Compared with the Internet winter, game companies have been much less affected.
The vast majority of game development companies are not listed on the market, and their survival does not depend on the capital market. They mainly rely on the real money support of players.
Therefore, the Internet winter is a good thing for them to some extent. Advertising on Internet channels previously required US$100,000 to achieve the effect, but now it only costs US$50,000.
For these game developers, the current collapse of the Nasdaq index is nothing more than the Great Depression of the national game industry in 1983.
You must know that the collapse of the gaming industry caused by Atari caused the entire industry's gaming revenue to plummet from US$3.2 billion to US$100 million in just two years.
Therefore, the Internet winter did not affect the 2000 E3 exhibition in full swing.
And this is regarded as the first E3 exhibition after the arrival of the 21st century, and the organizers attach great importance to it.
After returning to Los Angeles last year, attendance this time is expected to exceed 100,000.
“This is my first time attending the E3 show, and it is also my first time speaking on behalf of Flamingo at the E3 show.
Flamingo seems to have been less mainstream since its inception. Our games are distributed directly online without going through the promotional channels of traditional game publishers.
After the release, I also relied on spontaneous word-of-mouth among players for publicity. Later, I established Riot Games to provide a platform for communication among video game players. Zhou Xin said.
As the founder and chairman of Flamingo, Zhou Xin announced their upcoming new game at E3.
Zhou Xin is not as well-known in the gaming industry as he is in the Internet industry, but his identity and experience determine that everyone wants to hear what he will say and what kind of work he will bring to the industry.
Based on the quality of games produced by Flamingo in the past, everyone is looking forward to it.
Another reason is that the number of video games released through Riot Games is increasing day by day, and Riot Games’ own rating system is becoming more and more credible.
Nowadays, when players see the introduction of a certain game in a game magazine or game media, and get excited about it, they will immediately go to Riot Games to see if the game has ratings and reviews.
Decide whether to buy after reading the reviews.
Riot Games’ status and influence in the minds of players determine that more and more game developers want to cooperate with Riot Games.
Riot Games has been in several rounds of negotiations with console manufacturers such as Sony, Nintendo, and Sega.
Console manufacturers hope to use the verification code mechanism to allow their console games to enter Riot Games' scoring system.
After players buy a cartridge from Nintendo, they will receive a verification code. By entering the verification code into Riot Games, they can rate and write reviews for the game, and a purchase badge for the game will appear on the player's personal homepage.
This is a good thing for Riot Games, but Riot Games hopes to take a commission based on the selling price of the game. Because I am not a distribution channel, the commission ratio can be reduced. Originally, if it was released through my game channel, I would take 30%. Now I only take 15%.
Console manufacturers are naturally unwilling to agree. If I just borrow your evaluation system, you will charge me 15%. This is too expensive. We are only willing to cooperate at a price of US$50,000 per game.
The two sides have been in a stalemate over the charging method.
Originally, E3 would not be open to the public until 2017. Before then, if you wanted to apply for E3 tickets, you needed to prove a direct professional relationship with the video game industry.
For example, you need to prove that you are engaged in game development, an editor of game media, or a game publisher, etc.
After Riot Games sponsored E3 last year, Riot Games applied for 15,000 general tickets from the exhibition organizers and distributed them to ordinary players through various forum activities.
This activity has achieved very good results among the player community, greatly improving user stickiness and user activity.
Affected by this, this year Yahoo Games and Microsoft both sponsored E3. They also applied for general tickets from the exhibition and distributed them to their users through the event.
Microsoft even claims to announce the concept drawing of XBox and the expected official release time at this E3 exhibition.
“The game Flamingo brings this time is also a tower defense game, but it is completely different from previous tower defense games.
This game called Teamfight Tactics is a PVP tower defense game. It has a lot of unique innovative elements added to the traditional tower defense. "
After Zhou Xin finished speaking, a promotional CG for Teamfight Tactics began to play on the big screen behind him.
When Zhou Xin held a press conference at E3, Riot Games also began to warm up TFT simultaneously.
As a channel controlled by Zhou Xin, Riot Games brought this game to every user almost immediately.
Yes, what Zhou Xin launched is Auto Chess, LOL’s Auto Chess.
Under current network conditions, it is difficult to guarantee a 5V5 gaming experience.
In the mid-1990s, Americen's network was the first generation of broadband networks, namely DSL and cable modems.
