Why did Ma Huateng angrily spray the game business at Tencent's annual meeting
Recently, Tencent's founder Ma Huateng made a heartfelt complaint about his game business at Tencent's annual meeting. He said that Tencent currently mainly relies on games such as Honor of Kings, Peace Elite, CFM, LOLM and Golden Shovel to obtain revenue. However, none of the games launched by Tencent in recent years have been successful, even Yuan Dream Star, which has spent billions on marketing. In contrast, NetEase's Reverse Water Cold and Egg Boy Party have become hits.
In the gaming industry, "innovation" is an extremely important and sensitive word. If a company only relies on its old roots and lacks innovation, it will be surpassed by competitors if it is not careful. Tencent is now in such a predicament. Judging from the data, Tencent has not fully attracted some CFPC player traffic, and LOLM and Golden Shovel are also facing the same problem.
Another issue is the player experience. Honor of Kings, the flagship product of Tencent Games, is now starting to earn revenue by selling virtual currency. Tencent Games, which is at the top of the rankings, has also been conducting krypton gold lottery activities, resulting in a very poor player experience. This has caused some players to start flowing to other games, which is not good for Tencent.
In addition to the above problems, Tencent also faces other challenges. For example, DNF is also facing difficulties this year, and M, which undertakes QQ speeding, has basically gone out of business. In the terminal game market, Tencent's product share is gradually decreasing, and at the same time, Tencent has hired a lot of water armies to scrub the floor. This is because most of the water armies on Tieba in the past brought rhythm to NetEase games. NetEase launches a hit game almost every year, and Tencent hasn't seen a new hit product for a long time.
Although Tencent's full promotion of Yuanmeng Star is a work to learn from, with billions of promotion costs and users from the glory of kings, it still can't surpass the egg boy party. This made Ma Huateng suspicious of the company's self-developed games. He suggested that Tencent directly change its name to Tencent Angel Investment Co., Ltd. to help small studios at home and abroad make games, instead of making games themselves.
It is difficult for Tencent to make high-quality MMO games in the short term, and it is difficult to recover them without investing a lot of operating capital. And if you add working capital, it becomes a fast food game. In addition, Tencent does not have enough foundation in the field of two-dimensional games, and can only copy the works of other manufacturers, lacking its own unique things. This leads to serious product homogeneity and inability to form differentiated competition.
Tencent also has the problem of misunderstanding the needs of domestic and foreign online game users. They thought that some games would become hits and eventually failed. At the same time, they want to make a breakthrough in casual games, but because the quality of the products is too poor, the high-priced publicity does not pay off well.
Overall, Tencent's gaming business has underperformed in recent years. They did not continue to launch popular products like NetEase, but relied more on existing products to obtain revenue. For Ma Huateng, this is a sad fact.
However, Tencent also has its own advantages and opportunities. They are trying to enter the orthodox market in the chicken eating trend, first copying games such as O-Dream, and then trying to prove that they are orthodox. Although it has not succeeded in whitewashing, Tencent still has some strength in this regard. As long as we can correctly grasp the market demand and player psychology, perhaps Tencent's game business can make a breakthrough.
In short, Tencent is facing a series of problems and challenges in the game business. Pony Ma hopes to improve and innovate in all aspects to enhance the company's competitiveness. Whether it's by investing in small studios or improving the quality of existing products, Tencent needs to do more. Only by constantly adapting to market demand and meeting player expectations can we remain invincible in the fierce competition.