Wind Rises 2005

Chapter 568 Zombies Attack
It was more than a week after Ma Liang received the call from Mr. Han.

He is truly worthy of being the top brother of China Film Group Corporation. He is extremely efficient. He has already been in contact with Disney for a round, and there is a lot of interest there.

This is easy to understand, after all, the quality of the IP "Frozen" is there.

In order to open up the domestic market and please the China Film Group, Disney even agreed to cooperate in the development of a very niche IP such as "The Secret of the Calabash", let alone "Frozen".

Listening to Han Sanye's wishes, Disney headquarters is preparing to set up a special project team and immediately rush to China to discuss cooperation matters.

This news couldn't be better for Ma Liang.

Many things in this world require the help of others, and you may not be able to achieve the greatest benefits by yourself.

Just like the "Frozen" IP, if Ma Liang were to operate it by himself, it would be enough to earn hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue from the global market. No matter how much more it was, it wouldn't be much more.

After all, he has no experience in the film and television industry and does not have solid resources in the domestic market, let alone overseas markets.

But Disney is different. In its previous life, it operated the "Frozen" IP very successfully, and its total revenue has even exceeded more than 100 billion US dollars.

This is the power of the giants, the strength that can only be obtained by cultivating a track for many years.

It's normal to think about it. The influence of business is not just judged by the wealth of a person or a company.

Just like Lao Ma and Xiao Ma in China, they both became the richest man at one time, but in terms of influence in the world, they are not even a little bit behind Xiangjiang Lao Li.

He has been working in various industries for decades, and the resources and connections he has accumulated around the world are far beyond those of the young duo.

The same is true for Ma Liang. Even if he gets rich by going public on Twitter in the future, his actual energy is limited and he can only affect some things indirectly.

Therefore, for the super IP "Frozen", cooperation with Disney is his choice to maximize benefits.

Now that Mr. Han has joined the team, he doesn't need to worry much about the follow-up.

Ma Liang was happy about the movie project on one side, but there was good news waiting for him on the other side.

Just one day ago, Zynga Game Company successfully developed the game "Plants vs. Zombies" and ran it on a trial basis for a short period of time, waiting to be officially launched.

Under Ma Liang's guidance, the game's charging model has also been changed.

Players can try out some of the first levels for free, and only after they are interested will they need to pay to unlock subsequent levels.

And the biggest adjustment between the game and the previous life is that it is completely tied to Twitter's [Farmville] game. Some rare plants must be planted and collected in this English version of "Farmville".

Of course, if you are a rich man, you don’t need to go to so much trouble. You can just spend money to unlock it and have fun in minutes.

San Francisco, Zynga gaming company headquarters office.

Mark Pincus looked nervously at yesterday's trial operation data. Although there were not many players, the recharge rate was very high, reaching more than 30%.

This kind of trial-first-pay later game model was no longer unusual in 2008.

But to be able to perform like this is absolutely unparalleled among independent small games. At least in Mark Pincus's impression, he seems to have never heard of any recent small game that can have such astonishing data.

Only back in the 90s and [-]s, when FC games were rampant, could small games be so popular.

Today "Plants vs. Zombies" will be officially launched, and it's finally time for a real test.

Although the development and operation of the game was authorized by [Dafeng Interactive Entertainment], Mark Pincus felt that he was looking forward to it even more than when the chess and card game was launched.

As long as "Plants vs. Zombies" becomes a hit, regardless of whether it is licensed or not, Zynga's valuation will skyrocket.

Mark Pincus was still thinking about what the young investor had promised last time, which was to broker a merger between Zynga and Twitter.

As long as Zynga can be valued higher before the merger, then the benefits he will reap as a founder during the merger will be maximized.

For this reason, he did not hesitate to spend a lot of money on marketing to hype the game "Plants vs. Zombies".

Just one day of trial operation yesterday, the Internet is already flooded with various recommendation posts for trial play and evaluation, and this has only just begun, and more intensive marketing is still to come.

"Mark, everything is ready!"

At this moment, one of the partners, Michael Luxton, walked into the office and nodded to the CEO.

Mark Pincus was overjoyed when he heard this. No surprise is the best news.

"Very good, let's go online as scheduled!" At 12 noon San Francisco time, the download link for the official version of "Plants vs. Zombies" finally appeared on all major channels.

Zynga's official website, major software and game websites, and Steam game distribution platform have all updated their pages on time.

The most cruel thing is Twitter, which actually posted the poster of "Plants vs. Zombies" on the homepage of the website, so that countless netizens can see it as soon as they log in.

When the inner trial started yesterday, only a small number of players enjoyed the fun in advance, but now countless people are looking forward to it.

Not to mention the massive number of players of [Farmville] on Twitter, who have long known that a casual game related to special plants in the farm is about to be released.

As a result, major platforms were flooded with countless users in an instant, the servers were almost overcrowded, and the download bandwidth was completely full.

Fortunately, the game file is not large, so it can be installed and played in a short time.

When you open the game, there is a short tutorial. Almost most players skip this step.

"Plants vs. Zombies" is such a simple game that no tutorial is needed.

Click the level card and start killing directly!

This game was originally developed based on local culture. On the American side, except for a few big cities, more residents live in the suburbs, and their houses have their own courtyard lawns.

Familiar scenes that are essential for every household appear in the game, making netizens very friendly.

As a result, zombies suddenly attacked, and coupled with the funny and slightly scary BGM music, the sense of crisis was inexplicably heightened.

Players need to plant some special plants on the grass to deal with the zombie invasion.

Even though the game is full of old and American cultural elements, even users from other countries don’t feel any sense of violation when playing it.

Isn't it just planting plants to fight zombies? In one word, simple!
Some plants are defensive, and some are offensive. Different combinations can annihilate zombies and successfully pass the level.

As a result, while playing around, everyone realized something was wrong.

Later in the game, the difficulty actually increased several times.Unlike the previous levels, where you can easily kill all the zombies, you can easily die if you are not careful.

Now the players got angry and started to compete with the zombies one after another.

All kinds of careful calculations, all kinds of troop formations, it's not complete until the zombies are eliminated.

In fact, this is also a deliberate arrangement of the "Plants vs. Zombies" game from the beginning. As the levels progress, increasing the difficulty will induce players to become more addicted.

Especially the last two free levels, the difficulty has skyrocketed.

After all, if players can't get interested in free levels, how can they pay to unlock more levels?

For a time, countless people were fighting against the zombies, fighting non-stop.

But the more anxious you are, the harder it will be to pass certain levels, especially the last free level, which requires particularly clever operations to resist the zombie attack.

This makes many players stop at this level and fail to pass it after trying many times.

Everyone was so angry that they went to major platforms to leave messages and complain, scolding Zynga Game Company for not being a good person and actually developing an impossible level for everyone to play.

Many people even went to Zynga's official Twitter account to curse, and even CEO Mark Pincus was criticized.

As a result, the more fierce the players scolded the game, the more popular the game became. In a short period of time, the topic of "Plants vs. Zombies" reached the top of the popularity list on the entire Internet.

Therefore, more and more netizens are attracted and are jumping into this game.

Download, install, try it out, curse...

The same process happens all over the world. Countless players have unconsciously become the human trumpet of "Plants vs. Zombies". You pass it on to me and I pass it on to you, constantly playing the Amway game.

As long as users are online, whether actively or passively, they will encounter similar information.

"Zombies are coming in the backyard!"

"Plants vs. Zombies, Plants vs. Zombies!"

(End of this chapter)