Afternoon observation: Chinese game "Black Myth: Wukong" into a new "domestic light"?

Chinese game "Black Myth: Wukong" topped the list of hot searches on several platforms, including Weibo and Zhihu, as soon as it was released on Tuesday. Not only did the coffee co-branded with the game sell out, but the relevant game plate and publisher stocks soared.

Several companies have announced "gaming" holidays for their employees, even reimbursing employees for the cost of buying games.

Chinese netizens said that "Black Myth: Wukong" came out, ending China's 20 years without domestic single-player 3A games (refers to high development costs, long development cycle, well-made games) dilemma, successfully challenged the dominance of the United States and Japan in the game industry, is the "light of domestic."

Han Qiaosheng, a well-known soccer commentator, said on Weibo that he had been binged by "Black Myth: Wukong" and heard that it was similar to the significance of China's national football team playing in the World Cup.

What's more, Chinese netizens are happy to say that the game has also gained popularity overseas. According to third-party data agency SteamDB estimates, three hours after unlocking the game, online players on the world's well-known game platform Steam at the same time exceeded 1.4 million, becoming the highest peak online number of pure stand-alone games in Steam history, surpassing well-known games such as Cyberpunk 2077.

Chinese aesthetics and Western technology to help break the circle

The developer of the console game, Game Science, was founded by former Tencent employee Feng Ji in 2014 and has received investment from Tencent and Hero Entertainment.

Black Myth: Wukong took six and a half years and nearly 300 million yuan (S $54 million) to develop. The story is set in the ancient Chinese supernatural novel Journey to the West. Players will play the role of Sun Wukong, the "man of Heaven", who embarks on a journey full of danger and surprise in order to discover the truth of the legend of the past.

In online discussions, the game's smooth graphics and attractive plot setting are the most frequently mentioned highlights of its status as China's first domestic AAA blockbuster.

Science and technology from the media new intelligence meta-analysis, the game reached a beautiful picture, behind the Nvidia artificial intelligence (AI) technology contributed. The article mentions Nvidia's "panoramic light chase" technology, which simulates the propagation of light in three-dimensional space to produce very realistic images and light effects; And the deep learning-based image enhancement technology DLSS3 technology, giving the game picture a lot of real details.

In addition, the creative team said that because of the use of the world's leading Unreal 5 engine, the picture quality is cinematic. Unreal Engine is a game development engine developed by Epic.

Players also pay attention to the story, the Chinese scenery in the game and the high-definition restoration of ancient Chinese buildings.

One player commented that he had experienced the wild west of the United States in the virtual world, been a pirate in the Caribbean, and protected the home planet in the future war, but what he was most looking forward to was "returning to my hometown, being a holy man, and becoming the most admired hero in my childhood."

Behind the game's breaking circle is its mature use of Western game industry technology, but also presents a Chinese story full of Chinese aesthetics and culture.

For many, it goes beyond a simple game to become a product of exporting Chinese culture overseas. "Now we can let foreign players experience what Chinese heroes are like," netizens said.

'Journey to The West' and 'The Lord of the Rings' have different narrative structures and worldviews, but the core is not that different, and Wu Chengen and Shakespeare are not that different,' Feng Ji, the game's producer, said in a media interview.

This accurately captures the pulse of "cultural confidence" in the current Chinese society.

The heat spread to consumption, the stock market and tourism

The heat of "domestic light" is also transmitted to the consumer, capital and tourism markets.

The sales of Black Myth: Wukong itself need not be mentioned, according to the Chinese game statistics platform "National Game Sales list", as of Tuesday evening, the total sales of Epic, PS5, Steam and other platforms has exceeded 4.5 million copies, sales of more than 1.5 billion yuan.

The game and Luckin coffee co-named "Black myth Cloud American", Monday (August 19) on the line half a day out of stock. Yang Fei, chief growth officer of Luckin, said, "Almost the system collapsed, and male purchasing power subverted team cognition this morning." In addition, Didi, Lenovo, SONY, etc., have carried out joint brand promotion with this game.

Capital markets felt the water much earlier. Since last Monday (August 12), the game stock has been active continuously because of the upcoming release of the game. On Tuesday, the game was officially released, and the A-share gaming sector bucked the broader market, with game publisher Zhejiang Media up nearly 7% and Huayi Brothers, which indirectly owns the game developer, up more than 10% at one point.

The places of interest that appear in the game are also expected to drive the corresponding tourism fever. According to the National Business Daily, "Black Myth: Wukong" selected 36 scenic spots as the background of the game in China, including the Mingshan Temple in Anyue, Sichuan province, the Dazu Stone Carvings in Chongqing, the Lingyin Temple in Hangzhou, and 27 locations in Shanxi Province.

Driven by this, Ctrip platform data show that the search popularity in Shanxi Province on Tuesday increased by more than 10% from the previous day, and the search popularity in cities such as Datong and Shuozhou in the province also increased by 20% from the previous day.

Cultural tourism departments in Beijing, Chongqing, Anhui and other places have also issued propaganda videos to catch the heat, inviting tourists to "follow Wukong to the scenic spots."

Regulatory attitude change game industry or a turning point?

The premise of the explosive popularity and marketing of games is the softening of China's regulatory attitude towards games.

In December, China softened its approach after a draft regulation of online games proposed restrictions on games encouraging daily logins and wallet top-ups, sparking a backlash and a stock market sell-off. In February this year, 111 domestic games were reviewed in China, and "Black Myth: Wukong" was among them.

In addition to the regular issuance of game plates, the "Opinions on Promoting high-quality Development of Service Consumption" (referred to as 20 articles) issued by The State Council of China on August 3 this year also put forward: Stimulate the vitality of improved consumption and improve the quality of online games.

Some netizens noticed that this time, in the announcement of "Black Myth: Wukong", the game's producer Feng Ji accepted an interview with Xinhua News Agency, and a number of official media forwarded. Netizens commented that "the official media's 'noodles' should be seen by everyone" and "Wukong caught up with a good release time."

The Governor of Chang 'an Avenue, a subsidiary of Beijing Daily, also commented that Black Myth: Wukong shows the rich and profound cultural heritage of China and lets the world see the efforts of Chinese games to tell Chinese stories well.

Bloomberg noted that the game's popularity could mean that China's more than US $40 billion (S $52.31 billion) gaming industry is nearing a turning point after years of constant regulatory scrutiny. Industry insiders also believe that the success of this game will inspire the birth of more high-quality games.

Obviously, no matter which industry, to produce better products, not only the efforts of enterprises, but also a tolerant policy environment as a support.