Restart life

Chapter 511, page 0499: [The Three Giants of Chinese Gaming]

At noon, we eat in the cafeteria.

Chen Guiliang ordered a serving of rice, and the side dishes were chicken gizzards and scrambled eggs with chives.

Lu Yu only took a tiny bit of food as a token gesture.

Chen Guiliang sat down and joked, "Are you feeding a cat? Its appetite is too small."

Lu Yu said, "To lose weight, control your food intake."

Chen Guiliang said, "I think you have a good enough figure."

"Thank you," Lu Yu said, looking at the food on Chen Guiliang's plate. "Many people think that big bosses must have lavish meals every day, but I've noticed that your daily diet is quite ordinary. And you even personally queue up to get food in the cafeteria."

Chen Guiliang said, "It's more convenient; eating a big meal is a waste of time."

Lu Yu said, "I feel like all of you people in the internet industry are very similar. It was the same when I interviewed Zhang Chaoyang before... Can I mention Zhang Chaoyang?"

Chen Guiliang laughed and said, "I have a pretty good relationship with him."

Lu Yu said, "I interviewed Zhang Chaoyang a few years ago, and he was dressed similarly to you today. He would have a bowl of rice noodles or a bowl of clear soup noodles for lunch. He also didn't wear a watch and liked to talk about philosophy, astrology, Buddhism and Taoism."

Chen Guiliang said, "I really envy him. When he was a child, he could play in the arsenal and even shoot birds with real bullets. That's the childhood dream of so many boys."

"You know that?" Lu Yu asked with a smile.

Chen Guiliang said, "He loves to brag. How could he not talk about this? He always says that his grandfather fought for the country in 37, and he did not yield even when he was severely tortured by the enemy. In the end, he escaped from the enemy's tight guard."

Lu Yu said, "He said he was afraid of going to middle school because middle school students fight with bricks. They beat each other to death. What about you in middle school? It seems you had a similar experience."

Chen Guiliang said, "Times have changed. Back then, it was gangsters fighting, but when I was in high school, the 'Young and Dangerous' movies were all the rage. Anyway, the newspapers have already exaggerated the story, saying I was some kind of school bully or a gang leader. Today, I'll just clarify things."

“I didn’t join any gangs when I was in junior high school, and I was always the top student in the school. That incident was also in self-defense. I was blocked on the road by more than ten thugs with knives and sticks. I felt like I was going to die, so I grabbed a watermelon knife from a fruit stand and chased those thugs from one end of the bridge to the other, slashing several of them into the hospital.”

Despite the seriousness of the matter, Lu Yu joked, "One person chasing and slashing more than ten thugs? No way? I don't believe it."

Chen Guiliang was speechless.

The same thing happened when Lu Yu interviewed Zhang Chaoyang back then.

At that time, Zhang Chaoyang lamented the lowest point in his life, saying that he felt utterly hopeless the moment he saw the moon from the plane.

The atmosphere was initially rather melancholic when Lu Yu suddenly blurted out, "I don't believe it, you can see the moon from an airplane?" Seeing that Zhang Chaoyang didn't respond, she added, "Oh, so the airplane has windows, right?"

Seeing that Chen Guiliang was also silent, Lu Yu quickly tried to find a new topic: "What's your zodiac sign?"

Chen Guiliang said, "Gemini."

Lu Yu said without thinking, "Geminis are prone to being naive and forgetful."

Chen Guiliang said helplessly, "I am quite simple-minded."

Lu Yu added, "I mean, they are very innocent and kind. Even if they are deceived or hurt, they won't hold a grudge and will quickly forget about it. Moreover, Geminis have a strong sense of curiosity, like to constantly explore new things, and are willing to try and take on challenges. I think this is why Mr. Chen can keep innovating and still build a large business."

Chen Guiliang took out his phone to check the perpetual calendar: "When I was a child, my family registered my birthdate using my lunar calendar date but not my Gregorian calendar date. Let me see, my Gregorian calendar birthday seems to be July 23rd. Hmm, Leo."

Lu Yu quickly chimed in: "No wonder, Leo has a kingly demeanor! Moreover, Leo men are helpful and chivalrous. No wonder Mr. Chen was nicknamed 'Hero Chen' in high school."

Chen Guiliang read the text on his phone: "Leos are self-righteous and proactive, but they often ignore the feelings of others. This description is quite accurate."

Lu Yu asked, "Who was your idol when you were in middle school?"

Chen Guiliang shook his head: "I have no idols. I've always been arrogant, especially when I was in middle school. I don't feel anything when I read anecdotes about famous people. I always think that if they can do something, I can definitely do it too. Heaven is number one, earth is number two, and I'm number three."

"Arrogant?" Lu Yu asked.

Chen Guiliang corrected: "Ignorance is bliss."

Lu Yu asked, "You seem to have read a lot of ancient books. Last time Zhang Chaoyang talked to me about the I Ching, but I didn't quite understand it. Do you usually talk about these things?"

Chen Guiliang smiled and said, "We've talked, so I won't comment."

Lu Yu asked, "Why?"

Chen Guiliang said, "I'm only half-knowledgeable, and he's not even half-knowledgeable. He's just trying to fool me because he doesn't know anything. I talked to him about the I Ching and we got quite excited, like two bad chess players playing chess. Although we played terribly, we were very passionate."

"Really? I don't believe it. You're a top student from the Philosophy Department of Peking University. How could you be only half-baked?" Lu Yu laughed.

