boyutpedia Chapter 431 The Final Showdown
Chapter 431 The Final Showdown
Two weeks have passed in a flash.
Every morning when Lu Ran arrives at the company, the first thing she does is still look at the data, but her mood when looking at the data is different from before.
Previously, we would stare at the curve and figure out how to push it up further; now, we just need to make sure the curve doesn't drop down.
League of Legends' concurrent online users remained stable at around 2.5 million. Although the popularity of ARAM and URF modes declined, the ranked mode data rebounded.
Players had their fill of mindless gameplay during the Lunar New Year holiday, and now they're returning to the essence of competition, playing even more fiercely than before.
The user growth curve for Minecraft has finally begun to flatten out.
It's not that the game is no longer viable; it's that it has already reached almost all the users it could.
With over 50 million registered users and 30 million daily active users, these figures already place it at the top of the sandbox genre.
Looking further down, the second place doesn't even come close to a fraction of his ranking.
CrossFire is still rising in price.
Shooting games have a lower learning curve than MOBAs and offer a greater sense of purpose than sandbox games, allowing many casual players who were discouraged by League of Legends to find a sense of belonging here.
Who doesn't know how to shoot a gun?
Just click the left mouse button when you see someone; whether you hit them or not is another matter.
Three games, three tracks, three mountains.
The employees at Tutu Technology have been walking with a brisk pace lately, not intentionally, but with an energy and spirit that radiates from within.
The project team was established for less than a year, and the products they produced were increasingly impressive. Anyone in their position would be overconfident.
Xiao Yang posted a meme in the company group chat: a Shiba Inu with its head tilted back, captioned "Who else?"
Old Wang replied with a panda emoji and the caption "Keep a low profile".
The two exchanged memes for over ten rounds before Zhou Mingzhe finally ended it with a comment: "Don't slack off during work hours."
Lu Ran didn't participate in the meme battle in the group; he was staring at two pages on his computer screen.
One is the official website of Sakura Games, and the other is the official website of EA's China region.
Both websites updated their homepages with new content at the same time.
On the Sakura Games side, there was a huge promotional image with a background of an ancient city where cherry blossoms were falling, and in the foreground stood a warrior in armor, holding a long sword that emitted a blue light.
Behind the general were thousands of soldiers and horses, their banners fluttering in the wind.
The top of the promotional image reads: "Sakura Legend: Dragon Kingdom Edition, coming soon."
At the very bottom, there was a line of smaller print, but it carried far more weight than the main title above: "This time, we're serious."
EA took a different approach.
The promotional image is in a dark tone, showing a soldier in tactical gear standing on ruins with a crashed helicopter behind him.
Smoke drifted in the sky, and the distant city silhouettes were faintly visible in the flames.
The text on the image is simple: "Project X. Coming Soon."
There was no game name, no specific date, just those two words.
But the more secretive they are, the higher the players' expectations become.
On TUTU's gaming forum, some people have already started analysis threads, scrutinizing every detail of the promotional images for clues. Some say it's a sequel to Battlefield, some say it's a brand new IP, and others say it's an exclusive game that EA specifically created for the Chinese market.
Various speculations are flying around, and the level of interest is ridiculously high.
Lu Ran switched back and forth between the two pages several times, then leaned back in his chair and stared at the ceiling.
Sakura Games is really in a hurry this time.
He had heard of the game "Sakura Legend" in his previous life. It was a national-level MMO in the Japanese market, which had been operating for more than ten years and had an absurdly high level of user loyalty.
Friends that players make in the game can also become friends in real life.
Some people get married in the game, some find jobs in the game, and some even write their game accounts into their wills.
Products of this caliber would be game-changers in any market.
Sakura Games didn't bring its game to China before, not because it didn't want to, but because it didn't dare to.
This level of IP can lead to meteoric success if done well, or utter ruin if done poorly.
They would rather test the waters with some second-tier products than stake their trump card on an unfamiliar market.
But now they have no choice.
All of their exploration products failed, and their market share was completely dominated by Tutu Technology. If they don't do something soon, the Chinese market will truly be out of their reach.
So Yamamoto played that card.
Lu Ran glanced at EA's side again.
Project X.
The fact that they won't even reveal the name shows that EA values this project no less than Sakura Games.
