Game Development Giant

Chapter 9 A classic marketing case

In the evening, Jester's family of three gathered at home to discuss.

Li Chongyang, whose English name is Iris Li, is Jester's father and does not mean to blame Jester at all.

According to the conditions of the Schwer Group, even a good-natured man like Jester's father would refuse outright because the price they offered was too insulting.

As for Jester's mother, of course she supported her son without hesitation.

"The current situation is very unfavorable to us. Although I have confidence in "American Cube" and believe that it is a good enough game, but without a seller to help us sell it, we can't sell it ourselves." Jester's My father was a little at a loss. He just felt sorry for "American Cube". Such a good game was rejected by a few people without vision.

He did not consider at all how harsh the conditions given by his son were.

No seller will accept such conditions that are almost blackmail.

In his opinion, "American Cube" is a great game, and a great game must have harsh conditions.

If you want to get gold, you have to pay the price of gold. If you want to get gold for the price of buying bananas, it can only be said that you still have to buy it from a monkey.

"It doesn't matter."

There is still a faint smile on Jester's face. He has never doubted the charm of "American Cube". He clearly knows how amazing this small game of a few kilobytes will be in the future.

"Those four sellers only account for 60% of the sales network in Southern California, and we have 40% left...Father, I wonder if you have ever heard the words of the great red man, Is it called 'Rural areas surrounding cities?' He also said, 'A single spark can start a prairie fire'."

As if he didn't understand what Jester was thinking, Jester's father frowned in confusion.

What do video games have to do with that old man? Although he is great, it is impossible for him to help us sell the game console?

Could it be sold to distant China? This kind of unrealistic idea even appeared in Jester's father's mind. Fortunately, Jester couldn't see what his father was thinking at this time, otherwise he would have gone crazy laughing.

In fact, Jester was not thinking of Taizu's sayings such as 'the countryside surrounds the city'.

Instead, I thought of one of the most famous marketing cases in the history of Chinese online games. This marketing was closely based on Taizu's idea of ​​"surrounding the city from the countryside."

The final result is that this marketing successfully pushed an online game that may not even be considered a second-rate game directly to the throne of the first overlord in the history of Chinese online games, which really shocked a lot of people.

After that, China’s gaming industry entered an era that didn’t focus on quality but only on marketing.

Because quality is completely useless in the Chinese game industry. Whether players play your game never depends on whether your game is good or not, but only on whether you do a lot of promotion.

To a certain extent, this game ruined Chinese online games.

Yes, the game Jester had in mind was Legend.

The success of Legend is not so much the excellence of the game as it is the success of marketing.

Is Legend good? All I can say is that this game is lackluster. \u003cIn every aspect of the advantages that the game should have, it is outdated.

Whether it is graphics, sound effects, gameplay, equipment, skills, character growth, etc., they are far behind Diablo II, the originator of this type of game, by twenty eras.

As for those who say that Diablo 2 is a stand-alone game, they have never played Diablo 2. Even if they have not played the official battle network, have they ever been exposed to domestic private server battle networks such as impk?

What? You haven’t even come into contact with the private server Battle.net? Ever since you were little, you have only hacked single-player games? Then you still have the nerve to say that you have played Diablo 2?

The above sentence is a joke and should not be taken seriously.

Having said that, in fact, among the huge domestic Dark player base, those who have access to official Battle.net and private server Battle.net may only account for a very small part of this group.

Therefore, many people simply think that Diablo 2 is just a stand-alone computer, at most a stand-alone computer that can be connected to a local area network.

This is actually quite wrong.

Battle.net's Diablo 2 and the stand-alone Diablo 2 are, to be honest, two completely different games.

But why are Chinese players who are already accustomed to playing high-quality products like Diablo 2 still flocking to Legend?

First of all, although Legend is a very failed game that is a copycat of Diablo, it is still a Diablo game in the final analysis, and this type of game has a huge mass base in China.

The characteristics of dark games have the essence to impress players the most.

This is exactly what Hiroshi Yamauchi, a legend in the video game industry, proposed at a high-level meeting of Nintendo in 1997. An excellent game should have four basic elements, namely: collection, development, exchange, and addition.

Do you think these four elements look familiar, reminding you of a game at first glance?

Yes, these elements were summed up by Hiroshi Yamauchi from the legendary success of Pokemon (PM).

Secondly, and most importantly, it is to abandon the first-tier and central cities and concentrate its firepower on the second- and third-tier small towns for viral local promotion marketing.

Why concentrate on second- and third-tier cities?

First, there is less investment.

