Chinese online games feast is "dividing"

As a "dinner" of the end of the continuous upgrade, the page is "fast food", in the chaos to mature, and mobile games or in the field of "snacks."

The size of China's online gaming market is still expanding, but growth has slowed sharply.

According to the Ministry of Culture data, 2011 China's online gaming market size (including Internet games and mobile gaming market) amounted to 46.85 billion yuan, an increase of 34.4% from the previous year. This is no comparison with the 50% or even 60% per cent increase before 2009. If you eliminate the growth of web games and mobile games, internet gaming is slowing even more.

Behind the changes in the data, the pattern of the Chinese game market is changing.

The internet has entered the era of "fragmentation". From the game user's point of view, the player's age structure is constantly dispersed, the proportion of older players is rising, the demand for different age groups of diverse players. Guangdong Provincial Press and publication Bureau of Science and Technology and digital publishing office Su Yi in the new wealth interview, said that the basic reason for the transformation of the game industry is the change in user demand.

China's online games industry has been at the crossroads of transformation, if the Chinese online gaming industry as a feast of entertainment, then, this meal is "differentiated." As a traditional food, Chinese dinner client games rely on continuous "upgrade" to maintain the status of the river; web games in the form of fast food, to meet the needs of the user's fragmentation, is the chaos of hegemony to mature, and mobile games more like snacks, easy, simple, but still just in the growth stage. With the Golden Hill game Vice President Chen Feizhou said, the end of the tour is a bowl, the page is the pot, and mobile games, still in the field.

Large End Tour: "Chinese Dinner" upgrade

and "Chinese dinner" similar, large-scale end travel more complex, based on traditional Chinese culture, users can produce a deep sense of generation, and a strong desire to pay, is the most mature online games market, a few major traditional game operators are relying on large-scale end of the river to determine the status of the lake. However, after a fierce round of competition, the beginning of the Jiangshan, large-scale end of the tour is gradually from the "new product-driven" to upgrade to the old game to strengthen the original site.

Rely on fist game to lock market pattern

2011, the top six Chinese online games Tencent, NetEase, Grand, Perfect World, Sohu tour, giant Network, the total income of 35.3 billion yuan, has accounted for 75.3% of the market share, the top three market share also reached 59.1%, the market is highly concentrated situation. In addition, Tencent became the first company to enter the tens of billions of revenue camp, exclusive market share of 1/3, 15.8 billion yuan income is the first time more than the second NetEase and third Sheng and.

More games released in 2011, "China's top ten income online games list" shows that the top ten of the net swims without exception are large end of the tour, income and up to 21.94 billion yuan, accounting for China's total income of the net 46.8% (table 1). Moreover, the large-scale end swims to each home swims the company to contribute enormously. "Cross the line of fire" and "Dungeons and Warriors" contributed to Tencent's game revenue half, "Journey 2" income also occupies half of the giant network, "Dream West Tour" and "World of Warcraft" income of about 60% of NetEase's total revenue, "legendary series" and "Dragon Valley" income of about 70% of the total revenue of the grand game, and "Tianlong Eight 3" income is to reach Sohu total income of 80%.

From new products to old game upgrades

Large-scale end-travel pattern has been basically formed, the new game is not a successful opportunity, for the game company, the old games upgrade has a pivotal role. First of all, even if the page tour, mobile online games menacing, but large-scale end of the tour in the short term is still the main revenue, to hold large end of the market is a top priority. Secondly, with the first group of net players to participate in the work, online game player's income is also increasing year by year, the value of individual players still have to dig space. In addition, the page swims, the attempt of the mobile net swims need the fund to support, the large-scale end swims the profit pattern mature, it is the stable income source.

Because of this, China's several major traditional online gaming companies are sparing no effort to upgrade their classic online products. "The future of large-scale end-trips will be to service-oriented development, providing better service to the gamers, even if the number of users does not increase, revenue may grow." "Jinshan Games Vice President Chen Feizhou said, before the Golden Hill almost every year to launch a new game, now has changed the practice, constantly for the old game injection close to the user needs of new content. "The user can keep the game habit, the original achievement still exists, he is also more willing to pull friends to play, the word of mouth not only reduces the new user to obtain the cost, the user's loyalty is also higher." ”

NetEase also recently to nearly 10-year-old "old" "Dream West Tour" to carry out Multi-angle upgrade, including innovative play, put on TV ads. "NetEase is still the client game as the focus, at high cost and longer period of development, the most fundamental reason is to provide players with a better gaming experience, we will not change in order to transform, and will not be in order to reduce costs and transformation, all to the user demand." NetEase Game Market general manager Wang Yi said.

