On the Douyin platform, game anchor Zhang Daxian started his first live broadcast in "Honor of Kings". Although this live broadcast room is still labeled as a "newcomer", it topped the popularity list of the whole site only 8 minutes after the broadcast, and the number of likes exceeded 100 million within 10 minutes. Before the first game ended, the live broadcast room had already won the title of the top 100 list of the whole site.
Zhang Daxian previously conducted live broadcasts on Tencent's Douyu and Huya platforms, and now he has switched to Douyin, not only witnessing the reconciliation between Tencent and Bytes, but also experiencing the decline of Douyu and Huya.
This live broadcast is not only a personal victory for Zhang Daxian, but also a landmark event. It marks the dismantling of the barriers between two Chinese internet giants, Tencent and ByteDance, in the gaming space.
"Honor of Kings" opened up live broadcast rights to Douyin, which is a major shift in the relationship between the two parties. Looking back at history, in 2016, Tencent sued Douyin for copyright issues over "Honor of Kings", and since 2019, Douyin has been banned from streaming the game for five years. The competition between the two companies was once very fierce, especially in the field of long and short videos, and even triggered the so-called "pig food theory".
However, since 2023, the relationship between the industry giants has begun to ease. Tencent and ByteDance first relaxed restrictions on the secondary creation of short videos, and now they are cooperating in the field of games. With Zhang Daxian's live broadcast, Douyin's live broadcast ban on "Honor of Kings" has officially become a thing of the past, and some netizens commented that this is a historic moment.
Industry insiders believe that the conflict between Tencent and ByteDance on the business line is no longer obvious, and the two sides already have a basis for cooperation. Tencent shut down its own Penguin Live and NOW Live after the merger failed to promote Huya Douyu, and no longer insisted on its dominance in game live streaming and marketing. ByteDance, on the other hand, will massively shut down its self-developed unlaunched games at the end of 2023 and instead focus on a more efficient way to monetize by selling traffic to game manufacturers.
As one of the largest game companies in China, Tencent holds a large number of game copyrights, of which "Honor of Kings" is its important trump card. As the largest short video platform in China, Douyin has a huge user base. Dr. Luo Rentong, an expert in the application of digital economy, said that the cooperation between the two parties is expected to change the landscape of the game live broadcast industry, Tencent can use Douyin's traffic to further expand the influence of "Honor of Kings", and Douyin can attract new game users brought by big streamers and earn a share of the game live broadcast.
However, this may also mean that Tencent is no longer seeking to build a dominant game live streaming platform, but chooses to achieve mutual benefit and win-win results with Douyin. For Betta and Huya, who were originally in the first echelon, their fate will also be rewritten, and the road ahead may be even more difficult.
In order to continuously consolidate their competitive advantages and build their own business barriers, Tencent and Byte have been unable to tolerate each other, launching an all-round confrontation in everything from games to social networking and music, and even building a high "Berlin Wall" between each other like other Chinese Internet giants.
However, under the general trend of anti-monopoly and win-win cooperation, in recent years, Internet giants have begun to gradually "tear down the wall", and the cooperation between Tencent and Byte is also deepening step by step.
Taking the Douyin live broadcast of "Honor of Kings" as an example, the cooperation between the head content IP and the platform can bring at least three positive sum effects.
First, both sides can get increments.
The full opening of "Honor of Kings" to Douyin live broadcast will bring top-level native content and IP resources to Douyin, which will be converted into user increments, creators (anchors, short video authors) and derivative content increments.
Second, the cooperation between "Honor of Kings" and Douyin may continue to deepen, and follow-up actions may have an impact on the industry pattern and customary methodology, leading new changes.
With the full opening of the "Honor of Kings" Douyin live broadcast, the cooperation between the two parties will not only be limited to short videos and live broadcasts, but will extend to the fields of delivery, community ecology and even product distribution. When top content platforms and top distribution platforms can continue to cooperate deeply, and when top game brands find new acquisitions and UGC blue oceans, the story will be even bigger.