The speed of this technology is faster than traditional dial-up Internet access, but it is only a few hundred K per second. It was not until the late 1990s and early 21st century that it was gradually transformed into a broadband network, with coverage expanding and speeds increased to Mbps/s.
As for fiber optic broadband, it was only available after 2005.
Zhou Xin simply imagined that in a 5V5 game one or more people would often be disconnected and then gave up the idea.
Compared with mobi games that have high network requirements and require the cooperation of multiple people, the game mode of Auto Chess has much lower network requirements.
Auto Chess can be traced back to Dota Auto Chess, but in terms of subsequent operations, Dota Auto Chess is far inferior to Teamfight Tactics operated by Riot Games.
The development of the two has little to do with the quality of the game itself. The resources invested in the operation directly determine that TFT has always been very popular, and there are small innovations in every season.
But Dota Auto Chess gradually lost its sound.
Zhou Xin completely communicated the mechanics of Teamfight Tactics from S1 to S5 in his memory with the Flamingo planning team, and the effect was very close to Zhou Xin’s memory.
Teamfight Tactics is also preparing for the subsequent League of Legends. When the network conditions mature and the popularity of Teamfighting gradually decreases, League of Legends can be launched accordingly.
“TFT is an 8-player tower defense game, and a war chess game may be more appropriate.
But it is completely different from stand-alone war and chess games. We do not have a stand-alone mode, we only have players playing against each other.
What you need to do is survive to the end among 8 players.
We will make different styles of boards and heroes. Players need to pay to purchase the boards and heroes. The boards and heroes will not affect the fairness of the game itself.
Players need to constantly climb the ladder. Each time the top four players will gain points, and the bottom four players will lose points.
Finally, at the end of each season, we will invite the top 128 players in the ladder score to come to San Francisco to compete offline to determine the final champion.
The final champion will receive a chessboard made of pure gold.
At the same time, we will launch a championship chessboard at the end of each season, and 50% of the sales revenue of all championship chessboards will be used as a prize pool.
These 128 players will share the prize pool equally according to the final ranking. "
On stage, Zhou Xin talked about game mechanics, ladder rankings, and ladder rankings to e-sports competitions.
The media and business friends in the audience felt that Zhou Xin was talking about something very new, but is this really feasible?
They are not sure.
“The biggest surprise at the Millennium E3 exhibition – Teamfight Tactics
This is my first time to participate in the E3 exhibition, and it is also the first time that almost all members of the Sohu Game Channel have participated in a video game event. The author had never heard of E3 before becoming an editor.
It wasn’t until I personally visited E3 this time that I realized that there are so many game developers around the world, so many media outlets rely on evaluating video games to survive, and so many players are chasing their favorite video games like a pilgrimage.
It was only after I actually participated in E3 that I realized that games are more than just games, and why it can be known as the ninth art.
There were countless moments at E3 that impressed me deeply. Whether Hideo Kojima attended the E3 exhibition with the promotional video of "Metal Gear Solid 2", the gorgeous opening, the cinematic storyboards, the soundtrack like a Hollywood blockbuster, the weather and lighting that changed the battle situation, and the humor that Kojima is best at Technique, this promotional video surprises me every minute.
Or should we say that "Three Kingdoms" was the first appearance of a Chinese game manufacturer at the E3 exhibition, and it received an IGN8.0 rating upon its debut.
"Three Kingdoms" is an RTS game. RPG is the mainstream. The success of games such as Fairy Sword and Jin Yong's Heroes has allowed manufacturers to reap the benefits of martial arts games, and similar games are surging. RTS games were dealt a disastrous blow by "Blood Lion", and few game developers dared to set foot in this field again.
The development team of "Three Kingdoms" first launched "Iron Armor Storm" - a science fiction style RTS. With this development experience, they continued their efforts and developed outstanding works such as "Three Kingdoms" that have been widely recognized by the international game industry.
The author hopes to see more and more Chinese game faces at E3 in the future.
Or maybe Ricky Martin's lead dancer and Yu Suzuki were signing autographs for players one by one at the Sega booth. The rock climbing competition area at the entrance of the Sega booth also left a deep impression on me.
Or is it that Microsoft came to the E3 exhibition with a prototype of the Xbox and sent out the voice of the Internet giant to the three major neon console manufacturers Sony, Nintendo and Sega? Bill Gates, who has resigned as chairman of Microsoft, came specially to speak for it. Xbox station.
But the most memorable moment for me was the trial session in front of the Flamingo Game booth.
I believe everyone has received the first-line intelligence about "Team Tactics" from Sohu Games. It is difficult to tell how fun it is from the intelligence alone.
