Text | Eye entertainment
Due to an adjustment, the 21-year-old "Fantasy Journey to the West" ushered in its biggest rhythm ever.
The player bombarded the official on Weibo, saying: "The game uses the title of attacking the studio to make profits, cutting the output of the copy activity, and then selling it in his own pocket for infinite", demanding to improve the current situation of the game.
Since March 29th, the Weibo of the computer version of Fantasy Westward Journey has closed its own comment area.
When NetEase's new game "Condor Shooting" had just been tested publicly, players who had nowhere to vent poured into Weibo topics related to "Condor Shooting", and complained together with "Condor Shooting".
"Play Fantasy Journey to the West, taste the wrongs of life, brush up on the copy of the Mandate of Heaven, rejuvenate the army, play eagle shooting today, and become a sand sculpture tomorrow. ”
In fact, it is not only Weibo that has set off this rhythm, but also NetEase Games that has been affected.
"Fantasy Journey to the West" players broke out in this protest with amazing combat effectiveness, Weibo, Douyin, Bilibili, and official accounts all discussed the incident, and some posts even swiped to stock platforms and investment communities.
Generally speaking, "cutting off quest output" does cause dissatisfaction among players. Because the output is less, it means that if you want more resources, you need to go to the game item store to buy. But after all, it is a collective cut, and most of the player protests are limited, and the reason why it has caused so much indignation among players is because "Fantasy Journey to the West" is a very special game.
01
When watching the documentary "Senior High School", I was very impressed by one of the passages, which was that a scumbag was not good at studying, and when others asked him what he would do to earn money after he didn't study hard, he said that he relied on playing games, and then proudly said the amount of money he earned in "Fantasy Journey to the West".
The movie was watched by the school at the time, and after watching it, the teacher asked sharply: Can you make money for a lifetime by playing games?
Now it seems that if that classmate played the game "Fantasy Journey to the West", maybe he could really make money, and he would make a lot of money.
Casually search for money-making cases in "Fantasy Journey to the West". The "arms dealer" in the game has a monthly income of more than 10,000 yuan, and if you are lucky, the birth of a set of superb equipment can directly realize the vision of buying a car and a house; even if you are a part-time "five-open player" (a Liver Emperor player who operates five character accounts at the same time in the game), the multi-account income is enough to get an additional income to subsidize the family.
The reason why players can achieve stable revenue in "Fantasy Journey to the West" has a lot to do with the game's extremely excellent economic system. To put it simply, because "Fantasy Journey to the West" has achieved three points: "strictly controlling the output of a single account", "allowing players to trade freely", and "supporting the exchange of game currency for cash", a set of extremely stable economic systems that can run independently have been formed within the game.
How stable is it?
A well-known case is that in 2022, some players will spend tens of thousands of dollars to hoard the gourd baby fashion at the time of "Fantasy Journey to the West", ready to sell it at a high price after it is out of print. And, this player was generally not optimistic about the value of the gourd baby in the market at that time, the so-called "others are afraid of my greed", thinking that it is because everyone is generally not optimistic, so the market circulation of the gourd baby is less after it is out of print, and the price will inevitably rise.
Of course, this event finally ushered in the expected ending, and there are not a few players who reinvest in gourd baby fashion with the same idea, and a large number of hoarders have lost their money.
But behind this case, it is not difficult to find that "Fantasy Journey to the West" has derived a set of market financial system, where businessmen will buy the bottom, and players will buy up but not down.
What's more, the reason why "Fantasy Journey to the West" players ridiculed this businessman was that "he was hoarding gourd baby fashion", not "he actually hoarded a virtual game of fashion and thought he could sell it for money".
A similar case also appeared in the purchase of green channel qualifications in the new area of "Fantasy Journey to the West", where hundreds of players compete for qualifications at 12 o'clock every day, and they can earn 1,000 yuan after grabbing it, which is nicknamed Moutai in the game industry.
Behind this change in thinking is a consensus reached by players on the value of the "Fantasy Journey to the West" game, and it is also a kind of trust, and the core of finance is precisely trust.
This financial system forms an unbreakable link between players and Fantasy Journey to the West, which is more than pure entertainment and more than social relationships, keeping players in the game.
This is one of the reasons why "Fantasy Journey to the West", a 21-year-old game with outdated graphics and gameplay, can still become NetEase's ace product.
02
What does the current change mean for Fantasy Journey to the West?
There are two major changes:
1. Reducing the output of dungeons, that is, reducing the actual material output of the entire game, which can be understood as the "actual productivity" of the entire game is decreasing;
2. The attribute props sold directly in the mall are retained. You can understand that in addition to the actual output of the game, the official is infinitely over-issuing a material, and the inflow of this material will have an impact on the original market economy of "Fantasy Journey to the West".