Along with the "Dream West" ads swept the TV screen, there is also a grand "Dragon Valley", which is the game's largest ever marketing campaign. Shanda's high investment in the Valley of the dragon is not unreasonable, its 2012-year net operating income was 1.389 billion yuan (USD 221 million), up 10.9% from a year earlier, and 2.5% from the previous quarter, while income growth was coming from the "Valley of the Dragon", the "Eternal Tower" and the new version of "Star Change" and the launch of new activities. Shanda also plans to launch a new version of the saga in the second half of 2012.

Web games: "Fast food" in the chaos to mature

"Dinner" end of the tour through the upgrade for the Ashes level players to provide a higher quality service. and web games as the online game "fast Food", which is to play the convenient and fast, to meet the needs of the user fragmentation of the game, become the most active in recent years, the emerging market, is the chaos of hegemony to mature.

New forces that grow rapidly

Web game started in 2007, 2008 years. From the perspective of online game manufacturers, web games belong to the blue sea, can avoid large end of the edge of the trip; from the internet industry perspective, 2007-2008, China Mobile to the mobile value-added services to rectify, small and medium-sized webmaster naturally to find new flow of the way, the web game happens to happen at this time.

The appearance of the web game enriches the type of the net swims, the low entry threshold expands the net swims the user group, lets more and more users can taste the online meal. In the Web game, in 2009-2010, the number of active PC games users in China has increased markedly. At present, and large-scale end of the tour similar, the main use of the page tour props charging mode. Analysys International data show that the 2011 Chinese web game market size of 5.55 billion yuan, the market share has exceeded 10%.

Multiple forces involved in the competition

The beautiful prospect of web games has attracted the participation of all the Internet forces, from doing the "chef" of the page tour product, to "open the restaurant" The page swims the platform, the troop grows gradually, appeared the Guangzhou Philippine Sound, the Shanghai 37 plays, the Kunlun worldwide, the heart game and so on a batch of specially engaged in the page swims development or the operation company.

Traditional online gaming companies are also trying to page tours. Tencent in 2009 launched a page tour "Silk Road Hero", and at the end of 2011 through the way to increase the stock, holding page tour company Beijing Game Valley, 2011, Sohu Tour Acquisition page of the developer Shenzhen Seventh Avenue, quickly cut into the page tour market, Shanda, NetEase, and so on have also for its classic game launched version The perfect World is a 300-person team layout page tour.

Relative development links, platform competition is more intense, the Internet traffic giants have shot successively. Renren launched a page tour platform "Everyone Game", Baidu, Qihoo 360 also launched a page tour platform, although Ma Yun has publicly declared "starved to death will not do online game business", Taobao or in May 2012 low-key online Taobao game platform, the attractiveness of the page can be seen.

From chaos to maturity

And large end of the tour is different, the market is still in the happy rodeo stage. Although the share of the Web game product has appeared a certain concentration, Analysys International data show that the first quarter of 2012, the market share of more than 10% of the game has a, more than 5% of the game has five. However, whether developers or operating platform, market share is relatively dispersed, there is no absolute leading edge of the company.

At present, the success of the page tour product has a certain contingency, the life cycle is also relatively short, the page tour vendors through the introduction of a variety of products to share risk, and in order to quickly launch products, mutual plagiarism, malicious talent competition and other phenomena have appeared. In addition, the emergence of a large number of new products to promote the cost of promotion, some of the page tour manufacturers or platforms using pornographic elements to promote the practice also affected the image of the page tour industry.

Like many internet products, the chaotic state of the online games market is also a necessary stage for its mature. Focus on the page of the platform of Shanghai 37 play President Li Yifei, "Now the Web game market is in common to users of the education, together to make the market bigger stage, and users will eventually choose to operate a strong company, there will be leading companies to appear."

Huang Kai, the CEO of Guangzhou, says, "with the accumulation of experience in the research and development of the page, the improvement of research and development ability, the life cycle of the page tour will be extended, leading page tour research and development company will appear." The company from the SP Transformation, 2008 began to focus on web game development.

