The Rebirth of the Male God Starts From Playing Games

  Chapter 180 178. Can this game make money? ! (, subscription, monthly pass)

  "Not deleting the public test for the first time?" Operation Manager Wang Hanyang asked puzzledly.

  Each time the game was about to go live, the operation department was worried, for fear that Boss Cao would make some noise.

Sure enough, Boss Cao gave another new term this time.

  What is the public test without deleting files?

  Is there a public beta for deleting files?

  Currently, domestic online game research and development has just started, so many people don’t understand what a mature release process and system will look like in the future.

  But it doesn’t matter, because Cao Yang understands.

"This thing is mainly to give developers a retreat," Cao Yang explained, "Originally, according to the normal process, before the online game is officially launched, it needs to go through the company's internal testing, and then a small number of core players' internal testing, and then to The more widely-used file-deleted closed beta, and finally the open beta without de-deleted files."

In this system, Ding Sanshi’s NetEase was the first to improve the process and carry it forward, because it was the first domestic game manufacturer to develop self-developed online games. After several setbacks and blows, it gradually began to climb. Only after rolling out such a set of procedures.

The company’s internal testing is actually to let [professionals] evaluate the quality of the game at the very beginning, mainly from the perspective of playability and professionalism. Most of NetEase’s incubation projects also undergo an internal review. In the link, after the DEMO is completed, the internal review, if it fails, then the project will be cut off, if it passes, then inject capital, manpower and material resources into the project...

  So it is possible that NetEase has opened dozens of projects a year, and in the end only one or two can meet with you, most of them died in the internal review.

  After internal testing, when the game project is relatively complete, it will enter the first player internal testing.

At this time, a small number of internal test qualifications will be issued, and a few players with a scale of hundreds to thousands of players will be invited to play the game. The specific number of players will be determined according to the needs of the project. The number of players can be played, and the number of players that need to be invited will be greater.

  After the internal test, all data are up to the standard, then the first public test of deleting files will be carried out.

The so-called data compliance is mainly the retention rate and effective online time, such as next day retention, two-day retention, weekly retention, monthly retention... These data can see how attractive the game is to players in the long term, and whether players continue to play. Willingness to go down.

  Online duration judges the stickiness of the player to the game and the time the player spends in the game. The longer the time, the higher the stickiness of the game...

In short, data compliance is the most important criterion for the life and death of a project within NetEase. Even if the project is approved, more than half of the projects will be folded here. If the data does not meet the standard, it will either be rebuilt until the target is reached, or it will be directly cut off. , Re-establish the project.

  After reaching the standard, it enters the first public beta of deleting files, which means that the game is not far from the real launch.

  The reason why the company adopts the method of deleting files for public testing is mainly to avoid risks and leave a way out for itself. If a large number of players come in, the result will be poor reputation and unsatisfactory results, leading to serious negative effects of the game.

So at least the company has an excuse to say [We are deleting files for testing], and then it will collect the feedback information of players and make changes, so that there is a buffer, and it will not cause Waterloo as soon as it goes online. After the players’ interests are damaged, you It is very difficult to remedy it.

  After the file deletion test, there will be another time called 【No file deletion test】.

  In fact, it was officially launched by this time. The reason why the term "test" is still used is for the same reason as above, which can leave a way out for the company.

  Often many games, if there are no major problems, they will continue to be tested until the stage of testing without deleting files...

  At most halfway through, we will update a version one day and say that we are officially operating. At this time, players actually don't care and pay attention to it.

  ……

After explaining it to Wang Hanyang, the young operations manager suddenly realized that he had been taught.

  He quickly found a small book to record it, for fear that he would forget a detail.

After   , follow this process to post the game, there should be no big problem.

   "But..." Wang Hanyang frowned, "None of us have gone through the stage of file deletion testing. Why should we enter the public beta directly?"

   "I will decide this." Cao Yang smiled, "It doesn't matter, show up a little confidence."

  Wang Hanyang: "..."

In fact, for Cao Yang, Audition has already been verified in the previous life. There is no need for him to perform a lengthy test process in the early stage. Only Deng Peiqiang is required to check it, and there will be no major bugs in the program. There is no problem.

If you were more concerned, Cao Yang could directly [online] this time, but think about it conservatively and come to [Test without deleting files]. In case something goes wrong with the program, there is still room for loopback. .

  Since it is a direct public beta, for Wang Hanyang, the operations department must be treated as a formal battlefield. Game development can have a retreat, but there is no retreat on the operation side.

  So he formulated a series of operation promotion plans to Cao Yang.

  Cao Yang browsed it again and shook his head, "Hanyang, have you heard the story of chicken laying eggs?"

Uh……

  Wang Hanyang blinked.

  Sure enough, at an important juncture, the boss is about to produce a moth.

  He didn’t want to know.

  I really don’t want to know.

   "I know." Wang Hanyang nodded.