Previously, although there were official props for sale, the free market of the entire "Fantasy Journey to the West" was large enough to have a strong enough adjustment ability to eliminate this impact.
And now it's different.
As replica production is cut, the decline in productivity means that the market shrinks and the market is no longer able to adjust. The over-distribution of props through official channels will cause inflation in the "Fantasy Journey to the West" market.
As we mentioned earlier, many players use the game "Fantasy Journey to the West" to make a living or earn a part-time income, and the reduction of dungeon revenue will not only affect these people's future earnings in the game, but also the resulting inflation will also lead to the depreciation of a large amount of game currency in the hands of these people.
This kind of real conflict of interests may be the reason for the anger of the post-80s Buddhist veteran players in "Fantasy Journey to the West". Of course, among the players of "Fantasy Journey to the West" contacted by Eye Entertainment, not all of the players' protests were out of interest considerations. Some players who have played "Fantasy Journey to the West" intermittently for more than ten years, and players who really love this game also said that they were really hurt in this adjustment.
They think that "Fantasy Journey to the West" is a bit too ugly, as a point card payment game, not only has its own game props shopping mall, but also sells the VIP qualification of the green channel to make another wave of profit when the server queuing problem cannot be solved.
"There is a feeling of love for more than ten years year after year, but being treated as an old leek. One player said.
03
No matter how you look at it, "Fantasy Journey to the West" is full of adventure at the age of 21, and the drastic reform of the economic system that it relies on the most.
As NetEase's most profitable game, the "Fantasy Journey to the West" series can bring NetEase nearly 20 billion yuan in revenue every year, and it is really not a wise move to kill chickens and eggs.
In the view of Eye Entertainment, there are two reasons why "Fantasy Journey to the West" made this adjustment.
First, in December last year, the National Press and Publication Administration drafted the "Measures for the Administration of Online Games (Draft for Solicitation of Comments)", which shook the domestic game sector.
Although it is a solicitation of opinions, it shows a tendency of the state to regulate the game. Article 25 reads that "the same enterprise shall not operate online game currency issuance and online game currency trading services at the same time".
Accurately hit the core of the construction of the free market of "Fantasy Journey to the West" - the virtual props trading platform "Treasure Pavilion".
It is precisely because of the existence of the "Treasure Pavilion" that players can trade virtual props and game accounts in the game, and settle directly in RMB, NetEase can take commissions from each transaction, and the three parties will benefit and jointly create a stable economic ecology for "Fantasy Journey to the West".
If it is confirmed that the "Treasure Pavilion" platform cannot survive in the future, then it is not difficult to understand the adjustment of "Fantasy Journey to the West".
Another reason that can explain the adjustment is that "Fantasy Journey to the West" has an overly good economic system, which allows the in-game items to maintain their value.
This phenomenon is good for old players to stay, because the past efforts are rewarded, but not for new players to enter, because the pace of catching up is too long.
This has created a unique phenomenon of "Fantasy Journey to the West": most of the old players return, not to create a new account, but to directly spend thousands of yuan to buy an old account to play.
For veteran players, this situation is not surprising, because the experience of buying a new account to catch up with progress is too poor. And the price of a few thousand yuan is not expensive, because the economic system of "Fantasy Journey to the West" leads to the preservation of the value of the game account, and when they get tired of playing, they can sell the account backhand, and maybe they can earn a few hundred yuan.
But for new players who "lack knowledge", playing an old game from 20 years ago costs thousands of dollars to start, which is too expensive.
In the 2023 list of medium and heavy mobile game APP delivery materials compiled by DaaEye, "Fantasy Journey to the West" ranks seventh, higher than the tenth-ranked "Primal Journey", and it and "Primordial Journey" are also the only two old games on the list.
In the last two weeks at the end of March, "Fantasy Journey to the West" once again topped the list of heavy mobile game app materials for two consecutive weeks. "Fantasy Journey to the West" has always been trapped in attracting new customers.
Finally, "Fantasy Journey to the West" should have more positive responses to the current public opinion, rather than blindly evading. Previously, we have been comparing "Fantasy Journey to the West" with financial products, and analyzed that "Fantasy Journey to the West" has been able to achieve long-term prosperity for more than 20 years, and the ability to maintain the value of props and accounts is due to the trust of players.
And this trust has always been a two-edged knife in financial products. If public opinion is not handled properly, players will not be optimistic about the future development of "Fantasy Journey to the West" early, and a large number of props and accounts will be sold, and the building of the game will collapse in just a moment.