Compared with the first two years of birth, the discussion of WeChat mini games in the industry has been obviously insufficient. Especially at a time when mini games are still labeled with stereotypes such as "not doing much". But a Guangzhou game company relied on small games to achieve MAU 6 million.
On February 22, data agency QuestMobile released the "2021 China Mobile Internet Annual Report". The report lists the TOP 10 mini-games according to the December MAU rankings. Among them, the heavy 2D games "Journey to the West of the King" and "Sword Zun", which ranked 6th and 8th in the list, are particularly interesting.
Originally, the appearance of such heavy products in the list of WeChat mini games that focus on leisure is already very strange. But what is even stranger is that the MAU of the two products is as high as 6.21 million and 5.24 million, respectively.
In contrast, among the newly launched native APP mobile games mentioned in the report in 2021, the MAU of "Flower Yishan Heart Month" ranked top 4 is 4.89 million.
Although there is a certain error in QuestMobile's data, it is also a fact that the two 2D heavy WeChat mini-games of "Journey to the West" and "Sword Zun" have achieved high MAU, surpassing many native APP mobile game products.
You know, like "HuaYishan Heart Moon" and "Ace Racing", the heavy products of large manufacturers, their research and development costs are tens of millions, and most of them adopt the "big publicity" model in terms of purchase. The "Journey to the West of the King" and "Sword Zun" belong to the two heavy WeChat mini games of Guangzhou Leniu and Le play, and the product production investment is bound to be less than that of the star games in the APP market. But after tossing and turning, MAU is in the lead.
Although it is impossible to know the specific profitability of the two products, it is unlikely that the product will lose money from the perspective of its type positioning and the ridiculously high MAU. Otherwise, the buy volume will not reach such a large user size.
These two MAU million-plus mini-games, you may be able to do it
Objectively speaking, if you look at the product quality, there is a big gap between "Journey to the West" and "Sword Zun" and today's original mobile games, and the game as a whole retains many elements of classic page games.
Perhaps in order to fit the preferences of the Audience of the WeChat platform, both games have adopted vertical screen battles that are more suitable for one-handed operation. Although the sense of immersion is slightly worse than the horizontal screen, it is indeed much more convenient to operate, and the guidance in the game is often placed directly below the screen, reducing the frequency of large movements of the thumb used for operation.
The biggest difference between the two games is their battle type, Journey to the West adopts a turn-based combat method, while Sword Zun is ARPG. But GameLook really experienced down, limited to the game have added automatic pathfinding, automatic monster fighting, the experience difference is not big, the player really needs to operate the place is limited to one-click task, point, or other one-click can complete the operation.
In addition, the common equipment forging system, pet grabbing, immortal cultivation, PK gameplay, world chat channels, and cross-service team copies, etc., common game systems and gameplay on the market are mostly included in the two games. In short, in terms of the content presented, the two products are not much different from the MMO page games currently on the market.
However, it should be pointed out that although the two products are limited to the classics in terms of gameplay, the exquisite performance of the art style and screen is indeed profound, and there is a clear difference with the performance of the same type of game.
Do WeChat small games, small and medium-sized companies and large factories run the same line
Looking at the performance of the game alone, it may be difficult for you to understand why the MAU of "Journey to the West" and "Sword Zun" can surpass the products of some major manufacturers. Regardless of the content, GameLook believes that the competitiveness of the two products is reflected in two points:
On the one hand, the natural technical ceiling of the WeChat mini game platform restricts the play of the "banknote ability" of large manufacturers in research and development, so that small and medium-sized manufacturers can stand on the same running line; on the other hand, the concessions of the WeChat mini game platform in terms of capital efficiency and sharing ratio also allow small and medium-sized game enterprises with funds to have more opportunities.
As we all know, the WeChat mini game platform will have certain capacity restrictions on the game package due to the requirements of small and fine, which means that the development of small games is more dancing with shackles. In order to meet the requirements of the package, most mini games use 2D form, and the engine used in 3D mini games is also concentrated on the more light Laya, Cocos.
For small and medium-sized manufacturers, the benefits of the upper limit are obvious - not only reduce the development threshold and cost, but also narrow the technical and financial disadvantages with large manufacturers, and there will be no dilemma of being hit by large manufacturers in the native APP mobile game market.
The optimization and concession of the WeChat mini game platform in terms of capital turnover and share ratio is also the key to the breakthrough of waist manufacturers.
In the 2022 WeChat open class, Weng Yugang, product manager of the WeChat Mini Game Team, said that compared with the monetization process of the traditional channel settlement in January, the WeChat Mini Game Platform can achieve the withdrawal cycle once every half a month, which is twice the efficiency improvement compared with external channels.
It is worth mentioning that if the developer only wants to use the funds as advertising funds to transfer to the advertising account, the platform's "fast turnover" service can also realize the flow of funds in two accounts in a short period of time, and can also get 50% of the advertising gold discount. In other words, if the product continues to generate flow after it is launched, it can turn the flow into advertising costs, continue to invest in the purchase volume to expand the user base, significantly improve the capital turnover rate, and achieve a "snowball".
In addition, the share ratio of WeChat mini games has also been reduced, ordinary mini games can get 60% of the monthly turnover, and after applying for creative mini games, they can get 70% of the monthly turnover. Compared with the 55-point ratio of traditional channels (actually 47.5:52.5), the distribution cost brought about by the KPI requirements of various channels, and the transparent share ratio of WeChat Mini Game Platform is also friendly.
In the era when content is king, is distribution a technical job?
In recent years, perhaps with the rise of some content-oriented products, GameLook found that there is a topic that is mentioned in the industry from time to time: "Content is king" era, game publishing seems to be more and more worthless? The answer to the question varies, but from The company, GameLook, at least sees an answer beyond mainstream perception.
Le Niu Games, the developer of Journey to the West, is no longer a raw face. Not long ago, GameLook focused on the report of another MMO mobile game of Leniu Company, "Eternal Night Star God (National Costume Game Named Nine Spirit God Domain)", which was launched on December 30, Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan in China on December 30 last year through the dewball game agent, and has been steadily dominating the top 10 of the Taiwan service best-seller list for two consecutive months.
Similar to Journey to the West, Eternal Night Star God is a typical buy-in game. However, the actual situation is that both products have outstanding market or user performance, which is naturally due to the distribution team's accurate insight into the market and traffic.
With the help of the publisher, iQiyi Games, Eternal Night Star God seized the product window period in the Chinese Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan markets, effectively packaged the products by inviting Lin Xinru as a spokesperson, launching theme songs, etc., and concentrated on the delivery at the right time node, successfully attracting target users. Although there is no big IP blessing, the breakthrough has been completed.
The same is true of Journey to the West, which chose the WeChat Mini Game platform as a 2D turn-based game and achieved surprising success. Interestingly, at a time when MMO mobile games continue to encounter difficulties, Leniu Games will still launch 3 new MMO games in 2022: "Tower of Dawn", "Divine Fire Continent", "Mountains and Seas and Spirit Demons".
At a game marketing offline exchange meeting held by Huge Engine last year, the person in charge of the purchase volume of the Leniu team shared at that time how to do heavy games in game live broadcasting, which was quite refreshing and left a deep impression on the peers present, to say where are the industry opportunities? In GameLook's view, opportunities are left to people with hearts.
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GameLook Daily Game Industry Report
Global vision / depth is material