文 / 手游那点事 willow
After more than 400 days, NetEase Blizzard, which had cut its robe and broken its seat in January 2023, has finally announced that it will continue its lead.
Today (April 10), NetEase and Blizzard China officially announced that they have reached an updated game publishing agreement based on their cooperation of more than 15 years to bring Blizzard games back to our national players. Blizzard and NetEase are working on plans for a return, with more details to be announced in the future.
It's important to note that Microsoft Games and NetEase have also reached an agreement to try to bring new NetEase games to Xbox and other platforms.
As early as two days ago (April 8), "Bad Reviewer" posted a photo of NetEase CEO Ding Lei and Blizzard's new CEO Johanna Faries, revealing that NetEase and Microsoft have reached a cooperation, and the return of Blizzard's national server will be officially announced this week.
When the time came to April 9, many institutions confirmed to NetEase that Blizzard would officially return on April 10, and its business was mainly represented by NetEase Leihuo. In an instant, the Tag of "Blizzard Returns" quickly topped the Weibo hot search list, which also means that Chinese Blizzard players who have been wandering in the Asian server for a whole year have finally found their way home today.
It was also at this time that the author suddenly discovered that even if it is not counted for more than 500 days of disconnection, the cooperation between Blizzard and NetEase has come to its 15th year. So what does this relaunch mean for both parties?
01
What does it mean for Blizzard NetEase to restart cooperation?
First of all, the most intuitive change brought about by the re-cooperation between the two parties is that it will drive a slight increase in revenue from NetEase and Blizzard.
According to Activision Blizzard's Q3 financial report released in 2022, the net income of the agency games signed by Activision Blizzard and NetEase in 2021 is worth about 264 million US dollars (equivalent to about 1.9 billion yuan). As for NetEase, NetEase's revenue from agency games in 2021 will be about 8.356 billion yuan (equivalent to about 1.156 billion US dollars).
According to Microsoft's latest Q2 2024 earnings report (the U.S. stock fiscal year generally starts in July and ends in June), Activision Blizzard contributes more than $2 billion to Microsoft's gaming division. In other words, the revenue of game agency in China worth 264 million in 2021 is currently only equivalent to about 13.2% of Activision Blizzard's single-quarter revenue (games).
In terms of NetEase, according to NetEase's 2022 annual financial report, after NetEase successively ran out of self-developed explosive models such as "Egg Boy Party" and "Against the Cold" in 2023, the agency revenue in 2021, which was once worth 8.356 billion yuan, is currently equivalent to 8% of NetEase's total revenue in 2023, and cannot bring greater revenue growth to the company.
In addition to the direct economic benefits, I think that NetEase Blizzard's re-alliance this time may lead to closer cooperation in the field of IP licensing and product co-research than before.
For example, as early as August 4, 2022, according to Bloomberg, a "World of Warcraft" IP mobile game jointly developed by Blizzard and NetEase, directly led to the dissolution of a development team of about 100 people due to differences in cooperation terms.
Later, after Blizzard and NetEase officially "broke up", the outside world speculated that the untimely death of the mobile game under development may be due to the disagreement between the two parties on IP ownership and revenue sharing.
However, after the departure of Bobby Kotick, the former CEO of Activision Blizzard, Blizzard, which is now being acquired by Microsoft, seems to be open to third-party licensing of the "Warcraft" IP.
In April of this year, John Hight, the head of the Warcraft series, said in an interview with IGN that while the Warcraft IP will still revolve around the game (World of Warcraft), Blizzard is interested in its IP spin-offs, including but not limited to movies and other game genres.
At the same time, John Hight affirmed in the interview that Riot (Riot) has expanded its derivative game genres and IP dissemination through IP licensing and other means. "The Warcraft IP is open to people who really understand Warcraft and have cool ideas on how to express it," he said. ”
Judging from the above statements, after Blizzard experienced a sharp decline in profits from 2021 to 2022, they may now want to promote more alliances with third-party studios by licensing the "Warcraft" IP, so as to quickly produce more derivative products to drive revenue. In this way, with the resumption of cooperation between NetEase and Blizzard, perhaps "Codename: Neptune", which has accumulated three years of research and development progress, may reappear.
In addition to the above possible impacts, the most worthy of our discussion is NetEase and Microsoft, the back of Blizzard, in what areas are they cooperating this time?