  Cao Yang smiled, thinking you know a hammer?

"In this way, my idea is to promote the ones that should be promoted. Both the QQ side and the game platform will be promoted simultaneously. If the advertisements are advertised, the local pushers will also run. On the basis of these, we will add an activation code. activity."

  "Activation code?" Wang Hanyang asked strangely.

  He seemed to hear something familiar and terrifying.

"Well, every player who bought our game discs can get 2 activation codes. These two activation codes can be activated for the other two people," Cao Yang said with a smile, "Only players with activation codes can get them. Game qualification. At the same time, with the game activation code, a certain fee can be waived when buying a CD. If both activation codes are used, then we will return a certain fee to the person who purchased the CD."

  Fuck!

  Wang Hanyang frowned, how did he feel familiar, as if he had heard of this set of operating strategies?

  This Nima...

  Isn’t this the viral marketing strategy used in the previous 1+2 sales of Honor of Kings in the island country?

   "Uh... Boss, can you do this?"

"Don't forget, we are still in the testing stage. Although we do not delete files for testing." Cao Yang smiled, "Card-one-card activation code, we make full rebates, on the one hand, it can save a lot of promotion costs, players There will be a self-propagation process, which can be found from the last test.

  On the other hand, things are vaguely expensive. Although we do not have an upper limit on the number of activation codes, there is a time course between the activation and use of activation codes.

  Players who get the activation code first will be given priority to qualify for the test. For this group of people, they are actually very superior.

  So it is easy to create the illusion of [activation code missing], and players will be more inclined to try this game. "

   "I understand..." Wang Hanyang nodded.

  On the surface, this is a profit, but in fact, after accounting, it may really save a lot of operation and promotion costs.

  Players' spontaneous marketing and promotion can not only cause topicality, but also save Bomi a lot of operating expenses after it is formed.

  The ultimate goal of operating this thing is to advertise it so that more players can be washed in.

  The larger the proportion of viral marketing with activation codes, the smaller the promotion cost of natural operations.

  As for the game disc?

  That part of the money, Cao Yang didn't even look at it. According to his idea, the game discs can be directly free.

  The most important thing is to have enough users.

  ……

  On November 1, less than a month has passed since the first test of Bomi’s new game "Audition" without deleting files.

  But the official CD has been sold and can be purchased in major software stores across the country.

  Or mail the money to Bomi, the company can directly mail the CD to home.

  A variety of payment methods are available.

  At the same time, Bomi also launched a so-called activation code plan——

  As long as you buy the disc of the Bomi game, you can use the serial number to check the two activation codes on Bomi’s official website.

  By using the activation code to purchase the game disc of "Audition", you can directly reduce the cost of 1/3.

  If both activation codes are used, you can receive the rebate from Bomi at major software stores with the serial number, the rebate amount is up to half the price of the game disc.

  A game disc is 68 yuan. After two reductions, players can get it for less than 12 yuan.

  Countless people on the Internet directly exclaimed:

  【Gosh, Bomi is really awesome this time, right? 】

  [After the two reductions are calculated, you can actually buy the "Audition" disc for less than 12 yuan, which is too cost-effective. 】

  【Then what else is there to say, I must go grab it. 】

   [It's over, Bomi is too inhumane. Is this going to force the company to death? In the future, other companies will sell online games for free, right? 】

  【Hahaha, I suspect that the upstairs is insinuating Xishanju. 】

  【No doubt, remove the word doubt】

  【Xishanju's release of Jianwang 1 this time, CDs seem to be selling very cheaply. 】

  【If this continues, domestic game discs will feel like they will become cheaper and cheaper. 】

  【You think too much, online games can be cheap, and stand-alone games are also cheap, do those game businesses want to drink Northwestern? 】

  ……

  On the first day, Audition’s CD sales reached 50,000.

  As a promotion, Bomi gives all major Internet cafes free game installation disks. Because the activation code is an exponential growth model, Internet cafes can often get a large number of activation codes.

  The next day, Audition’s sales exceeded 130,000...

  This number continues to increase.

  However, Cao Yang discovered that on the Internet, some scalpers are already selling activation codes publicly.

  This model is also very simple, because many players buy game discs, but they may not share the activation code. At this time, the scalpers can buy them at a low price and then sell them to those in need.

But the upper limit is also obvious. You can't sell more than 1/3 of the price of the game disc, so no player is willing to buy the activation code from you, so even if the scalper passes the price of 1 yuan or less than 5 yuan I got a lot of activation codes, but the selling price can only be maintained below 12 yuan.

  China’s scalper party is really terrible.

  Even such a small profit should be accounted for.

  There was no such problem in island countries before.

  Cao Yang didn't know whether to feel happy or sad.

  Because the Chinese are really the most budget-conscious and business-oriented people in the world, but when you are facing such a group, the road ahead is not easy.

