find Feng Ji, hoping to start a stand-alone game project. He is currently more familiar to the majority of netizens as the head of art of "Black Myth: Wukong".
Since making a 3A game requires not only high quality and high volume, but also high cost, where does Youke Interactive’s funding come from? According to Qichacha information, Youke Interactive has undergone two rounds of financing, namely an undisclosed amount of angel investment from Hero Entertainment in May 2017 and an undisclosed amount of strategic investment from Tencent Investment in March 2021.
At present, Youke Interactive mainly has five shareholders, namely natural person Feng Ji, Shenzhen Youke Interactive Enterprise Management Center (Limited Partnership), Tianjin Hero Financial Control Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as: Hero Financial Control), Shenzhen Youke Research and Development Enterprise Management Center (Limited Partnership), Guangxi Tencent Venture Capital Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as: Tencent Venture Capital), with shareholding ratios of 38.76%, 27.36%, 19%, 9.88% and 5% respectively. Among them, Shenzhen Youke Interactive Enterprise Management Center (Limited Partnership) and Shenzhen Youke Research and Development Enterprise Management Center (Limited Partnership) are natural persons Feng Ji and Zheng Runzong after penetration. Zheng Runzong is also the director and technical person in charge of Youke Interactive. After penetration, the two hold 44.10% and 31.90% respectively.
From the above analysis, we can see that there are currently only two external shareholders of Youke Interactive, namely Hero Financial Holdings, which holds 19%, and Tencent Venture Capital, which holds 5%. But it is worth mentioning that Hero Financial Holdings is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Hero Entertainment, and Wu Dan, CEO of Hero Entertainment, serves as a director of Youke Interactive. In addition, Ma Xiaoyi, senior vice president of Tencent Group, also serves as a director of Youke Interactive.
Talking about the significance of "Black Myth: Wukong" to China’s game industry. Xu Fanke, a senior data analyst at Gamma Data, believes that the first is the significance of industry growth and global status. Whether it is the domestic market or the overseas market, the difficulty of growing the market size in recent years is much higher than before, and the global sales of "Black Myth: Wukong" mean that the buyout game market is still very promising. "Black Myth: Wukong" is also expected to become an opportunity for Chinese companies to enter the overseas buyout market. If Chinese game companies want to further enhance their global competitiveness, then entering the PC and console fields that overseas companies are good at is likely to be unavoidable. The output of "Black Myth: Wukong" may help Chinese companies take this step more firmly.
Finally, "Black Myth: Wukong" can also help the Chinese game industry better sort out how to balance the game preferences of domestic users and overseas users, such as publicity, R & D (world view, combat system, etc.), which overseas users are willing to pay for and which domestic users are looking forward to. Whether it is in terms of global popularity, user expectations, sales or other aspects, "Black Myth: Wukong" is currently the best performing domestic buyout game, which also means that the industry can observe enough global user feedback.
The above-mentioned game industry analysts said that "Black Myth: Goku" has more confidence in the game industry than practical significance. "From the perspective of actual revenue, the impact on the industry is limited, but if it can be successful, it can give big manufacturers and investors greater confidence, boost the confidence of the industry, and make more content-oriented games." He said, "In addition, start IP linkage without release. This model is very new in the field of stand-alone games. Earn extra income in advance, but this method is very mature in the field of mobile games."
Beijing News Shell Financial Reporter, Bai Jinlei, Editor, Yue Caizhou, School Dealing with Chunyun
