Wuxia is probably rooted in the blood of Chinese a complex, it is true that the momentum of the decline of wuxia novels has become more and more obvious in recent years, the death of Mr. Jin Yong three years ago has made many people have a feeling of the end of the era, but Jin Yong's series of works is undoubtedly an important part of the martial arts dream in the hearts of generations in recent decades, and the game industry has also entered the game early, providing the most symbolic presentation for many people's martial arts dreams.
As early as 2006, changyou, which launched the end game "Tianlong Babu" and won the right to adapt the mobile game of Jin Yong's ten works for 20 million yuan in July 2013, will certainly not be an unfamiliar company for Jin Yong fans. Just today, Wei Qing, CDO of Changyou, posted in the circle of friends, "Warmly celebrate the domestic flow of "Tianlong Eight Mobile Games" to break 10 billion! "The investment of The year is far from just a "return to the capital".
At the Beijing International Game Innovation Conference last September, Wei Qing revealed that the game's turnover had reached 8 billion yuan by the third anniversary. As an MMO game launched in July 2017, it can still harvest 2 billion yuan in nearly a year and a half, and achieve domestic flow of more than 10 billion in 4 years, which is not dazzling in a number of mobile games, and behind this, in addition to the joint release of Changyou and Tencent, the appeal of the IP of "Tianlong Eight Parts" cannot be ignored.
Unlike some of jin yong film and television works that have been remade and "destroyed classics" in recent years, "Tianlong Eight Mobile Games" has indeed withstood the test of time and players, and still has a high score of 7.9 in TapTap games.
The martial arts spirit in Jin Yong's works has been recognized and supported in the virtual world of the game, and the game, as an important part of the IP ecology, Jin Yong's martial arts universe will go in what direction under the influence of the game.
Classics never go out of style
Starting from 1955's "Book of Swords and Vengeance", in 17 years, until 1972's "Deer Ding", Jin Yong created a total of 15 novels, constructing a world full of his understanding of "chivalry" and "jianghu", and then version after edition of classic film and television remakes and interpretations, but also let Jin Yong's works in a often new form, accompanied the past Chinese from the age of ten to fifty or sixty years old life.
In the eyes of many people, "Tianlong Babu" is a crucial work in Jin Yong's martial arts series, and it is "the master of Jin Yong's style". In the "Report on the "Jin Yong Composition" of Contemporary Young People" released by DT Finance and Tamen not long ago, "Tianlong Babu" spanned multiple age groups and won the first place in the list of "the most popular Jin Yong novels and film and television dramas".
In terms of knowledge, a person titled "Why do many people say that "Tianlong Babu" is Jin Yong's best novel?" The question received 680,000 views, and many netizens analyzed the characteristics of the work from multiple angles such as literature, Buddhism, and philosophy.
In terms of games, as a game owner who owns the copyright of the original adaptation, according to the Data of the State Press and Publication Administration, since 2012, Changyou and its Seventh Avenue Technology Co., Ltd. have launched 11 related game products in the past 10 years. After the "Tianlong Eight Mobile Games" cooperated with Tencent, Changyou also released two adapted games, "Tianlong Eight Glory Edition" and "Tianlong Eight Parts Return".
Even if you don't consider the countless pirated and IP game products in the early years, the work of "Tianlong Eight Parts" has already exceeded 10 billion in the game.
The efforts of game companies based on changyou are naturally rewarding, and in the 25-40-year-old users at the core of MMO games, that is, the player group from the 80s to the 95s, the impact of the game on the spread of Jin Yong martial arts cannot be ignored.
Unlike younger audiences who have a variety of choices such as the Internet and film and television works in the process of growing up, this group of people is often a loyal audience of classic film and television dramas, from the sidelines of film and television to game interaction, which is a very natural growth. So it is not difficult to find that the spokesperson of "Tianlong Eight Mobile Games" invited Huang Rihua, the actor of the 97 version of Qiao Feng, and the "New Tianlong Eight Parts" that was launched a year ago was promoted by Hu Jun, who played the 03 version of "Qiao Feng".
In the "Contemporary Young People's "Jin Yong Composition" Report", nearly 20% of the post-80s have learned about Jin Yong's martial arts works from the game.
