Three years ago, most practitioners may not have thought that a niche tower defense secondary product could become a dark horse in the mobile game market at that time, continue to become popular to this day, and raise the aesthetic texture of the domestic secondary yuan.
Tower defense, dark horses, design sense... That's right, this game is Ark of Tomorrow.
In the process of gradually branching out, "Ark of Tomorrow" is growing into a well-known IP that spans games, comics, animation and other fields, constantly bringing surprises to players. On April 23, Ark of Tomorrow held a three-year preview program, which brought players' expectations and social media popularity to a new climax.
High creativity is played steadily, and the mysterious blockbuster linkage attracts heated discussion
Like all the previous live broadcasts of "Ark of Tomorrow", the third anniversary live broadcast was warmly welcomed by players, representing the popularity of the live broadcast room points once exceeded 40 million, and reached the first place in the total list of B live broadcasts.
At the same time, "Ark of Tomorrow" has once again appeared on Weibo hot search with multiple topics for the third anniversary, and if you do not set the density of the bullet screen, it is even difficult for you to see the screen clearly. In Station B, relevant introductions, recordings, and interpretation videos have also sprung up.
On the show, the most exciting thing for many players is that the live broadcast finally announced that the heavy linkage with Capcom is about to open.
Creating content with IP as the center is the consensus of the current game industry, and the creation of IP is often inseparable from cross-media, that is, through different carriers, platforms and forms, it continues to inject new vitality into IP. Among them, IP linkage is an important part of IP expansion influence, and the significance of linkage is to break through the original circle layer and involve more target audiences. For the game market that has entered the stock market, linkage has become one of the most important expansion methods for games, especially secondary games with high fan loyalty.
The form and content of the linkage with Capcom will be presented, which undoubtedly stimulates the curiosity of players. On yesterday's three-week preview program, the newly exposed linkage was unsurprising, which triggered a new round of hot discussion among players. Leaving aside the content, eagle horn always seems to have a very good set in the matter of competing for the attention of users.
Afterwards, there was also a lot of speculation among players about which Capcom game "Ark of Tomorrow" would link. For example, the linkage "Devil May Cry" allows Dante to come to Terra Continent for adventure, the linkage "Monster Hunter" makes the giant beast hall appear, and the more wonderful idea is that it is linked to "Reverse Referee", so that Chengbutang helps players solve many unsolved mysteries in Rhode Island.
Monster Hunter is naturally very convenient in terms of the richness of enemy settings, but from the perspective of similar game settings, Resident Evil seems to be more suitable. Of course, as the player said, "Eagle Horn is free", whether it will link multiple Capcom IP at the same time is unknown.
In GameLook's view, every linkage can arouse the expectations of players, in addition to the unexpected choice of linkage objects, the player's trust in the content creation level of "Ark of Tomorrow" is the core reason why the Ark players are extremely sticky.
Birthday creators connect with each other and create ecological prosperity
For the mobile game industry, which generally has a life cycle of only one and a half years, three years is both a super-average achievement and a new starting point. The need for the development of their own IP, the increasingly large audience, the continuous and meticulous progress indicators... They all put forward higher requirements for the diversity and quality of game content.
As the saying goes, a thousand lines above, a needle below, the game alone, it is bound to be difficult to carry the enthusiasm of all players. Fortunately, eagle horn has never been alone in the content creation of "Ark of Tomorrow". Every player is part of the Ark of Tomorrow content ecosystem.
After the preview program, the UGC creators also brought the third anniversary of the doctors to the creation party, and different UGC creators celebrated the birthday of "Ark of Tomorrow" with one excellent fandom two-creation program after another. The birthday creation party also successfully appeared on the hot search and recommendation of the B station, and was affirmed and recognized by the players.
In a way, Eagle Horn and Ark of Tomorrow are lucky. In GameLook's cognition, the importance of UGC has long become the consensus of the industry, but the high-quality and prosperous second-creation ecology is always unattainable. This is also the reason why people always refer to the popularity of "Ark of Tomorrow" as "the wind blows". Because there is always a group of creators who love the creation of "Ark of Tomorrow" and are good at creating, they continue to "produce food", and eventually form an ideal of official co-creation with creators.
The formation of UGC programs such as the New Year Party and the Birthday Creation Party has gradually become a "tradition", marking the completion of the development of the UGC ecology of "Ark of Tomorrow" from point to surface, and has become a common festival for Ark players. The meaning of "festival" lies in the unique sense of ceremony, which helps to strengthen the player's identification with their own identity and become the gravitational center of Ark of Tomorrow to attract more users.
IP multi-dimensional layout to create a unique world
Inside and outside the game, Eagle Point has always been committed to one goal – to create a unique world.
Producer SeaCat once said that there is no single methodology for game development, as long as it is carefully made, there will be flashes of light, and players who love it.
Eagle Horn does exactly that. In the process of building the world, "Ark of Tomorrow" does not stick to the single carrier of the game, but continues to try to extend the boundaries of IP through various forms such as peripherals, music, comics, and animation. Therefore, in the third anniversary live broadcast, Eagle Horn announced the offline linkage with China Post and Guangming Bear Xiaobai, introduced the new rhythm synesthesia and carnival activities, and previewed many comics such as "A1 Action Preparatory Group"...
In addition, in addition to the release of the animation TV trailer of "Prelude to the Dawn", Eagle Horn also brought a new CG animation and bubble noodle fan-related content, and at the same time announced a blockbuster news, and set up a special animation studio - Gravity Well.
Strictly speaking, this is not the first time Eagle Horn and Ark of Tomorrow have ventured into animation. In April 2021, on the second anniversary of tomorrow's Ark, Eagle Horn released the CG of the pilot animation "Under the Tide" on the live broadcast, and in October of the same year, it also previewed the mini-series "Carp Detective Agency".
From the previous material types released by "Ark of Tomorrow", it is speculated that perhaps Eagle Horn has already formed a working group with different categories such as comics, derivatives, animation, etc., and the animation production team has officially announced it as a studio, which also represents that Eagle Horn's emphasis on animation has been further enhanced.
In addition, we also found that with the establishment of the animation studio Gravity Well, the official website of Eagle Point has also added a large number of animation job requirements recently, covering multiple functions such as animators, storyboarders, art supervisors, and executive directors. All indications are that Eagle Horn's determination to cultivate animation is becoming stronger and stronger.
The third anniversary of the content update, linkage, birthday creation party co-creation, and the announcement of gravity well animation studio... It is not difficult to find that Eagle Horn has begun to jump out of the simple game content creation for the creation of IP, connecting from more fields such as point and animation to achieve multi-dimensional layout.
epilogue
Building an IP is never easy. It needs to be based on an engaging worldview, with continuous updates of quality content, with the help of multiple mediums to tell different stories, allowing users to observe, read, and even experience the whole world from different perspectives.
Through the observation of "Ark of Tomorrow", we will realize that Eagle Horn is gradually stripping away the label of "small factory" and appearing more and more mature, but unexpectedly, the price of this maturity does not include the loss of its unique creative expression. Being able to produce more player-favorite content with more professional efficiency may be the charm of Ark of Tomorrow towards the next third anniversary. And this charm, I believe it will continue to nourish the "Ark of Tomorrow" in the future, nourishing a more potential pan-quadratic IP growth.
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GameLook Daily Game Industry Report
Global vision / depth is material