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By 2022, the persistence of true cloud gaming companies has done at least three practical things:
1. Help cross-platform money make money.
Some domestic console game publishers have determined that old games with version numbers that are re-issued on cloud game platforms such as Migu and Tianyi can indeed attract new customers in the nostalgic and sinking markets and continue to make money.
2. Help the high hardware threshold of boutique mobile games to make money.
The store ranking and third-party data show that the cloud version of "Original God" made by Wei Ling Times entered the top 30 of the AppStore best-seller list, and the income in the first 20 days exceeded 20 million yuan.
3. Help mobile game purchase volume to reduce costs and increase efficiency.
According to 37 Interactive Entertainment, Sheng Qu Games and its cloud game technology solution service provider Fast Disk Technology, the recently launched "Qingyu Nian" mobile game can reduce the cost of an A by nearly 30% after using the cloud micro-terminal purchase program. At the same time, in the case of using Qualcomm 865 computing power, the cost of cloud services brought by a new user is less than 6 cents.
Considering that the single-player and console game resources are small, the cloud version is difficult to pay, and the boutique mobile game with a high threshold is only "Original God" for the time being. At this time when new products are difficult to issue and the amount is difficult to buy, the story of cloud micro-terminal purchase is more worth telling.
Basic logic: Refer to registration before downloading
The logic of cloud micro-terminal purchase is not complicated, that is, to minimize the threshold for players to enter and experience the game.
Generally speaking, the traditional buying path of a mobile game is probably: determine the user base and channels - do the corresponding materials - delivery - obtain users, do CPM, CPA settlement.
Under this set of paths, the user's behavior path is probably: visiting the channel - seeing the material of interest - clicking - downloading the game client - registering - experiencing, and then churning or retention, paying.
What about cloud micro-terminal buying? Most obviously, the user's path of behavior will change.
Because it can be launched directly on the micro-terminal, the player's registration and experience are mentioned before the download, and the local client download and the game experience are carried out at the same time, almost seamlessly.
Users can skip the download waiting time of ten minutes or even tens of minutes, as well as hardware storage and performance obstacles, directly click on the advertisement, and register and experience in the cloud micro-terminal in a few seconds to download.
If you think the game is OK, if you have good function, choose to play while playing, play for a while, and go to the local client to continue. Players who are not functional and can endure the discounted picture quality and smoothness of cloud games can continue to retain and pay in the cloud.
Of course, even if the user plays for a few seconds and feels that the game is not good, then this "registration" with almost no operating cost is completed.
Taking the recent "Qingyu Nian" mobile game as an example, the game features big IP, high quality, and big world MMO, and the target users need to see IP elements and exquisite pictures to act.
At this time, there are two main tasks for the fun of the game:
1. Do enough to attract people, maximize the display of these characteristics of the material, marketing, so that users want to experience. As a result, there are the most purchased materials and celebrity endorsements in February.
2. Lower the threshold for users to download and experience.
In this piece, the value given by the cloud micro-terminal is to turn the 8G client into the 8M cloud micro-terminal, turn the player's tens of minutes of download waiting time into a few seconds, and reduce the conversion rate loss caused by various accidents here by reducing the time-consuming.
Players can click to download on the TikTok advertisement and enter the game through the cloud micro-terminal in a few seconds
As for the effect, according to The Fast Disk Technology and Sheng Qu Games, the mobile game "Qingyu Nian" uses cloud micro-terminal purchases, and the acquisition cost of a single A is reduced by about 30%, and the conversion effect of the same material delivery is several times higher than that of the traditional purchase method.
Specific operation: more than ten people docking, the fastest two days to land
The effective link between the game and the cloud is a very heavy job, the so-called cloud native game, need to do from the development to the distribution and operation of the full cloud, cloud versions such as "Cloud • Original God" also need to be the early intervention of the Weiling era in the development of "Original God", and the resident technicians of the two sides spend several months doing detailed docking and debugging.
Put into the cloud micro-terminal purchase program, the difficulty is still there, but it will be relatively reduced.
According to the relevant employees of 37 Interactive Entertainment and Sheng Qu Games, the company's main difficulties in the development of the new cloud micro-terminal are concentrated in the two parts of demand docking and time node selection, but "it is not a big difficulty". Specifically, the development cycle of a completely new cloud micro-terminal is about 1 month, the number of docking times between the two sides is less than 10 times, most of them are remote, and the number of resident or meetings to work together is less.
Gui Jingjing, co-founder and COO of Fast Disk Technology, also mentioned in the interview that after the technical capabilities and solution standardization of technical service providers reach a certain level, the development cycle and docking difficulty are not the main problems of cloud micro-terminal cooperation.
For example, in the "Qing Yu Nian" mobile game cooperation, there are three main stages of fast disk and Sheng Qu docking:
First, in June 2021, the game is basically finished and has a high maturity. Executives from both sides met to talk about their understanding of cloud games and their respective capabilities, and determined that mobile games currently hope that cloud games will solve the problem of promotion, and reduce costs and increase efficiency.