Secondly, compared to players in big cities, players in small cities have a lower chance of playing high-quality games. To put it bluntly, in an era when the Internet was not yet developed, the vision and knowledge of small cities were not as good as that of others to a certain extent. Big city.

Finally, after building momentum in small cities, big cities will naturally collapse on their own.

As the old saying goes, people all have a herd mentality, and blind obedience does not distinguish between Chinese and foreign, ancient or modern.

What is ground push? As the name suggests, it means asking people to go directly to the local network to promote it, make promises to the network bosses, give them benefits, and let them install the legendary client on their own network machines.

According to what was later said, it was to seize the installed capacity.

Think about it, with the lack of game choices at that time, when someone accidentally clicked on the Legend client, he would be surprised to find, wow, there is Diablo that can be played online!

Don’t underestimate the influence of Diablo in China at that time. It was a game that influenced an entire generation.

Which player from that era dares to say that he has not been affected by Darkness?

And when all the second- and third-tier cities are occupied, can the first-tier and central cities that have lost their roots survive alone?

Just like a big tree whose roots have been dug out, no matter how strong and lush it is, it cannot escape death.

Just like that, Legend achieved unprecedented success.

Jester thought of this case, and his plan was ready to come out.

Of course, it cannot be copied completely. After all, China and the United States have different appeals, and the charm of Tetris itself is enough to lead the trend, without the mass base of Legend that needs to be laid by Diablo.

But the general plan is still the same.

Relying on the quality of "American Cube" that completely transcends this era, people take his arcade machines to big cities, first-tier cities, and central cities throughout California. He believes in the quality of "American Cube" and does not even need publicity, just relying on itself. With its charm, it can become popular all over the place.

\u003cOr you’ll know just by bat?

No kidding, Supermarine is known as the beginning of modern video games. Not only did he save the video game industry, but he laid down the rules for everything.

Just like the producer of "Metal Gear", the founder of the Kojima team, and the talented designer Hideo Kojima said, "Operation, story, game purpose, puzzle settings, boss battles, hidden elements... The game has formulated all the rules, and it can be said that all current games are derived and developed based on this."

This is what ultramarathon is all about.

Just like this, when the 'hives' who have never seen anything like modern video games see a masterpiece that transcends time and spans generations like "American Cube", why don't they immediately kneel down and lick it?

This is similar to the Apple mobile phone against non-smartphones and the MP3 player against the Walkman. It relies on design ideas and technical standards that are completely ahead of the times to carry out a crushing attack on this era.

This offensive is irresistible.

Can you use a Tiger tank to fight against the 99 major modification, or can you use a P51 Mustang to fight against an F22 Raptor?

This is not a dimensional battle at all.

Victory is inevitable.

When "American Cube" gains momentum and forms a prairie fire, the trend will be established. These sellers will naturally rush to negotiate with themselves, which is called using their power to suppress others.

I was really too complacent before, but now I can get whatever I want from others with just an "American Cube".

I know that the total sales volume of the cube is 120 million, and the sales volume of a single platform is more than 30 million. I know that the price I offer for the cube is not high. Compared with its true value, it can even be said to be cheap, but these People don’t know.

Think about it for a moment, if you were a seller and were blackmailed by a small, unknown designer with such harsh conditions for a seemingly good game, you would be very angry.

Because I don't know how to praise.

But how can these people's eyes penetrate countless time to see the greatness of their own game? I put gold in front of the other party, but the other party thought that I was bullying him with shit, but blamed me. This has never been the case in this world.

I am willing to admit defeat in a bet and stand upright when I am beaten. Who told them to be blind?

As for why you don't choose small cities like Legend Marketing, wouldn't the cost be much smaller?

This is actually a very simple question. Legend chose Taizu's strategy of "surrounding the city from the countryside" because its quality was not good, but "American Cube" is completely different. It is the best game of this era. , there is no need to go to a small city to create momentum. If you want to create momentum, you can easily do it in any city on the earth with this game. Going to a small town to do it cannot be said to be the opposite, it can only be said to be the icing on the cake.

The most correct approach to "American Cube" is to learn from the methods of the Soviet October Revolution and use cities to lead rural areas.

When all large cities and central cities are captured, those satellite cities will naturally collapse.

This is actually the same principle as "rural areas surrounding cities", but they are two extremes with different methods.

Jester didn't explain it carefully to his father. He just found a map of California and, with his father's help, selected the most suitable city on the map.

Eventually, he set his sights on Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego, and San Jose, the four largest cities in California.

They are the core of this Jester marketing plan.

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