It's not that they don't want to promote themselves, but that they dare not reveal too much in advance, for fear of being targeted by their opponents.
This level of secrecy is rare even in EA's history.
Lu Ran picked up his phone and sent a message to Chen Mo: "President Chen, I've seen the new moves by Sakura Games and EA."
Chen Mo replied instantly: "I saw it too. Sakura Games is really going all out this time. Do you know what they're saying internally?"
"What did you say?"
"They said if this doesn't work out, they'll withdraw from the Chinese market completely."
Lu Ran looked at the line of text but did not reply immediately.
Completely withdraw from the Chinese market.
The weight of these six words is not something an ordinary person can bear.
There is no publicly available data on how much Sakura Games has invested in the Chinese market, but industry estimates put it at least in the billions.
Billions have been poured in, but barely a splash. Now they have to bet their last trump card; if they lose, they'll just have to accept defeat and leave.
This isn't a business decision; it's a gamble with your life.
"Is the information reliable?" Lu Ran asked.
"It's reliable. I have friends inside Sakura Games. They had a high-level meeting last week, and Yamamoto made a solemn pledge at the meeting. The old men on the board originally disagreed with investing more money, but Yamamoto vouched for the plan with his career, and that's how they got it approved. If this fails again, Yamamoto will resign, and Sakura Games will completely scale back its business in China."
After reading the message, Lu Ran leaned back in his chair.
He had never dealt with Yamamoto, but from Chen Mo's description, he could tell that Yamamoto was a ruthless person.
People who dare to gamble their careers on an opportunity are rare in large companies.
Most professional managers seek stability, preferring to earn less rather than suffer losses, because if they make money, the credit may not go to them, but if they lose money, they will definitely bear the responsibility.
Yamamoto chose a different path.
He pushed all his chips onto the table and went all in.
"What about EA?" Lu Ran asked again.
"EA is even tighter on the airs. Even my people can't find out the specifics of Project X. All we know is that the investment is much larger than Sakura Games', and it's specifically tailored for the Chinese market. There's no similar product in Europe and America; it's a completely new development."
Made specifically for the Chinese market. These seven words are more powerful than any advertisement.
In the past, when EA entered the Chinese market, they would simply take products that sold well in Europe and America, change the language pack, and launch them.
Players aren't stupid; they know they're second-class citizens, and while they harbor resentment, they have no other choice.
EA has finally realized that the Chinese market is not subservient to the European and American markets, and Chinese players are not inferior to European and American players.
If you want to make money from them, you have to show sincerity.
Lu Ran replied to Chen Mo with a message: "Mr. Chen, thank you for telling me all this."
"You're welcome. I've told you before, I'm on your side on this issue." Chen Mo paused, then sent another message, "President Lu, are you really not worried this time?"
Lu Ran thought for a moment and typed a few words: "Is worrying useful?"
Chen Mo sent an ellipsis and then said, "You really have a big heart."
"It's not that I'm carefree, it's just that things have come to this point, and worrying won't change anything. They make a move, I fight back. It's that simple."
"Okay. Good that you understand. If there's anything I can help you with, just let me know."
"it is good."
Lu Ran put down his phone, stood up, and walked to the whiteboard.
The line written on the whiteboard half a month ago is still there—"Sakura Legend. EA Unknown Project."
He picked up a marker, circled the name of Sakura Legend, and wrote a few words next to it: "National-level MMO with high user loyalty."
They circled the unknown EA project and wrote, "High level of confidentiality, custom-made for China, huge investment."
After finishing writing, he took two steps back and looked at the whiteboard, finding the battle map increasingly interesting.
Three products from Tutu Technology faced off against two ace products from foreign companies.
MOBA vs. MMO, sandbox vs. open world, shooter vs. shooter.
The product categories overlap and are misaligned, so it's not a one-on-one head-on battle, but they're vying for the same group of people's time.
A player only has so much time. If you play Sakura Legends, you won't have time to play League of Legends. If you play Project X, you won't have the energy to grind CrossFire.
This is a zero-sum game.
There are no draws, only wins and losses.
Lu Ran stood in the office for a while, then picked up his phone and called Zhou Mingzhe.
"Brother Zhou, come to my office."
Zhou Mingzhe arrived five minutes later, holding a cup of tea and wearing an expression that said, "What trouble are you causing now?"