Mobile games: Also in the field of "snacks"

The "snack" property of mobile games is embodied in two aspects. On the one hand, from the current stage, mobile gaming market size is still very small. According to the Ministry of Culture data, the 2011 mobile gaming market size of 3.87 billion yuan, compared to the entire market of 46.85 billion yuan in terms of the scale, can only be regarded as snacks. On the other hand, mobile games meet the needs of users to play the game anytime, anywhere, fill the fine bits of free time, through Cross-platform data interchange and other means, mobile games can be added to the PC games, and can be combined with mobile Internet applications such as LBS. And, for users, mobile games are simpler and more flexible, their game snacks.

Still more obstacles to development

Mobile Internet big development, intelligent terminal popularization, mobile game seems to usher in the spring. But it has to be noted that the 2011 rounds of several mobile games, like "Angry Birds", "Fruit Ninja", "fishing talent," and so on, are only stand-alone games, users do not need to access the Internet can participate in the game, it should be said that there is no real mobile games can be so popular, single game is still the mainstream of mobile games.

In China, there are many practical problems in the development of mobile games. 2011, China's intelligent terminal shipments reached 110 million units, more than the sum of previous years. Although the number of large, but the main force is thousand-yuan intelligent machine, this type of mobile phone configuration is difficult to support mobile games, and even slightly more complex picture of a single game will appear card machine phenomenon, electricity also does not meet the requirements.

In addition, China's mobile network development is not satisfactory, 3G penetration rate is still less than 1/4. As of 2011, the WiFi penetration rate in Chinese households was only 21.8%, below the global average, and many users were restricted to mobile internet access, which largely restricted the development of mobile games. In addition, China's mobile payment is also at the initial stage, immature.

The first step is to occupy the entrance.

Despite the many obstacles, almost no one has questioned its incalculable prospects. No matter how the future mobile game mode deduction, the accumulation of users, occupy the entrance is the first step. At present, the platform has become the industry's common choice.

GF Securities (000776, shares bar) media analyst Zhao Yujie said, "In addition to Apple and Amazon in the mobile end of the formation of their own ecosystem, other manufacturers are still exploring, if you can find a new entry point, there is a chance." And in the future, once the pattern is formed, the vendors who have not built the platform will adjust their position, for example, to be a powerful content provider. But at present it is still the stage that everybody competes to build platform.

In addition to the application store mode, the market also appeared a number of professional mobile phone game platform, such as music, papaya mobile, traditional internet companies have joined the team of hand-tour platform. Tencent launched the mobile phone QQ Game Center in 2007, and in May 2012 will be mobile end of multiple platforms integrated into Tencent QQ game wireless platform. Shanda Games in 2005 launched the hand platform Game-v,2010 launched Android mobile game integrated Application "Hemp Ball Game box", because of various reasons, these two platforms have not reached a grand expectation. May 2012, the Grand Mobile platform Pole (g) came out.

As an effective way to cash in, the mobile gaming market naturally attracts companies that occupy portals at the mobile end.

Relying on mobile browsers to start the UC gifted as the 2009 acquisition of mobile gaming platform nine tour, into mobile games, its chief operating officer Zhushunti said, "UC has the internet gene, more understand the use of mobile internet users, acquisition of nine tour and make up for the lack of experience in the game operation." China's largest free WAP portal 3G Portal also launched mobile gaming platform in 2008, 3G Portal President Zhang also said, "whether from the pay situation or market capacity, the game is very important in mobile Internet, and do the platform is the dream of all internet companies."

Angry Birds vs through the FireWire

Rovio's "Angry Birds" are all over the world, becoming a classic mobile game. On the PC side, Tencent operates the South Korean online games "through the FireWire" to win "China's most absorbed gold online" laurel. Mobile games are the new favorite of the industry, and the traditional online games have many "Ashes class" players, from product characteristics to promote operations to the profit model, they have each wonderful, each has its own challenges.

Product Features: Simple and brisk vs depth experience

The biggest advantage of mobile games is to fill the user's finely idle time, coupled with the mobile terminal configuration can not compete with the PC, so mobile games need to be short, brisk, simple. As a stand-alone game, "Angry Birds" combined with the mobile phone's sense of gravity and touch screen function, simple screen, easy to operate, music easy. "Simple to mentally retarded" and fun to make it a young and old, in the global 1 billion users of mobile phones pitched settled, of which more than 100 million users from China.