Finally, the cooperation between the two is not only mutually beneficial, but also brings new needs to the game and live broadcast industries, creating new space for many industrial chain links such as live broadcast platforms, MCNs, and anchors.
With the reconciliation between Tencent and ByteDance, the future of the game live streaming industry is still unclear, but the industry has already begun to undergo changes.
On the one hand, the growth of Douyu and Huya has slowed, and on the other hand, Douyin, Kuaishou and Bilibili are competing for users' time.
According to the financial report, the average daily usage time of users of Kuaishou and Bilibili in the third quarter of 2023 will be 129.9 minutes and more than 100 minutes, respectively, both of which have achieved year-on-year growth. Although Douyu and Huya did not release this data, their decline has become an industry consensus.
Huya will turn from profit to loss in 2022, with a net loss of 487 million yuan. In the face of declining performance, Huya founder and CEO Dong Rongjie left in August 2023.Douyu's situation is even more severe, and in November 2023, Chengdu public security confirmed that Douyu's founder Chen Shaojie was arrested on suspicion of opening a casino.
In terms of user scale, the growth of Douyu and Huya has stagnated, with more than 50 million and 80 million monthly active users respectively, which is not in the same order of magnitude as Douyin. Clearly, the strategic value of Huya and Douyu to Tencent Games is decreasing. Dr. Luo Rentong, an expert in the application and practice of digital economy, said that the current situation of Huya and Douyu can no longer support the promotion of Tencent Games, and continuing to rely on copyright barriers is inconsistent with the development strategy of Tencent Games.
In addition, the cooperation of games such as "Honor of Kings" is beneficial to both the game and the short video industry. For the short-form video industry, this means a surge in the volume of content. The open cooperation of top game IPs can bring high-quality native content, attract a large number of IP fans, make creators free from copyright restrictions, and prompt distribution platforms to launch new support programs. For the gaming industry, the partnership between Honor of Kings and Douyin may set a new industry benchmark, provide case references for other companies and brands, and promote the development of the entire industry in the direction of win-win cooperation.
At the same time, game streamers are also shifting. The short video platform represented by Douyin has increased its followers rapidly and has mature commercialization capabilities, attracting a large number of high-quality anchors to settle in. Tencent opened the live broadcast copyright of "Honor of Kings" to Douyin, but this is undoubtedly worse for Huya and Douyu, losing the content advantage and facing the loss of more and more game anchors.
Faced with the situation of losing their advantage in the field of game live streaming, Douyu and Huya have actually begun to save themselves. Last year, Huya formulated a transformation strategy, mainly developing game distribution, game props sales and game advertising, etc., in order to change the revenue structure based on rewarding; Zhang Shule believes that Douyu and Huya can focus more on live broadcast of e-sports events in the future and explore the revenue scenarios of e-sports derivative chains.
When the Internet giants realized that "no one can do the king takes all", interconnection became an inevitable trend. Those vertical platforms that once relied on giants for survival have lost the advantage of monopolizing resources and must face the cruel test of the market. Betta and Tiger Tooth are not the first batch and will not be the last.
China's Internet is no longer a winner-takes-all situation for Alibaba and Tencent. An era of openness and win-win has arrived.
Correlation Analysis:
Tencent's "NOW Live" has been shut down for refunds after 7 years of launch, has the live broadcast industry come to an end?
Light-year business shrinks, why did ByteDance give up the game?
CEO Chen Shaojie, who was exposed to be missing, and Douyu, who tore off the "mask" at 23 o'clock in the middle of the night, is just the epitome of the dilemma of entertainment live broadcasting
Revenue growth has slowed down, and where is the second half of Huya Live, which has been losing money one after another?
Is it possible for Betta and Huya to merge?
The truth of the controversy of Aiyouteng's "pig food theory": burning 100 billion yuan in ten years is not worth three minutes of second creation
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