  ……

But after thinking about it, Cao Yang felt that these players were really stupid. Why did they find the scalpers to buy the activation code? A few classmates got together to buy the CD, and everyone would get a discount. Isn’t this better than going to the scalper to buy the activation code? Is it more fragrant?

  In fact, quite a few players take the activation code just to qualify for the test and do not want to buy game discs. They can play games in Internet cafes. For this part of the players, the cost is less than buying the disc.

  So in fact, the number of CDs sold through activation codes is much smaller than the number of activation codes issued.

  ……

  November 27, finally came the day before the game's release.

  About 1.3 million activation codes have been activated for "Audition".

  The official number of CDs sold is 680,000.

  It means that a large part of players only bought activation codes to obtain test qualifications.

  Cao Yang felt a little bit heartbroken. With so much profit, it seems that the sales of optical discs are amazing, and finally the sales of optical discs are so low.

  Full of calculations, almost the sales revenue of optical discs is about 20 million.

   deducting the cost, this thing feels like it has not been earned.

  ……

  At the same time, on the side of Xishanju, the developers of Jianwang 1 were already standing in front of the computer.

  In fact, it is not only Xishanju, but also other counterparts in the industry.

  After several big sales, Bomi’s new game has become a vane in the industry.

  Boss Cao’s record of almost 0 failures in the gaming industry is simply a myth.

  So every time Bomi releases a new game, it will naturally arouse a wave of widespread attention.

  Especially "Audition" this time.

  For people in the industry, they simply can’t figure out why Bomi is making such a thankless game.

  First of all, you have to get authorization from major music companies. Otherwise, the music library is limited and players can’t dance a few songs at all, so the game life will naturally be greatly reduced.

in addition--

  The number of people who like dancing machines is still a mystery.

  Anyway, people in the industry are not very optimistic.

  The reason given by Sun Hongyin, the producer of Jianwang 1 at Xishanju, is very simple-

  In reality, few people like to play the dance machine, and most of the people who like to play the dance machine are girls. They play the dance machine for three minutes. It may be the first taste, but it didn't take long to give up.

  It’s just such a player base. Isn’t being a network dancing machine looking for death?

  ……

  There is a mature project development mechanism in the game industry, which is——

  First, find the target user first, that is, look at the user base of the game, and then consider whether there is a profit, before proceeding with the project.

After   , it will enter the development process...

  In fact, what Sun Hongyin said is correct, because in reality, the number of people who like to play dancing machines is quite small.

  If it wasn’t because the Bangzi Country’s girl group had a strong enough influence and a strong fan base, they wouldn’t have thought of making such a game.

   But Cao Yang's view is completely different.

  Because others have not seen Audition, he has seen it. It is too narrow to equate Audition with a dancing machine.

  In fact, Audition and Dance Machine are completely different things.

  Dancing machine is used to exercise the body, Audition is used to socialize.

  Mild, casual, cool, and powerful social attributes, this is the core of Audition.

  So Cao Yang is full of confidence in this game.

  ……

  On November 27, 12 o'clock noon, "Audition" officially opened.

  This time Cao Yang did not choose the time in the underworld, because the activation code is completely controllable, and how many activation codes you send will ultimately determine how many players will come in.

  The number of activation codes determines the upper limit of the player.

  In other words, the number of players entering the server today will not exceed 1.3 million.

  So if you are prepared, you don’t need to open the underworld. Liu Guangran is completely controllable.

  As soon as the server opened, players immediately swarmed in.

  ……

   "Huh?" After playing for a while, a planner of Xishanju suddenly turned around and said in surprise, "Boss, I don't seem to find where the game points are?"

   "Hey? It really is!"

  As soon as I was reminded, everyone seemed to have encountered a ghost hitting a wall, and all of them were full of weird expressions.

  This Nima is too terrible, is it possible that Bomi’s new game does not require card charges?

  How difficult is it to find something that everyone thinks is impossible to not exist?

  Colleagues at Xishanju, there are dozens of people in total. After searching for two hours, they can’t find the points display of the game.

"this……"

  It's shuddering about the fact that there is no remaining point indicator in online games.

  It is more terrifying than encountering ghosts.

   "Mom! Does this game of Bomi really don't require a card, right?"

  The most terrifying thing is that this wave of exemptions is not the most irritating.

  Because the new online game "Audition" launched by Bomi this time is actually a game that can be played unlimitedly without any point card purchases.

  Except for the initial CD installation fee, it can be said to be completely free.

  The colleagues of Xishanju were completely shocked——

  Audition’s CDs are so cheap.

  The game itself has no numerical growth, and the official does not sell game attributes.

  Only some avatars are on sale in the game mall, but the prices are very cheap, ranging from 5 cents to one piece.

  Everyone looked at each other and was stunned by Bomi's operation.

  This game, can you make money? !

  ……

  ——————————————————————————

  There is no update today.

   Ask for subscriptions, monthly passes, and rewards.

  Thank you all.

See you tomorrow

  (End of this chapter)