In fact, as early as February 24, 2022, at NetEase's earnings call, an analyst asked NetEase how it views Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard and the impact of this behavior on Blizzard's cooperation with NetEase ("Diablo: Immortal"), Ding Lei replied like this:
"Microsoft and Activision Blizzard have been very close partners of NetEase for a long time. We have a very good relationship with Microsoft for the operation of Minecraft in China, we have a very good relationship, mutual trust, and we have achieved a lot of good operational results. I believe that their acquisition will have a more positive impact on our business development in China, which is our understanding. At the same time, NetEase is also willing to cooperate more closely with Microsoft and Activision Blizzard in other businesses. ”
Although NetEase Microsoft has announced that it will bring new NetEase games to Xbox and other platforms, it is believed that with the gradual intensification of Microsoft's game business expansion in recent years, and the return of Blizzard has greatly narrowed the relationship between the two sides, perhaps NetEase and Microsoft will reach a more in-depth cooperation in the near future.
02
Talks about Microsoft, Blizzard returns,
Is this really NetEase's natal year?
Looking back on the process of NetEase and Blizzard from their first cooperation in 2009 to their official breakup at the end of 2022, and now the two sides are back together after two years, it can be described as nine twists and eighteen turns.
Back in April 2009, Blizzard, which was famous all over the world, and NetEase, which was known all over the world, officially announced that they would cooperate in the operation of World of Warcraft in China, which led to a wave called "Blizzard Games".
Subsequently, between 2010 and 2022, the two sides launched a full 8 game documentaries on "World of Warcraft", and on the way, the most successful "Warcraft" IP spin-off "Hearthstone" was launched in 2014, and at the same time, "Overwatch", which was described by players as "the summer of 2016", also swept the domestic market after "Hearthstone".
In June 2022, the mobile game "Diablo Immortal" jointly developed by Blizzard and NetEase was officially launched. After this game topped the 112 free lists in the world and topped the TOP20 best-selling list in 63 countries, it also symbolized that the relationship between NetEase and Blizzard has reached a new peak (joint research). But I never thought that the scene that should have been Hehe Meimei was short-lived, and the 14-year cooperation between NetEase and Blizzard was shattered in just half a year.
On the morning of November 17, 2022, Blizzard unilaterally announced that the licensing agreement with NetEase was about to expire, and the two parties failed to reach a renewal. coincided with the critical juncture of NetEase's financial report, and the news of the termination of NetEase's Blizzard cooperation once caused NetEase's stock price to plummet by about 11.34%, and the contradictions between the two sides were completely ignited in a fierce way.
Since then, the two sides have launched a two-month tug-of-war of public opinion. When the time came to January 17, 2023, after Netease Blizzard made a final response to the cooperation between them, all of Blizzard's game products operating in Chinese mainland, except for "Diablo: Immortal", were officially suspended on January 24, 2023.
Now, after more than 400 days, NetEase, Blizzard, and Microsoft have re-reached cooperation on the above incidents, which is obviously a win-win decision for both NetEase and Microsoft Blizzard.
But just after this incident, I suddenly realized that NetEase's accumulation in the game field over the past few years seems to be ushering in an intensive outbreak in 2024.
For example, at the "Xiaohan National Wind Festival" held in early 2024, NetEase announced that its "Reverse Water Cold" IP has attracted more than 100 million active users. In less than 24 hours after the release of this information, game-related topics have gained 4300w of topic popularity on Weibo in one fell swoop, and the popularity of the "Xiaohan National Wind Festival" held by it has far exceeded that of other popular game festivals.
In the casual party track, the national original paradise game "Egg Boy Party" also connected to three "Spring Festival Galas" such as "China Central Radio and Television 2024 Network Spring Festival Gala" during the Spring Festival this year. According to official data, the number of people watching the party on Chinese New Year's Eve exceeded the 100 million mark, and the game's full-day active users exceeded 40 million on the Chinese New Year's Eve.
Subsequently, on February 29, 2024, NetEase released its financial results for the fourth quarter and full year of 2023. According to the data, NetEase's net income in 2023 will be 103.5 billion yuan, officially breaking through the revenue mark of 100 billion yuan. In addition, NetEase's net revenue from games and related value-added services was RMB81.6 billion, with the above two figures achieving a year-on-year growth of 7.3% and 9.4% respectively.
What needs our attention is that in 2024, NetEase will also make frequent moves at the product level: for example, in 2024, NetEase's "Shooting the Condor", "Yanyun Sixteen Voices", "Seven Days World" and other open-world masterpieces will also be launched one after another;
Whether from the perspective of revenue or products, in the past Q1 quarter of 2024, NetEase, which has become more and more courageous, can be said to be in the limelight. Now, Q2 2024 has only started 10 days, and NetEase has reached a cooperation with Microsoft Blizzard, and it is foreseeable that the momentum of NetEase's upward development will continue.
So what other surprises NetEase can bring to the game industry in 2024? Let's wait and see.