After Zhou Xin held a press conference for TFT on behalf of Flamingo, there were only 8 computers placed on the booth outside Flamingo, and a total of 8 players could try it out.
The most unacceptable thing about Flamingo is that only 8 players can try it out at a time. Only the first player can continue playing, and the next 7 players need to give up their positions to the people behind.
In addition to the 8 computers, there is also a huge screen. On the screen is a simplified version of the score ranking list, which is the ladder mentioned by Zhou Xin.
You can queue up in a continuous loop, and your name and score will be listed on the ladder list behind if you are in the top 100.
The first 100 people can get a verification code, and after the game is officially launched, they can use the verification code to obtain out-of-print board skins.
The game itself is very fun. Whether it is the bonding mechanism or the mechanism that three chess pieces can be synthesized and upgraded, as well as the PVP battle mechanism, they are all very interesting.
As a game editor who specializes in game reviews, this is arguably the most fun game I've ever played.
But unfortunately, I was eliminated in the first round. Then when I wanted to queue up again, the queue in front of the flamingo booth was full of people. Later, the number of people became more and more, and the queue grew until I visually estimated that there were more than a thousand people.
Even if you wait in line for a whole day, you may not be able to play. Later, Flamingo projected real-time game footage of live players on the big screen at the door. This resulted in a huge crowd at the entire booth, even more crowded than the day Yu Suzuki signed autographs for players at the entrance of Sega.
If you want to be ranked in the top thousand, there is only one way, and that is to win as many consecutive games as possible. But this is too difficult. Teamfight Tactics is somewhat similar to Mahjong. Three one-star chess pieces can be upgraded to one two-star chess piece. Three two-star chess pieces can be upgraded to one three-star chess piece.
At the same time, different chess pieces require different gold coins to purchase, ranging from 1 gold coin to 5 gold coins. Whenever a player combines a Samsung 5-gold chess piece, all the players in the audience will cheer and scream.
It also has an equipment mechanism. Different basic equipment has different synthesis routes, which results in the entire game having both gaming and luck components. Although Zhou Xin said that this is a tower defense PVP game. But in essence it is completely different from previous tower defense games. For players who are playing for the first time, luck plays a major role.
So if you want to get as many points as possible, you have to queue for at least two rounds, which means you should be familiar with the rules as much as possible for the first time and rely on luck to be the first several times. Then master the rules when it's your second turn. Once you master the rules, you can more easily win in a row.
Because I had to interview many booths, I didn’t have time to queue up at the Flamingo booth. Later, towards the end, I had the honor to interview three of the top 100 TFT players during the E3 exhibition, including the number one player. .
Without exception, they waited in line for at least two rounds, and the top-ranked player took turns queuing in front of the Flamingo booth with his friends throughout the E3 exhibition.
Later, due to strong protests from players, the number of people who could experience it at one time was increased from 8 to 16.
Teamfight Tactics is undoubtedly the biggest surprise at this E3 exhibition. It is difficult for you to look at this game based on past experience. Like Zhou Xin's past works, it is full of innovative elements.
Generally, innovative elements mean that players are not easy to accept it at the beginning. It takes time for them to accept it, and it requires word-of-mouth fermentation and media publicity.
Teamfight Tactics seems to have skipped these processes directly. This game is full of innovative designs, but players do not need time to get started. The experience threshold is extremely low, and they can realize the fun in just a few minutes.
It has a completely different gold coin acquisition mechanism, bond mechanism, chess piece upgrade mechanism, draft mechanism, PVP mechanism interspersed with PVE links, and it even has an equipment synthesis mechanism.
These are mechanics I have never seen in other games before, and TFT blends them together as if they were born to be designed this way.
The most amazing thing is that the mechanism that sounds so complicated and innovative is actually very easy to use during the actual experience, with almost no difficulty. Zhou Xin and Flamingo have developed new products in the fields they are good at. I have been extremely looking forward to the day when "Team Tactics" is officially released.
The only regrettable thing is that there is currently no agent for TFT in China. If domestic players want to play, they can only apply for a Riot Games account from Amerikan, which may cause relatively high network delays. "
The above is an official report posted by a Sohu editor in Sohu’s gaming forum.
Because there are a large number of official accounts in the Riot Games forum, these official accounts will post some official news from game developers, and will also actively engage in some forum activities. Other game forums have followed suit, and Sohu has even created a news team dedicated to games.