Second, in early January 2022, the cloud micro-terminal delivery plan was determined and technology docking began. Among them, the opening is responsible for developing and running the cloud micro-terminal, opening up channels, registration, payment and other links, and Sheng qu is responsible for providing materials, adapting, and providing corresponding user benefits and content for the cloud version.
Third, at the beginning of February, the specific implementation of the plan landed, counting the Spring Festival holiday, a total of less than 1 month to complete. During the period, the two sides had several visits and meetings, and more than ten people participated.
In addition, in the follow-up docking of cloud micro-terminal cooperation, the landing cycle of the new cloud micro-terminal purchase program can be shortened to less than 1 week, and it can be completed as soon as 2 or 3 days. With the current degree of standardization and technical strength of the current express market, they can provide cloud micro-terminal purchases and cloud services for dozens of products at the same time.
"Qing Yu Nian" mobile game cloud game real machine screen
Seeing this, the cloud micro-terminal purchase volume has already had a one-sided image: the purchase effect is good, the development time is short, the process is not complicated, and it is a cost reduction and efficiency increase artifact.
But there is another fact in reality, this thing is good, but there are still not many people have tried the "new thing".
What has shaped this split is the lack of understanding of cloud gaming by game vendors and the fear of the high cost of computing power. The actual situation is actually better than many people think.
The details of cloud micro-terminals: ubiquity, technology costs, models
According to a number of small and medium-sized game companies, their wait-and-see attitude towards cloud micro-terminal purchases mainly comes from four questions:
1. How valuable is this thing
2. How much to spend and how to judge how much money is appropriate
3. Is not suitable for their own products
4. The value of the amount bought in this new way will not change
This piece, value-related as already explained above, can indeed be a significant reduction in cost and efficiency. The rest, we also asked for results from service providers and experienced game providers.
First, taking the fast drive as an example, they are currently charged according to the computing power, and they can give the game provider two ways to pay.
If there are more products, or a single product has long-term and large-scale purchase demand, it can be booked monthly. One-time package under a certain standard, volume of computing power for long-term use. This approach is more robust, but can lead to redundancy and waste of hashing power.
Products are fewer, smaller, mainly engaged in short-term purchases, you can also choose more flexible pay-per-view. Every time users use the cloud micro-terminal, they will charge the corresponding hash rate, generally starting from a few cents.
Proportionally, in the purchase volume of the "Qingyu Nian" mobile game, if the acquisition cost of an A is 100 yuan, the game provider needs to pay only about 1-2 yuan to the fast disk, the input cost is less than 3%, and the acquisition cost of a single A can be reduced by 30%. In short, the bulk of the money collection is still the channel, and the cloud micro-terminal is exchanged for a small amount of investment in exchange for a lot of efficiency improvement.
As for the new purchase volume recycling model, according to Sheng Qu employees, before the launch of the "Qing Yu Nian" mobile game, they had done a small-scale cloud micro-terminal purchase model test in early March, and the budget investment was about 5%, and the "effect was basically satisfactory". When it was officially launched, the budget of cloud micro-terminal purchases increased several times compared with before, and the conversion rate of users who converted from cloud micro-terminals to client downloads increased by 3 times, "the effect exceeded expectations".
37 Interactive Entertainment revealed that the previous cooperation effect is basically satisfactory, but from the perspective of advertising, after the cloud micro-terminal joins, game providers should redesign targeted materials and find new recycling models through multiple practices, so as to be more accurate.
Second, in terms of universality, Gui Jingjing believes that the "point-and-play" feature of cloud games in the cloud micro-terminal will greatly reduce the threshold of user experience, which is easy to make good products easier to find, and it is easy to expose defective products faster, so in theory, it is more suitable for high-quality products or products that can quickly display the essence in the early stage.
Finally, because the user's "action" in the cloud game version of the retention, payment has been at a low level, some enterprises believe that the users bought through the cloud micro-terminal are too "generic", the education cycle is too long, and the value is not large.
On this point, Gui Jingjing's view is that compared with the short-term "rapid increase in user recharge", cloud service providers and game providers should have a final thinking and pursue long-term value.
In the eyes of the fast drive, playing online will be the main way to experience the game in three or five years. Therefore, in the cloud micro-terminal service, on the one hand, Fast Disk pursues the needs of balancing game studios and market departments, with Qualcomm 865 and nearly 30 nodes to ensure the cloud game experience, and there are also playing this service to promote the conversion of micro-terminal users to client users.
On the other hand, they also emphasize the completion of the commercial closed loop in the cloud, and directly open up payment on the cloud micro-terminal, so that users can complete the payment without downloading. Gui Jingjing said that Fast Disk is gradually collecting and analyzing various behavioral data of cloud micro-terminal users, and will do special user growth for micro-terminals in the future.
In short, today's cloud micro-terminal can already help mobile game purchases to achieve a more obvious cost reduction and efficiency increase, as for the user value after that, more accurate new models, etc., there are more cases to support and more attempts.
When the old operation is no longer suitable for the harsher industry environment, it is necessary to understand and try new things, and it is more promising.