"Why are there so many people?" As soon as I arrived at the Chongqing Jiangnan Sports Center, I was frightened by the sight in front of me.
I'm here to see the 8th Anniversary Rekindle Ceremony of Naruto Mobile Game and the 2023 Finals. I thought that on Friday, January 5th, at 14 o'clock on weekdays, there should be fewer people here, after all, the schedule starts at 16 o'clock every day, but I didn't expect that there were already long queues in various activity areas outside the venue......
I guess some of the players, like me, thought they were too early, but they made a mistake — as I passed by the activity area, I felt a little emotion in my ears: "This line is too long." ”
Chongqing is just the tip of the line for this anniversary. There are also a lot of people in Shanghai, Shenzhen, Qingdao and Nanchang to watch the sub-venues.
The first scene of the Urban Channel
Reported on the activities of the Shenzhen branch
In all fairness, if someone had told me that a fighting mobile game that had been online for 8 years would have such a scale and popularity for offline events, I would probably not believe it. But these three days of the festival have refreshed my understanding of the user portrait of the "Naruto" mobile game again and again.
01 An offline festival for "social fear" players
One of the things that impressed me the most and what I didn't expect was that the users of the Naruto mobile game, who had never met in reality, were all social terrorists offline.
As soon as Grape Jun arrived at the venue, he saw a bunch of cosers dancing "Pure Land of Bliss", attracting a large number of passers-by. As a result, the on-site staff later told me that those people were players, not official cosers.
There is also a player skipping subject three
Even if there is no cos, there are many players who incarnate as Konoha Hidden Village ninjas in the live scenery and activities.
In the Yunlei Gorge area, players follow the staff to "fight Kirabi"
Swipe left and right to view
Not only Chongqing, but also the branch venues in four other cities also reproduced many famous scenes offline. For example, in the center of the Shenzhen branch venue, a huge statue of Susa was restored;
The entire Shenzhen branch venue was also converted into Konoha Hidden Village, and landmarks such as the village gate and the Hokage's office were moved into reality;
Swipe left and right to view
02 Is it for IP or for mobile games?
Seeing this, you might think it sounds like a comic con. I also wondered at first, how many people here really came because they liked Naruto as a mobile game?
But when I walked to the Prayer Ema area, I saw it - the largest proportion of prayers here is not for money or love, but for strengthening my favorite Naruto mobile game characters. In other words, most of the people who come to the scene actually care about the game itself.
Especially at the beginning of the outfield exhibition game, I noticed that there was a sudden decrease in the number of people in those interactive activity areas. Soon, almost everyone gathered in front of the exhibition stage.
There are no reproductions of famous scenes, only PvP fights, but the crowd is noticeably more emotional than before. Listening to their exclamations one after another, you should also feel that fighting PvP is what they want to see the most when they come here.
Player battle stage in Shenzhen branch
And if you want to talk about the most serious and fierce fighting competition, it has to be the finals schedule in the gymnasium that starts at 4 p.m. every day. For many players, this is the main meal to rekindle the festival.
At 2:30 p.m., the queue began at the entrance
Shenzhen branch venue to watch the stage
Different from the slapstick and amusement of the exhibition match, the atmosphere of the finals schedule is more tense. Although each game of player duels basically doesn't last more than five minutes due to PvP time constraints, the players' expressions change quickly during the table. In just a few seconds, it can also suddenly transition from a happy smile to a nervous worry. In other words, although the battle is limited in duration, no one is sure of winning until the winner is decided.
I was still laughing, but suddenly I realized that the player I liked might be losing
Then the favorite player turned the tables in desperation
On the day of the finals, the last day of the ceremony, the competition between the contestants became more intense. In the end, Mo Li won the first championship trophy of his career through the martial arts track, and Xiao Hao reached the final from the lower bracket of the indiscriminate track and finally won the championship, which is also the fifth time he has won the championship in the "Naruto" mobile game competition. (A ninja pool will be randomly selected before the start of each round of the undifferentiated track, which will test the depth of the ninja pool more than the martial arts match)
Xiao Hao won his fifth championship,
Many viewers held up their phones to capture this special moment
You can clearly feel that for these players, the players have placed their own emotions. In other words, the e-sports ecology of the "Naruto" mobile game has taken root and matured.
Three Xiaohao fans
03 The scale of the anniversary has changed? No, it's the popularity of the game that has changed
For players who follow the Naruto mobile game, these anniversary scenes may not be unusual. After all, this is not the first time that the game has officially held an anniversary, and they have been hosting esports competitions since the year they were launched.
But compared to the past, you will find that this year's anniversary is actually quite special. Specifically, it's significantly larger.
Overlooking the Chongqing Jiangnan Sports Center, see the watermark for the source
THAT'S WHY I COULDN'T HAVE ANTICIPATED THE EVENT'S POPULARITY AT FIRST: ON THE ONE HAND, THE SCALE UPGRADE CAME A LITTLE SUDDENLY, AND ON THE OTHER HAND, THE FIGHTING MOBILE GAME HAS BEEN AROUND FOR 8 YEARS, AND COMBINED WITH THE TIME DEBUFF, IT'S HARD FOR ME TO IMAGINE HOW MANY ACTIVE PLAYERS ARE STILL IN THE GAME.
