It could all start with a video that's only 8 seconds long.
The video is simple: a Coser of the Girl Front tactical humanoid AN-94 demonstrates changing cartridges. The video was released last August and reached 2 million views. At the end of June this year, the news of the call of duty mobile game (hereinafter referred to as "CODM") and the "Girl Frontline" was officially announced. Before and after that, the 8-second video grew by nearly a million views. As of July 11, it had 2.994 million views on Station B.
"I took this video to the project team and asked, 'Why do you think such a video of less than 10 seconds has millions of views on Station B?' Leo said to me. Leo is the general manager of Tencent Tianmei Studio Group J3 Studio, and at the moment, he is talking to me about the reason why CODM chose to link "Girl Frontline".
There are also some similar videos on Station B, and the number of plays is often not low
<h3>start</h3>
The real beginning of the matter may also be that the members of J3 Studios are already familiar with "Girl Frontline". Long before he followed the 8-second video, Leo noticed that there were a lot of veteran Girl Frontier players on the team, "and they often went to discuss this project." With the atmosphere of discussion, it was natural to pay attention to the two creations around this game - compared to other games of the same size, the community atmosphere of "Girl Frontline" is very active.
Logically, at a conference earlier this year, Leo came up with the idea of "doing a linkage activity", and the team began to argue whether this idea was feasible. The difficulties are obvious, and the works of linkage are usually relatively close in theme or style. But intuitively, there is a clear difference between CODM and Girl Frontline – one is a realistic FPS mobile game, and the other is a typical two-dimensional painting style. Whether it is the picture or the style, it is not difficult to unify.
But on the other hand, a large number of FPS games with realism as the core selling point have never been insulated from the "second dimension". The player-made pain guns in the escape from Tarkov community, which is known for its hardcore, are widely acclaimed, and the multi-generation console game of Call of Duty directly adds two-dimensional skins - in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, the pain guns are nothing, and there are even paper man trucks and paper man helicopters...
In the console version of the game, the two-dimensional pain gun is already a very common thing, but the visual impact of the "two-dimensional helicopter" is still very strong (see watermark for the picture source)
"We [CODM] also made some skins that were biased towards the second dimension, and then found that our player base really liked them." Leo introduced. In fact, when the two-dimensional skin was launched twice before, players repeatedly mentioned the name of "Girl Frontline" on social media.
At the same time, team members familiar with "Girl Frontline" pointed out that another commonality between the two games is that they both have a rigorous worldview and a serious narrative style. Leo explains: "It's not that we had to do a two-dimensional linkage, so we chose Maiden Front. Linkage needs to be consistent with the overall tone, although it seems that our art style may be very different, but in fact, there is a commonality in the spiritual core, so that linkage is possible. ”
The similarity of preferences and the room for worldviews made the CODM team realize that seemingly peculiar linkages are actually very feasible. To further validate this judgment, they ran a series of questionnaires and user interviews for CODM players. The results show that the proportion of pan-quadratic users in the player group of "CODM" is very high, and there is naturally a huge audience intersection between "CODM" and "Girl Frontline".
Subsequently, this research report came to the producer of "Maiden Frontline", Yu Zhong.
<h3>Win-win</h3>
The first time I heard that Tenmi wanted to do a connection with them, Hachinaka's feeling was "surprise". He told Touch that the differences in gameplay and style between the two games were not small, but he realized at the first time that the other was serious.
The invitation was received before the Spring Festival this year, which is a fairly early node - codm was officially launched in Chinese mainland last December, and it is said that the Spring Festival is still a period of confusion for various affairs in the early stage of the launch. "The team of Tianmei J3 is more sincere and has taken a lot of solutions to show us." Yukaka introduced.
In February this year, CODM also launched the first batch of two-dimensional painted firearms, which were unanimously praised by players
In Yunaka's view, this somewhat unexpected linkage invitation is a win-win situation. From the perspective of "Girl Frontline", Hanaka believes that it is a new opportunity to link with games with different styles. He said: "The entire cultural circle of the second dimension is still expanding, and peripheral users are slowly being absorbed, which is a trend in the industry. In fact, we also hope that with the help of this linkage, the brand and image of the 'Girl Frontline' can be developed in a better way to the circle outside the second dimension. ”
After a pause, Yusaka added, "Moreover, we are more confident in the artistic effect of 'Maiden Frontline' itself, and we believe that even for non-two-dimensional players, they can appreciate the characters and art design of 'Maiden Frontline'." ”
For Tianmei J3 Studios, things are similar – although CODM is larger in terms of user size, the user types of the two sides do not coincide. Touch music has introduced the achievements of "CODM", which has 500 million downloads worldwide, and the national service has 60 million reservation users before it was launched. These staggering numbers also mean that almost all of the most immediate audiences know about the game. In Leo's view, "CODM" can almost reach the upper limit of the military hardcore style mobile game group, and if you want to seek further growth, then going to a new field may be a good choice.
There are common foundations, but also their own differences, for both sides, this kind of similarities and differences make the linkage can play a "1 + 1>2" value.
<h3>balance</h3>
Because they are both identical and different, the right midpoint is somewhat difficult to find.
