Winning the new financial era

Chapter 494 VR Games
After the Bluehole Game Company was acquired by Zhonghe Group, some of its employees entered China, together with Chinese employees poached from game companies such as Penguin and NetEase, they jointly established the PUBG studio.

In addition to continuing to operate the domestic and overseas mobile games and end games of PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, it also undertakes the task of continuing to develop FPS and TPS games.

The employees who stayed in South Korea continued to use the name of Bluehole, named Bluehole Studio, and the research direction is MMORPG games, and the Chinese side is called "massively multiplayer online role-playing game".

The first batch of core employees of Blue Hole Studio are all from NCSoft, the largest game company in South Korea, which is the company that made MMORPG large-scale online games such as "Heaven" and "Sword and Spirit".

And before PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, it also developed a "Battle of the Oracle", which still has a deep research and development accumulation in the MMORPG field.

After the successful launch of PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, they have not been idle, and put their main energy into the research and development of a game called "A:IR".

In fact, the project of this game is still before PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, but the development difficulty is really not small, and Zhang Yida asked them to disperse their main energy to PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds.

So the project has been dragging on, hurrying up and down, and finally started the test this month.

The background of the game is based on the steampunk world view, where mechanical civilization and magic coexist, and the war mainly takes place in the sky of the broken planet and the empty city suspended in the air.

There are five major occupations: Gunner, Warrior, Witch, Assassin, and Elementalist. Since most of the battles take place in the sky, it is reasonable to say that it is an air combat game.

As the owner of a game company, it is a bit unreasonable not to experience the game himself.

Zhang Yida chose a gunner character, piloted the spaceship, manipulated the cannon, and experienced a ground and air attack.

The game screen is still very beautiful, the shells hit the ground and splashed explosion flames in the air, Zhang Yida said it was enjoyable.

After five or six hours of continuous playing in the office, and fully raised the game characters to the full level of 30, Zhang Yida stopped the game with unsatisfied satisfaction.

I made a phone call to Jin Changhan, the director of Blue Hole Studio, and boasted: "The game is well done. I played it for a few hours and found it quite fun. How soon will it be officially launched?"

Jin Changhan was very happy to be praised by Zhang Yida himself.

After Bluehole Company was merged into Zhonghe Games, he only served as the general manager of Bluehole Studio, which has been greatly weakened, and also served as the vice president of Zhonghe Games, which is considered a void.

He also received 2.5 million US dollars from the sale of Blue Hole for 5000 million US dollars, which is regarded as wealth freedom.

He also thought about leaving his job and starting a new life, but after thinking about it carefully, he still extinguished this idea.

When a person reaches middle age, has a family and a family, he no longer has the impulse of his youth.

Blue Hole went bankrupt once before, and he didn't want to go through it again.

In addition, Zhang Yida also thinks highly of him. Not only did he allocate part of the operating profits of PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds to him to develop "A:IR", but he also received options from Zhonghe Group, and his annual salary is not low.

After leaving the job and starting a business, I have concerns, and finding a job may not be as good as it is now.

Zhang Yida is far away in China, and usually rarely gets involved in game development. With the support of Zhonghe Group, a powerful parent group, there is no shortage of research and development funds. He feels quite comfortable.

He doesn't have many ideas now, he just wants to continue the miracle of PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds and build Blue Hole into a world-renowned game studio.

When Zhang Yida asked about the launch time of the game, Jin Changhan smiled wryly, "Now only 70% of the research and development work has been completed, and the server will be tested later. The official launch will be at least at the end of 18."

With more than half a year left until the end of the year, Zhang Yida frowned slightly, and soon relaxed it again.

"Okay, don't worry, I'd rather go online later than ruin the company's reputation and word of mouth."

Kim Changhan nodded and said yes, saying that he would do his best to complete this work.

There is only one blockbuster game released in the game field. In terms of the capital market, this is considered to be a huge unstable factor.

Making a good game may be due to your luck, but it does not mean that you must be strong.

Moreover, after PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds is no longer popular, there is a lack of a game that supports performance, which is quite unfavorable for valuation.

Zhang Yida didn't force the employees of the game sector too much. After all, it is difficult to produce popular products, so it can't be said that there are some.

He set up multiple game studios and recruited a large number of industry elites, just to lay the foundation for the small workshop Blue Hole.

The stronger the company's background, the greater the probability of making blockbuster works.

Zhang Yida called Zhang Lan to the office and asked about the research and development progress of the Ohayoo platform.

Zhang Lan said: "The research and development work has basically been completed, but because we are not well-known in the field of game distribution in the early stage, we cannot attract enough game developers.

What I mean is to represent a few casual and entertainment games first, and then launch our Ohayoo casual and entertainment game publishing platform when the market reputation is up. "

That's right, Zhang Yida intends to grab 4399's business and make platforms such as Douvision, Kuaishou, Bilibili, and Rocket Video the promotional positions for casual games.

With the help of the algorithm mechanism, Zhonghe can easily find game lovers and push the mini-games to him.