Chen Guiliang said, "In my opinion, most experts who study the I Ching today are only half-baked!"

Lu Yu remarked, "Truly arrogant."

Chen Guiliang put down his chopsticks: "After you finish eating, let's go for a walk."

……

Lu Yu switched to Anhui TV last year. The edited version of her special interview with Chen Guiliang will be broadcast on Anhui TV, while the rough cut version will be sent to Tudou.com, AcFun, and Bilibili.

Post-production is none of Lu Yu's business. When she flew out of Beijing, she posted a Weibo post with a photo of herself with Chen Guiliang: "Just finished interviewing Mr. Chen, it will be broadcast on Anhui TV soon."

When Lu Yu got off the plane, she found that her Weibo post had been widely commented on and shared. "An interview with Old Master Chen? Really? I don't believe it!"

Lu Yu: Which game from Youke do you like the most? Mr. Chen: There are too many, it's like asking a mother which child she likes the most, it's hard to choose. Lu Yu: Your mother only has you as her child.

"Mr. Chen probably doesn't need to buy children's clothes."

"..."

Many netizens are making fun of this, and Lu Yu is already used to it.

For example, when Lu Yu was interviewing Zhou Xun, Zhou Xun said that all the clothes she bought were too big, so Lu Yu blurted out that she should go buy children's clothes.

Back home, Lu Yu was quite bored, and suddenly the game she played that day came to mind.

She called her husband: "How do I install 'My Own Swordsman' on the computer... I don't mean downloading the TV series, I'm asking about the 'My Own Swordsman' game... Go to the official website to download it, but how do I find the official website? Wait a minute..."

Two hours later, her laptop broke down.

I didn't even enter the game.

She installed a large-scale online game on the C drive of her ultra-thin netbook... I have to say, her C drive has quite a lot of space.

A few days later, her husband came home and personally built her a new computer.

Then the couple played "My Own Swordsman" together.

The Chinese online gaming market in 2011 was quite different from that of the previous two years.

In terms of peak concurrent users alone, the top five are as follows:

CrossFire: 335 million views, Tencent.

"Future Era" 306 million views, by Youke.

"The Oracle Era" has 285 million views and is available through the game "Youke".

Fantasy Westward Journey: 268 million views, NetEase.

World of Warcraft: 130 million copies sold by NetEase.

Next up are games like QQ Speed, Three Kingdoms Kill, Tian Long Ba Bu 2, Jade Dynasty, QQ Dance, and Taoist Online...

Of the top ten games, Tencent Games has four, Youke Games has three, and NetEase Games has two.

A three-way power structure!

Games like QQ Speed ​​and QQ Dance, once considered knock-offs, now contribute huge amounts of revenue to Tencent every month. Tencent has a whole host of other "QQ series" games like these.

In terms of market share in the online game industry, if it weren't for the high overseas revenue of GameTech, it would have been surpassed by Tencent long ago based solely on domestic revenue.

The game "Dragon Nest," operated by Shanda Games, was quite popular last year, but it's not doing so well this year, failing to even rank in the top 15.

Shi Yuzhu's "Zhengtu" and Tao Chenggang's "Quan Yu Tianxia" both fell out of the top ten list. However, despite their drastic drop in peak concurrent users, these two heavily pay-to-win games still easily rank in the top ten in terms of revenue!

Youke's "Wulin Gaiden" was launched for public testing under this market environment.

With peak concurrent users exceeding 40 in the first week and 60 in the first month, it's already approaching the top ten on the charts. On websites like 17173, "Wulin Gaiden" even ranks in the top three in terms of popularity, with discussion threads about the game appearing everywhere.

Many players are inquiring about PC specifications because their computers simply can't run the game properly, or they experience slight lag. Many players are choosing to upgrade their computers, or even build a completely new PC, specifically for this game.

However, "My Own Swordsman" ultimately has too high computer requirements, and after the peak number of online users exceeded 60, the data growth began to slow down significantly.

Many players don't not want to play, but their computers are too weak to play!
For a game that charges a subscription fee, a peak of 600,000 players is already quite good. When World of Warcraft was operated by The9, it mostly only reached around 600,000 players.

Therefore, some gaming media outlets have called "Wulin Gaiden" the "Ming Dynasty version of Warcraft".

Online games that rely on prepaid cards can be very profitable as long as the user online rate is increased.

以60万峰值在线而论，付费玩家大概在500万到750万之间。推算点卡（或月卡）收入，每月营收大概在2亿到3亿之间。

Excluding all costs and taxes, it would only take three or four months to recoup the more than 3 million yuan development cost of "My Own Swordsman".

In addition, "My Own Swordsman" also has hidden benefits.

This high-quality, large-scale online game can represent the company's image and is a rare flagship product.

Chen Tianqiao was green with envy for "Wulin Gaiden" because Shanda had been operating games for ten years, and the only game that could represent Shanda's image was still "Legend of Mir".

Whenever Shanda is mentioned, the first thing that comes to mind is "Legend of Mir".

That's so low-class!
Now, when people mention Tencent Games, the first thing that comes to mind is "CF" (CrossFire), which is jokingly referred to as a game for elementary school students.

CrossFire (CF) has now reached the peak concurrent player count, making it the game with the most players in China. Without a doubt.

But Pony Ma was not satisfied. Tencent urgently needed a flagship product, which is why it spared no expense in creating "Dou Zhan Shen".

(End of this chapter)