Kabam founder talk about how to develop popular games

Kabam is currently the most popular hand tour company. Zhou Kevin, founder of the company, recently boarded the "Fortune" list of 40 business elites under the age of 40. Recently, Zhou Kevin accepted the "Fortune" interview, talked about the founder of the Kabam, and how to develop a popular game.

A seemingly smooth and fun game, in the development of time is often not so simple.

This is exactly what the Kabam company has developed to follow when it comes to the development of a memorable hand tour. The Kabam company provides games through free mode and then earns money through additional paid content. In 8 years, under the leadership of co-founder and CEO Zhou Kevin, Kabam has grown from a small, obscure company to a large enterprise with an annual income of $360 million trillion and valued at $1 billion trillion. Last month, Kabam was also reported to have received a $120 million investment from Alibaba.

Zhou Kevin ranked 25th in Fortune's 40 business elite under 40 years of age. A few days after the list was released, he received an interview with Fortune, talking about his experience in the 2008 financial crisis, the secret to developing a successful game, and how the company intends to make China the next growth point.

Not every game company executive likes to play games. Are you a gamer?

Zhou Kevin: I've loved games since I was a kid. In high school I was a world-ranked StarCraft StarCraft player. It was interesting, and just a few days ago, my wife let me read a video on YouTube: A father threw all his son's game discs onto the lawn and ran over it with a lawn mower. It wasn't that bad when I was a boy, but my parents certainly wanted me to do something meaningful. So now I turn my favorite things into a big deal, and it's a dream come true.

Kabam's first selling game?

The first particularly successful game is the "Kingdom of Arthur" (Kingdoms of Camelot) distributed via Facebook. It's a strategic game that describes the medieval knights--the kind I like. There were also some complications, especially in the technical aspects of delivering games via the Internet. We couldn't have developed the kind of game you saw on the Xbox or PlayStation. So we can't develop athletics games. We were unable to deliver that level of graphic power over the Internet. So we chose an instant strategy game. Consider, for example, the strategic game of Yucatan Island (Settlers of Catan) or risk (disorientated), which does not require a lot of cool graphic effects, but more decisions, and then experiences the results of these decisions and fights with other players.

You said you were in a pay game that was affected by the financial crisis of 2008 years, can you talk about that?

From 2008 to 2009, we lost 90% of our income and had no money to pay. We said: "Our advertising revenue can not be recovered in the short term, what should we do?" At the same time, the so-called "mini game" is attracting a high degree of participation. And we've found a bigger trend: Many games are flocking to Facebook and using free mode. At that time, we put all bets on the game, decided to only develop the game, do not rely on advertising revenue-that is, only players for the game (advanced content) pay. Time proves that this is a good business.

How did you work with Hollywood to develop the game?

The gaming industry has been working with Hollywood in the past, but recently many game companies have focused on their own games, so many big Hollywood companies are also looking for new game companies to collaborate. When they launch a movie, they basically want a game that matches it. So they found us and said we had a good game on Facebook. After a few such calls, we said: "Let's have a try and see what happens." "The first thing we tried was The Godfather (The Godfather), and at first we were worried because if we were to develop a game ourselves, we would be able to make our own money and not have to share it with anyone." When we first played movie games, we really had the feeling of walking on eggshells. But the Godfather is a success for all parties because it's not the kind of high-end game where the lawyers ' team want to squeeze your last drop of blood to sign a deal. We love the game of crime and family hatred. So our cooperation with the Paramount Industry (Paramount) was a great success. Then Warner Brothers Warner us a call, followed by the US Gaomei Industry (MGM). Then we began to play The Hobbit (Hobbit) game. Universal Studios Universal us, and then we started with speed and passion 6 (Fast and Furious 6). Recently we have just announced that we will work with Marvel to a big project. We now understand the pattern and we know what we can bring to the player.

Are the goals of these games to simulate movie plots or to make the story grow?

Some of the company's games are trying to simulate movie plots, and their appeal is to repeat the movie to make you feel immersed in the episode. Some games are doing well in this area, but that's not our strategy. Our strategy is to develop other elements of the film that may only be part of the movie or the original. We can basically create a whole new story trail around that. Obviously we still want to adopt the essence of the film, such as the characters, stories and circumstances that make it very successful, but we don't want to be limited to the content of the movie. For us, ideally, a game can be popular for 5-10 years. Our first game, the Kingdom of Arthur, was launched almost 5 years ago, and now it's still very impressive, with hundreds of thousands of players playing every month. If you just follow the script of a movie, you can extend a two-hour movie to 100 hours, but its appeal won't last a few years.

Are there any movies you don't want to adapt to?

Of course, we will consider the audience of a film. First of all, we don't adapt documentaries to games--the reason is obvious. In contrast, comedy and the like are difficult to adapt to the game. The Game of Thrones (Game of Thrones) is a good example: The play has a lot of sexual and violent scenes. If we adapt it to a game, these things may not appear in the game. "Godfather" is another good example. We will show a bed with a horse's head, but we will not show a truer, more vivid picture.

Does any character or story get you into trouble?

When you try to sell a game disc for 60 dollars in Best Buy, you might hear something like, "Wow, did you hear that this game is going to get you into the airport and sweep down a man with a chainsaw?" Everyone is against this kind of violence, but guess what? It really attracts people to buy a CD for 60 dollars at Best Buy. But our game is not the same, our model is the opposite, you can download the game free of charge, installation and start is very simple, and then see if you like to play. It's our job to do something very good to make sure you play today and come back tomorrow. It's not very useful for us to do that kind of gimmick in the game. What we have to figure out is whether it will drain our existing player population.

What's the trick in developing a game that people are willing to pay for?

Your game must have what we call "the sense of pursuit." You install a game that can play for a few minutes. But there must be something in the game that hooks you. Then you have the feeling you want to pursue: you really want to do what you want to do in the game. Maybe you want to be a tough superhero because you like superheroes--that's what we're doing. We want to make something that you can marvel at and then let you spend a few months chasing that thing. We want it to be very inspiring in the first few minutes. We don't want to be the kind of game that people don't want to play for two hours. In order to make our business successful, we must establish a long-term relationship with the players.

Which big market do you need to conquer next?

In order to become a truly global company, especially given the assets and talents we currently have, we are looking to Asia. My family grew up in Asia and you have to understand the cultural dimension in Asia, you have to figure out how to do business there, and you have to know how to build and manage a studio there. We have done all those things. We have established a good relationship with Alibaba, and we have established a partnership with other partners, and the next step will be announced soon. So you'll find that we put a lot of energy into this area.

What kind of game are you going to launch next?

We have put a lot of attention to the real-time strategy game, we have also done a racing game and several action games. Later we will expand to other game categories outside the core business. It's like we've been filming all our lives, and now we're starting to take action movies. One of the big plays is a fighting game. Our project is a combat game, with your superhero playing against other superheroes, a bit like the style of Street Fighter 2 (Streets Fighter 2). We are very excited about it.