When these games are launched, Zhonghe will get a share of the turnover revenue, which can be regarded as a kind of traffic realization.

Three and a half Internet business monetization models, except for the half of Internet finance, other advertisements, e-commerce, and games have all been monetized on the short video platform.

After the merger of Ruixiang and Zhonghe, the data of the two parties will be connected, and the half of Internet finance can basically be implemented.

"Okay, just do what you want!"

Zhang Yida smiled, "I don't know which small game companies will be the lucky ones, so don't choke them."

Zhang Lan didn't think this was an exaggeration. Based on the number of players of PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, one could calculate the proportion of players in the Zhonghe Group's user group.

Even if it can only convert one out of ten, that's tens of millions of players.

This achievement can definitely make a small game company leap from a carp to a dragon's gate, and turn an ugly duckling into a swan.

"Mr. Zhang, in terms of traffic, it may be necessary to mobilize all resources of the group to promote the first batch of cooperative games, and there may be some waste in the middle."

Zhang Yida waved his hand, "What a waste, that's not waste, we have to set some examples.

In this way, the developers in the game circle saw the first person to eat crabs to hang out with the Zhonghe Group, and everyone changed their shotguns and ate their mouths full of oil, which can produce a herd effect. "

Zhang Lan nodded, the reasoning was very simple and straightforward, and she understood it as soon as she heard it.

"By the way, the foreign game called "Fortnite" has eaten away a lot of our market. We have to make some countermeasures quickly, otherwise the players will run away."

Zhang Yida knows this game, the game screen is in the style of American comics, similar to PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, and it is also a battle royale mode.

It's just that this game is a little more interesting. You can use the collected materials to build walls, stairs, etc., transform the terrain, form a defensive front, or achieve more tactical goals.

The style may not please most domestic players, but there are still quite a few people who like it abroad.

But fortunately, there are not as many cheats in PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds as in the previous life, and they were not directly collapsed by Fortnite.

The two sides are evenly matched, and even PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds can have a slight upper hand.

"Then what do you think we should do?"

Zhang Lan thought for a moment, and replied: "It is not realistic to make a follow-up game, let alone whether it can become popular, the time is too late.

I think we still have to focus on PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, build the game well, try to keep players active, and prolong the life of the game.

In terms of competitions, it would be great if we could set up a league like football, divided into several divisions such as China, South Korea, Asia, Europe, and America.

Then gather the top players in each division to play a "Champions League". "

Zhang Yida rubbed his forehead. This seems like a big deal, but it's actually not difficult. The key is money.

As long as the bonus is enough, it will naturally attract enough e-sports clubs to join in and make this event a long-term league.

"There is no problem with the funds. You can contact various well-known e-sports clubs at home and abroad, discuss with them, and come up with a charter."

Zhang Lan smiled, "Mr. Zhang, you don't have to worry. Last time you spent a lot of money, all the e-sports clubs were full of praise. They are also looking forward to the next round of competitions launched by Zhonghe Games."

Zhang Yida nodded, remembered something, and said, "Consider it, let the strategic investment department select 2-3 relatively good VR companies to invest in. VR games are very interesting, and they are likely to usher in great development in the future."

Zhang Lan nodded. Although VR games are not mainstream at present, as long as the technology is greatly developed and the hardware cost is reduced, there is still a chance to become a mainstream game.

Google, Samsung, Sony and other companies have entered this field one after another, and have also launched their own wearable devices such as virtual reality glasses and helmets.

But there are still many problems, such as: dizziness after playing for a long time, there is still a lot of room for improvement in screen pixels and image refresh rate, etc.

The most important thing is that game developers must produce high-quality game works that also match virtual reality equipment.

She is also looking forward to the emergence of that epoch-making black technology. Players wear virtual reality equipment, as if they are in a different dimension.

At that time, video games that were originally in a two-dimensional space will be completely abandoned.

The game mode that relies solely on keyboard or handle operation will become history forever, and it will be replaced by an all-round game experience that can mobilize the five senses.

[-]D games will become the mainstream, and the entire game industry structure will be completely reshuffled.

That's why game giants like Sony are vying to establish themselves in this industry, because they don't want to be abandoned by the times.

As a person who loves to play games, even if she is a woman, she couldn't help asking: "Mr. Zhang, after the merger with Ruixiang is completed, can we also set up a VR laboratory? Just research VR-related games .”

Zhang Yida nodded, "Yes, but this must be a arduous task that requires long-term investment and will not be rewarded in a short period of time."

Zhang Lan smiled, "Let's plan ahead. Penguin has "Shadow Hunting Project", NetEase has "Homeland", and we also need products for playing cards."

Zhang Yida knew about these two games, and he had to go to an offline VR experience store to play them.

Users have a taste of it. Generally, only enthusiasts are willing to buy these products that are still flashy.

For most people, just go to the offline VR experience hall to play.

As for Netease and Penguin, they are losing money and making money, but they still hold on to the future and the exploration of technological progress.

(End of this chapter)