"What's wrong?"
Lu Ran pointed to the whiteboard. Zhou Mingzhe followed his finger and looked at it for a few seconds, his expression changing from casual to serious.
"Have you seen the new moves by Sakura Games and EA?" Lu Ran asked.
"I saw it. The group chat exploded. Xiao Yang said the promotional image for Sakura Games is so beautiful, she wants to take a screenshot and use it as wallpaper. Lao Wang said that EA's Project X is kept under too much secrecy, even people he knows who work at EA don't know what it is. In short, everyone is quite nervous."
What do you think?
Zhou Mingzhe stood in front of the whiteboard for a while, then said something that surprised Lu Ran: "I don't think we need to be too nervous."
Why?
"Because they've done similar things before. Sakura Games was full of confidence before they came, and what happened? EA had a massive publicity campaign before they came, and what happened? Lots of noise but little action." Zhou Mingzhe turned to look at Lu Ran. "I'm not saying it will be the same this time. I'm saying we can't be intimidated by their hype. Let them do their thing, we'll do ours. There's no conflict."
Lu Ran laughed after hearing this: "Brother Zhou, when did you become so calm?"
"I learned it from you. I overheard you talking to Chen Mo on the phone, and every time he said something big, you just said 'oh' and that was it. At first, I thought you were faking it, but then I realized you really didn't care. Since the boss doesn't care, why should I worry about it?"
Lu Ran felt a little embarrassed by what was said.
It's not that he doesn't care, it's that he feels it's pointless to care.
What the opponent does is their freedom; what he can control is what he does.
As the person in charge of the overall situation, Lu Ran knew he couldn't afford to lose his composure.
"Brother Zhou, can you do me a favor?"
"What is it?"
"Call the core team leaders of the three games together for a meeting. It doesn't need to be long, an hour will do. I'll explain the next steps and strategies to them."
Zhou Mingzhe nodded, turned around and left.
Lu Ran stood alone in front of the whiteboard and looked at those few lines of text for a while.
Sakura Legend, Project X. Two strong cards, two formidable opponents.
He silently calculated the timeline in his mind.
Sakura Games' promotional images have just been released. According to industry practice, it usually takes at least two to three months from promotion to launch.
Needless to say, EA hasn't even decided on a name yet, so the release date will only be later.
In other words, he has a window of opportunity.
During this window of opportunity, he can put aside his current tasks, get the team in top condition, and then get that matter done.
He took out his phone and found Shen Yuege's WeChat.
The two people's chat history stopped last night.
Shen Yuege posted a photo of her cooking. The appearance was much better than last time; at least you could tell it was braised pork instead of burnt pork.
Lu Ran gave a thumbs up, and Shen Yuege replied with a smug emoji.
He looked at the photo and a smile crept onto his face.
He hadn't told Shen Yuege about the wedding yet. It wasn't that he didn't want to tell her, but he wanted to surprise her.
But the premise of a surprise is to arrange the time well. Don't let him be on stage giving his oath while his phone keeps vibrating in his pocket, all of them from the tech department saying "the server has crashed again."
He put his phone away, walked back to his desk, sat down, turned on his computer, and created a new document.
I typed a line in the document: "Wedding Planning Checklist".
Then he stared at those six words for a long time.
He's a typical straight man, how would he know what to prepare for a wedding?
Wedding dress? Venue? Emcee? Wedding car? Wedding favors? Invitations?
After thinking about it, he decided to seek help from outside sources.
He picked up his phone and sent Tan Yu a message: "Tan Yu, how are your wedding preparations going?"
Tan Yu replied instantly: "I'm so busy. Manxue drags me around every day to look at venues, try on wedding dresses, and choose wedding candies. My legs are about to break."
Looking at the message, Lu Ran suddenly felt a little guilty.
Tan Yu started preparing a month in advance, but he hasn't even set a wedding date yet.
"Do you have any experience to share?"
Tan Yu sent a question mark: "Why are you asking this? Are you also having a wedding?"
"Hmm. We haven't set a time yet, let's find out more first."
Tan Yu typed a string of exclamation marks, then said, "Holy crap, really? You and Shen Yuege?"
"Otherwise what? Who should I talk to?"
"Brother Lu, you've finally come to your senses! I've been fucking waiting for this day for so long!"
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