Reports from Sohu Game News Team will be synchronized to Sohu Game Channel and Sohu Game Forum at the same time.
All players who have experienced Teamfight Tactics have given unanimous praise, and people who have experienced other games are also amazed by it.
"How do you evaluate the new game "Teamfight Tactics" brought by Flamingo Games to this E3 exhibition?"
As E3 is in full swing, a large amount of news from the front lines of the game has been reported by the game media, and these reports are inseparable from the game "Team Tactics".
Coupled with Riot Games' official publicity, after photos of long queues for the on-site "Top Tactics" trial were posted to the forum, players were curious about the magic of this game.
You can’t tell much of the mystery simply from the mechanics and promotional videos.
Quora has a lot of answers from front-line people who participated in the E3 exhibition:
"Newman's promotion at the game conference was completely unable to ignite the enthusiasm of players. Unlike "Angry Birds" and "Plants vs. Zombies", which are interesting at first glance, Newman's new work "Genting" this time It is difficult to tell what kind of game it is from the promotional video or introduction.
Even at the TFT press conference, my colleagues and I felt that this game was not worthy of Newman’s attention. You must know that this is the first time Newman has held a press conference for a game. Newman has great expectations for it, and we also have great expectations for it because of Newman.
Looking at the entire press conference, we feel that it did not meet our expectations. Compared with the promotional video of "Metal Slug 2", the promotional video of "Team Fighter Tactics" seems a bit boring, or there are no explosive points.
Including Newman talked about a lot of game mechanics and ranking mechanisms that were not easy to understand during the press conference. Even including the subsequent e-sports content, these lack highlights for industry veterans like me.
After the press conference, it was open to experience. Because we were media, we could directly experience TFT. After experiencing it, our colleagues and I were shocked. This is another typical Newman-style game.
The game mechanics are completely different from those in the past, with difficult game thresholds that are easy to master once you start, and a large number of unique and interesting game designs. The actual experience was a completely different feeling from listening to the press conference, maybe because Newman's presentation was so poor.
Simply speaking from the game itself, we are unanimously planning to give it a score of 9 or even higher.
It’s hard to imagine that in the electronic game industry, which has developed to this day and has a history of more than 20 years, there can still be games filled with a lot of innovation. "
This is the answer from the editor-in-chief of IGN. His answer represents the attitude of the game media.
In fact, the game media don't like Zhou Xin very much, because the emergence of Riot Games and its rating system has deprived the professional game media of a large part of their power, and even their credibility has been seriously affected.
The game media just gives high scores to games that are not fun. This score is seriously inconsistent with the player ratings in Riot Games, which will cause players to question the credibility of the magazine.
When there are too many such things, the magazine will be subconsciously labeled as untrustworthy. This also leads to game magazines not daring to forcefully adjust the content.
That is to say, for bad games, if the game developer offers money and it is difficult to refuse, then they will not rate it, they will only talk about the advantages and lightly brush off the shortcomings.
In the Riot Games forum, the videos of the exciting games played by the trial players that day were posted in the forum for players to download and watch.
A large number of positive reviews whetted the appetite of players, and then a download link was opened in Riot Games.
Flamingo also takes advantage of the current low cost of Internet advertising to promote marketing on related websites. You can see ads everywhere, and click to jump to the official website, but you just can’t play.
Only a string of instructions can be seen: It will be officially launched at 9 am North American time on May 15th. A set of hunger marketing combinations has definitely raised the expectations of players.
This method of play has very high requirements on the quality of the game itself. You have raised expectations to the fullest, which means that your game needs to be able to exceed the expectations of players.
Why Blood Lion has such a bad reputation is not because they overestimated their expectations. The final product did not even meet the players' bottom line, not to mention exceeding the players' expectations.
"Newman, the number of downloads of Amerikan has exceeded 200,000, and the number of downloads in the Europa region has exceeded 300,000.
This number of people has exceeded our expectations, and we need to activate alternatives to increase network bandwidth.
It is so popular, if players don’t approve of our charging method, then the more users we have, the more losses we will suffer. "Johnson was helpless.
The Amerikan area is okay, there will be income no matter what. After all, electronic payment in the Amerikan area is relatively mature.
However, in the Europa region, bills related to electronic payments have not yet been approved.
It will take at least half a year from the approval of the bill to the improvement of electronic payment channels.
In other words, in the past six months, they have not been able to make money from players in the Europa region, so they have provided server and broadband resources to European players.
I originally wanted to write 8k today.
(End of chapter)