"Why are there soldier ants in our world?" Why are these guns like this? (Because there are many differences in the worldviews of the two games), we have to make everything traceable, it has to be a complete joint combat operation. These issues plague Leo and his team. They try to find a rationality, but it's not easy.
In the planning of the linkage activity, the linkage content includes various in-game bonus items such as spray paint, hanging ornaments, stickers, avatar frames, linkage guns, etc., as well as exclusive collection catalogues and gunner display pages, as well as a number of small gameplay designed for linkage. At the same time, there are also plans to place a number of hidden Easter eggs in different corners of the game - compared to the linkage that CODM has done before, this time it can be said to be the largest one.
For Tianmei J3 Studio, the difficulty is not only to complete the production of linkage content, but also to make the copyright and cooperative developer Activision and the linkage partner Scatter Explosion Network can recognize these contents. In the early days of the collaboration, the R&D members of Tianmei and Scattered Explosion had already joined the discussion and began to consider how the linked worldview and activities should be designed.
The basic production process of linkage firearms and other content is that the original material pictures are first provided by the scattered explosion network, and after the CODM team completes the painting design, it is returned to the scattered explosive network for supervision and repair, and finally reviewed and approved by the copyright owner
The event's linkage firearms are also specially equipped with acoustic CV
Not only to communicate with the linked partners, but also to the opinions of the copyright owners. After communicating with Activision several times, they are still relatively recognized for the IP linkage. (But in terms of details), Activision is very insistent on the brand of the entire IP and has very strict requirements, which sets a very high standard for linkage. ”
"It's not hard for the two games to fit in narrative styles, and we have a very rigorous hardcore setting with 'Girl's Frontline', including the equipment of each tactical humanoid in 'Girl's Frontline', the relationship between the characters in the story, and the gun supervision..." Leo introduced.
The question is how to get the story started. Hagenaka said that in the early discussions, the production team considered letting the characters of "Maiden Frontline" appear directly in "CODM". But that would make it hard to round the story, in Leo's words: "It's still hard to explain, right?" ”
In Maiden Frontline, the tactical humanoid is a war robot that has a great impact on the battlefield. This is different from the "Call of Duty" setting, which becomes difficult to handle - it is impossible to change the basic settings of the series for a single linkage.
In the end, such a scheme failed to be adopted, and another way had to be found.
The existence of a "tactical humanoid" would obviously affect the pattern of war. In terms of worldview, it is particularly important to consider what kind of image the characters of "Girl Frontline" appear in "Call of Duty"
The rejected proposal is not worthless, it hints in the right direction. Just as the tactical humanoid cannot be added, the two worlds cannot be changed too much because of the linkage, and the same is true for the enemy. As a result, the soldier ants in Maiden Frontline were chosen to be the right enemies — massive, not too powerful, and more in line with the appearance of traditional robots in the world of Call of Duty.
On the other hand, although the tactical humanoid cannot appear directly, the linkage must also create an intersection. Given the nature of the game, this intersection was rightly identified as "equipment" that came from another world and could provide great assistance to the warriors in the world of Call of Duty Mobile.
A rough outline has been revealed, and the difference is only in tandem. The final and most important piece of the puzzle piece completed is the linkage experienced Activision, which, after many rounds of discussion, gives the story outline:
"Sheila went to an area to investigate after receiving the anomaly report.
In this area, she found strange robots (soldier ants) haunting, attacking humans and facilities. Nearby, she found a mysterious helicopter with some unworldly equipment, equipment, and a letter.
In the letter, Kalina introduces herself, mentioning that she has recently discovered that a rift in their world has appeared, through which a large number of soldier ants made by iron-blooded workers are passing through this rift. Griffin could not cross the rift, so they chose to send the helicopter and equipment through the rift, hoping to help the people at the other end of the rift.
As a result, Sheila put on her equipment and weapons, and finally destroyed the invading soldier ants with the cooperation of the player. The rift eventually closed as well. ”
<h3>steel wire</h3>
If you only look at the results, the story of linkage is not complicated. But if you know it in depth enough, such a simple story is almost optimal. After all, linkage means creating a small coexistence corner for two distant worlds. This corner cannot be too important, because outside of this corner, the worlds on both sides will still move forward; this corner cannot be unreasonable, because a mistake in the setting may cause the two worlds to collapse together.
"Cos is already the best way to get a Girl Frontline character into the game." After the launch of the linkage campaign, the countless rounds of discussion that the production team experienced were repeated in the player community. In the Call of Duty mobile game bar, a player made the above explanation for "why only a Sheila Cos costume instead of a direct character" was explained. His reasoning was precisely the concern of the production team: if the AN-94 from Maiden Frontline had been pulled over, the "Call of Duty" setting would have changed.
These debates are more or less in the expectations of the project team, and the players of the two games already overlap, and they will certainly care about the rationality of the setting.
Moreover, the discussion of "rationality" is not limited to the worldview part, and for the only skin launched by this linkage, "Sheila-Alien Union", there are simultaneously opposite views in the player group. Some players believe that the characters in the skin are larger than the original AN-94 case; others feel that instead, they think that the image looks thinner than Sheila herself, and that the clothing is not a common battlefield combat outfit.