Image source: DT Finance
The ultimate form of MMO
Jin Yong martial arts works such as "Tianlong Babu" have been adapted into MMO games, which is naturally related to Changyou's own experience and characteristics, but more importantly, the characteristics of martial arts works that attract the audience the most also determine that MMO is the most suitable category for martial arts IP adaptation.
Excellent martial arts works often build a profound and magical fictional world for readers, which not only has the dashing of chivalry, but some works will even reflect history and reality, with a sense of heaviness and philosophical atmosphere. The requirements of this strong narrative doom it to be almost impossible to change into MOBA, Roguelike and other games.
Similar to Jin Yong and other martial arts works, not only simply attract generation after generation, almost all audiences who like martial arts have more or less fantasized about entering the jianghu in martial arts works, or becoming the protagonists in the works, or just a mysterious chivalrous guest, this demand for bringing themselves into the fictional world of the work is also the advantage of MMOs.
Coupled with the prevalence of Jin Yong martial arts, the thick history, the conflict of multiple forces, home country, war and other narrative essential elements, building a virtual world for players has become a game adaptation to try to convey the spirit of jianghu and chivalry in Jin Yong's novels, and it must be done.
As we all know, the ultimate form of MMO is "Metaverse", MMO for Metaverse, is the old bottle of new wine, but in MMO games, what players have to do is to manipulate the characters in the game, and Metaverse, more like a sandbox MMO, the player is the character in the game.
And which Fan of Jin Yong does not want to become a character in the novel, or enter such a world and get to know the classic characters in Many works such as Qiao Feng, Duan Yu, Ren Yingying, Zhou Zhiruo and so on? The technology to add NPCs to games, or to future "Metaverse", that doesn't rely entirely on established program control, has actually appeared not long ago.
Late last year, EA filed a new patent for an AI computing model with the U.S. Copyright Office, which aims to revolutionize the way AI mimics human behavior in games and make AI more human-like. Not long ago, a company called Sensorium also publicly demonstrated its latest AI-powered NPC, using a "hybrid evolutionary AI architecture based on genetic algorithms and reinforcement learning", which will naturally evolve in the process of interacting with players.
Image source: Sensorium
Although these technologies are still not publicly commercially available in the game, with the help of AI, perhaps the game company can not only restore a character in Jin Yong's novel, but even the subsequent growth and fate of the character, which can be continued or changed in the interaction with the player.
In addition to the classic tribute, can the Jin Yongyuan universe be recreated?
However, no matter how many ideas about MMO and Metavalse, follow-up initiatives are still difficult.
As a classic of several generations, Jin Yong's martial arts world, like most IPs, must also need fresh blood to maintain prosperity. Of course, round after round of uneven quality film and television adaptation is a good choice, and in the past few decades, it has also made the entire IP have a certain influence in the world. But the game is different, even capcom, the god of fried cold rice, will add new stories, characters, and new content to its IP, and the same is true for Jin Yong's martial arts games.
Leaving aside for the time being whether these new changes can be recognized by players and whether they can be recognized by copyright owners is a very difficult thing. After all, the classic does not change, it is placed on the top of the cabinet, even if it falls to ashes, it is a classic, but once the subsequent creation is opened, it is very likely to fall into the same place as the eighth season of "Game of Thrones", "The Final Words of Attack on Titan" and "The Last survivor 2".
For example, if the game company does not make too many restrictions, then in the interaction with the player, the AI is deliberately trained to be "anti-social" personality, how to define the harm caused by the responsibility; and once the game company is over-restricted, then whether we retreat from the so-called Metavalse back to the MMO game.
And from the current development trend of Metavalse, UGC will be an inevitable stage, and whether players' creations based on this worldview can be recognized by copyright owners are obvious questions. Not to mention some of the historical elements in Jin Yong's martial arts, whether there will be a suspicion of historical nihilism in such a high-freedom world is a topic that is very easy to fall into the whirlpool of public opinion.
In the development of Jin Yong martial arts in the past 70 years, it has already had a considerable influence in China, and even gave birth to the "Jin Xue" that specializes in research works, and it should be known that before this, this was the treatment of such a famous book as "Dream of the Red Chamber".
It is said that a person's real death is when he is forgotten, although Mr. Jin Yong has gone west, his spirit has been preserved together with the works, and how to make these works move forward with the times is what all the "chivalrous guests" who once wanted to fight the sword are working hard.