But actually, I guessed the Naruto mobile game player retention trend wrong – this year, the product's active users are still breaking records.
Grape Jun feels that this is the most peculiar place, and it is also the key question worth exploring: how can a side-scrolling fighting mobile game continue to expand IP and category users in 8 years, and continue to grow against the trend and constantly refresh the active user record?
With such questions, Grape Jun randomly asked some players at the scene: Why do you like to play this game?
Another eldest brother who has been playing for 5 years said that he likes the skills of some of the characters in this game, specifically, he likes the skill design made by Xiao Li (one of the planners of the Naruto mobile game) the most.
This is basically the same as the "Naruto" mobile game player reviews I swiped on the Internet before, and it can be summed up as: the quality of the content is guaranteed, and 0 krypton, micro krypton, and heavy krypton can enjoy the fun of fighting competition.
Specific to 2023, an 8-year-old player at the scene told me that he felt that the content of the game was much better than before in the past year. As for what has changed, he said that there are three things: art, sound, and operability.
Regarding the last point, he explained: "In the past, I could win without brains, but in 2020 I was super forbearing! But now these new characters, you can't play without brains, you have to operate and think a little, but this is also more fun!"
The second brother from the right said that he was super forbearant in 2020
For the other four players, the shortest time to play the Naruto mobile game is 3 years
If you usually watch the official planning and talk show of the "Naruto" mobile game, you will find that they have indeed tried a lot of new ideas in terms of content in the past year.
For example, the Nine Lamas Naruto, which was launched in May, compared to other characters, is not only the volume of art special effects and animation performances, but also its strength and operability.
For another example, when they teamed up with Bruce Lee in June to launch Rock Lee's "Grandmaster of Interception", they grasped a lot of details in order to make Bruce Lee's sense of déjà vu: integrating the music composed by kung fu movie soundtrack master Huang Yinghua into the mystery of the character, cooperating with students from professional conservatories to create an audio library of martial arts movements, and dismantling Bruce Lee's movements and Jeet Kune Do moves and integrating them into Rock Lee's physical skills......
Stepping on the 8th anniversary, the latest S-class high-recruitment ninja just launched on January 5, Uchiha Sasuke's "Eternal Kaleidoscope" was evaluated by players as "epoch-making in quality", and the skill strength and operability were not inferior to the Nine Lamas Naruto, and the picture performance and action design were also rated as "very handsome".
What makes players feel "commendable" is that the planning of the "Naruto" mobile game does not take care of the design itself, but will communicate with players through planning and sticking. Ideas that players come up with, as long as they don't have too much impact on the balance of the game, will basically end up being implemented into the game.
And when the "Naruto" mobile game planning took the stage to reveal the new ninja during the finals, the players behind me also became extremely excited, and took out their mobile phones to shoot while saying, "Coming! It is not difficult to see that they have a lot of expectations for the new role.
Planning in the introduction of the New Year characters
04 When players evaluate a best-selling Top 4 game "Conscience"
The new characters bring more and more surprises to players, which must be a good thing from the player's point of view. But for the "Naruto" mobile game team, in order to do a good job of the new characters, their design, research and development, and operating costs are visibly rising.
Even so, the Naruto mobile game did not pass on the cost pressure to players. For example, Li Luo's "Intercepting Fist Master", which was launched in June this year, can be received for free by players logging in and signing in. Of course, this isn't the first time they've given characters to players.
Players joke that the Rubik's Cube may have been sent to lose themselves
This reminds me of what Wayne, Naruto's mobile game operations director, said, "You have to impress players with quality content, and they pay if they want to pay – that's the way to get back to the market." In other words, they simply trust users to pay for quality content.
And the player also made a statement with practical actions. First of all, at the level of public opinion, there are many people who are willing to speak out and recognize the efforts of planning. This is still relatively rare in the current domestic mobile game industry.
At the end of December, the official planner said that the show reviewed the past 5 years of game iterations.
Player reviews recognize the effort of the plan
Secondly, at the level of flow, the best-selling data of the "Naruto" mobile game also represents the actual support of players to a certain extent.
On January 5, the game rose to the top 4 of the best-selling list
Seeing this, I think you should also understand why the "Naruto" mobile game can continue to grow in reverse: even though the game quality and PvP competitive gameplay are constantly being upgraded, and the research and development cost of the game itself is also rising, for players, the krypton pressure that needs to be borne to experience the fun of this game is still not high. And this does not mean that the game will definitely lose, because players will eventually pay for the game they like.
I think that as long as the village rules and village style remain unchanged, next year's "Touching Village Annual Gathering" is expected to be very lively.
Mashiro and Xiaohao touch each other's heads. The head touching originates from an in-game emote that is usually used by the winner to comfort (taunt) the loser. It is also the most commonly used dating etiquette for Naruto mobile game players at present.