The design of "Sheila-Otherworld United" chooses a certain degree of compromise, compared to the original standing painting, her dress is more rigorous, but compared to the battlefield clothing, this match is relatively cool
In fact, they are all right. Based on the reasons for the worldview setting mentioned above, the CODM project team finally decided not to add any new characters in this linkage, but to adopt the scheme of designing a set of skins for existing characters, but this skin is not easy to do. "You know, the two-dimensional standing paintings are very ... Special quadratic elements. But our game is 3D, and the style is more realistic, you see the other characters are tightly wrapped, this character (Sheila) skin, in fact, is already closer to our style in the 'Girl Front'. Leo said, "The painting styles on both sides are completely different, and we tried many solutions, but they couldn't work."
"In the end, we chose to put a mask on the character... I know there may be players who aren't quite happy with this mask..., but you need to fit into this environment of Call of Duty. ”
At the time of our interview, it was only 2 days since the skin was officially released to players, but Leo still hadn't decided whether the details still needed to be adjusted. He knows players will be picky, and the same is true for the details. It sounds like such a linkage is a bit like walking a tightrope, you have to be careful, always pay attention to maintain balance, no matter which side you tilt to, the result may be falling.
Similar trade-offs are also reflected in the linkage of gameplay design, on the one hand, the planning team hopes to restore the game experience of "Girl Frontline" as much as possible, the construction part is of course one of the core systems, the problem is that the two gameplay are completely different, this system can not be reproduced as it is. Eventually, CODM adopted the method of creating "mini self-disciplined humanoids", designing this mechanism as a system that uses formulas to build unlocked drawings
<h3>"Double Kitchen Ecstasy"</h3>
Now, the linkage has been launched, and the various questions that the project team has struggled with have final answers. The good news is that, at least as it stands, they are still firmly above the tightrope. In Baidu Tieba, NGA, B station and other places, the vast majority of voices about this linkage are praise. And, although this is a one-way linkage, both sides have gained some new attention.
Although it is a one-way linkage, the NGA's "Girl Frontline" section also has a "CODM linkage" label, and there are still many discussions
CODM players have also shown unprecedented enthusiasm for this linkage, which has led to a large number of secondary creation content. Compared to the "Less Front" element in the "Girl's Frontline" section, the focus of CODM players is on the linkage activity itself. For example, the construction system in the linkage activity is relatively novel to CODM, and the activity strategy accounts for a considerable proportion of the large number of linkage activity submissions that have emerged at station B.
Even the fixed Baidu Tieba line link is quite joyful. There are big scoldings "all say that the world is 94 without krypton"; there are also "be careful of the two-dimensional" speech, but click on the user's attention, and find that the attention bar is all two-dimensional; and some players complain that Sheila's skin should not show her legs, and sent a post with the title "Sheila is just a beginning, it is a temptation to test us". Several players replied: "And this kind of good thing? ”
The post itself is also quite interesting, in addition to the common Tieba melee, there are also many "Girl Frontline" players to explain the setting, that is, why an-94 can be dressed in this way on the battlefield
In the NGA's "Girl's Frontline" special edition, players posted that pointed out many details and Easter eggs that appeared in the linkage activities. This is all content that can make old players smile, and many players who posted "Girl Frontline" saw it and said they were "very interested in trying it". When I saw this post, I was reminded of Leo's mention that "there are many veteran players of "Girl Frontline" in the J3 studio of Tianmei " – it seems that this statement is indeed not a polite statement.
Of course, there are more Easter eggs than that, in the interview, Leo also talked about some interesting hidden content, and players may find more surprises in the next open gameplay of the event
In fact, when I heard this sentence in an interview, my first thought was "chasing stars with public funds." Although Leo presented a series of evidence in the interview, from the survey to the data, that this was a reasonable decision, the idea did not end up in my mind. Is it really appropriate to link up a game you're playing? Shouldn't we make a clearer distinction between work and life?
In an interview with Yu Zhong, I asked another question: "There is a saying that "Maiden Frontline" is more casual when it comes to doing the linkage itself. It is said that some linkages (such as the linkage of "Sharpshooter Girl") are because you are playing or watching a certain work, playing or watching very happy, so you want to try to link. Is this true? ”
After carefully replacing "I" with "we", Yu Zhong answered the question from the front: "Indeed, we will have some project team considerations in it, after all, the linkage is a matter, if the team does not like it, or does not know much, we think it is unlikely to make something more interesting." ”
Such a statement is also very attractive. Is a business report that seems to be well-thought-out, but doesn't resonate in any way, really more reliable than what you love? Isn't it strange to expect works you don't even like to be liked? Perhaps, linkage should have been looking for its favorite works.
In this regard, Leo's statement is the same as Hanaka's. "What do you hope this event will bring?" This is a fixed ritual for many interviews, and most of the answers are close - some polite words such as "users like", "excellent results", "smooth holding", etc., but this time it is slightly different.
"Double Chef Ecstasy?" After thinking about it for a while, Leo said so.