Simple is the magic weapon of mobile game, is also a mishap. When the music network data show that the single mobile game within 3 months of the user churn rate reached 48.3%, and a year's loss rate is as high as 77.6%, short life cycle is the nightmare of mobile games. In view of this, Rovio constantly introduced a new version for users to create freshness, online so far, "Angry Birds" has launched dozens of versions of the series of games. For now, it works well, but challenges remain.

Unlike a brisk bird, "crossing the line of fire" as a large shooting game is more complex and requires the depth of user participation. The game July 2008 official test, to lurk and defenders of the two camps of the battle for the story of the main line, patterns, maps, tasks, equipment, matching the complexity of the game will continue to magnify, to attract continuous exploration, in-depth experience, there have been a number of paid "Ashes class" players. March 2012, "Through the FireWire," the highest number of online players reached 3.5 million, creating a new record of Chinese games. Although the forum around the Games, the association has been produced, in favor of the stability of the player group, but the user's risk of loss to prevent. To this end, "through the FireWire" also continued to launch a new version, and regularly held through the FireWire Hundred City League, Champions Cup and other activities. Starting from beta, more than 40 versions have been launched, with an average of 1 months to launch a new version.

Promotion way: Do not spend money vs.

Only one of the main game Rovio, and most mobile gaming companies, and strive to promote not to spend money, adopted a more "flattering" mode of promotion. The spread of Angry Birds starts with social media, builds a homepage on Facebook, promotes product promotions on Twitter, and makes it popular with Apple's App store. Every time a celebrity mentions "Angry Birds," Rovio will upload the video to YouTube, such as talk show host Conan Oblein boasted that he had rushed into the "Angry Birds", which has aroused public curiosity and taste. When it flew into China, it is already a big star, the Chinese user's eager to let it basically save the burden of promotion.

"Through the line of fire," the promotion is the use of silver smashed out of the heavy mode. In the use of their own media, IM resources to promote, Tencent will look to the whole media. Print media, television, radio, internet, Internet cafes have become the promotion of positions. Online activities under the line is "through the FireWire" to attract players eyeball a big weapon, from the collection of Chinese name for the game began, Tencent to attract players to an endless stream of activities, such as the line across the FireWire hundred City League, offline reality version of the game, large cosplay and so on. "Through the FireWire" also opened a microblog.

Blue cursor (300058, stock bar) (300058) earnings show that in 2011, Tencent to 96 million yuan game advertising into its second largest customer. Tencent itself has channel advantages, which in some extent reduced the publicity costs, the other online games companies to promote the cost is even more alarming. According to the data of the consultation, the 2012-year quarter, the top Sports page Tour "Football World" advertising amount of up to 6.312 million yuan, become the most burning money online games, the second "WOW" advertising investment also as high as 5.007 million yuan.

Profit model: Advertising plus derivative vs prop charges

Abroad, the "Angry Birds" profit comes mainly from paid downloads and derivatives sales. Rovio's 2011 earnings show that its derivatives revenue amounted to $32 million trillion, accounting for 106.3 million of the total revenue of 30%. Given that Chinese users are accustomed to free, the mobile payment system is not mature enough, "Angry Birds" chose to do as the Romans, to take a free download of the way. Its income in China comes from three parts: embedded ads in the game, without affecting the quality of the game and experience of the premise of appropriate introduction of brand advertising, and cooperative companies to be divided; the derivative of the entertainment industry chain, involving plush toys, food, clothing, animation, comics, theme park, etc. experience a higher fee version, For example, in cooperation with China Unicom launched the full level of no advertising fee version of "Angry Birds, Space edition." According to Rovio's plan, derivatives revenues will be the main source of revenue in China.

"Through the FireWire" is to take the game free, prop charge mode, which is the common practice of Chinese online games. "Through the line of fire" in props, experience, logo and so on to highlight the difference between paid players and free players in the game, for paying players to provide a lot of convenience, to attract free players to pay upgrades, and the complexity of the game has created more props design space, pulling users to continue to spend.

2011, "Through the FireWire" by virtue of 5.46 billion yuan income into the "China's top ten income online games list", China's gold absorption capacity of the strongest. "2011 China online game Market Research Report" shows that the total consumption of net users from 2010 to 27.3% to 10.5%, the monthly consumption of more than 500 yuan users near 20%, but there are still 68.3% of users pay the model is not satisfied with the prop. Chinese online games need to explore a new profit model, "through the FireWire" also began to try to implant brand advertising in the game.