April 27th, Wednesday.
Shangyang Games.
Pei Qian made a special trip to Shangyang Games today, intending to get a brief update on the promotion of the ioi domestic server.
Since assigning this easy-win task to Lin Wan at the beginning of the month, Pei Qian had been quite at ease and hadn’t inquired about it.
After all, ioi’s momentum overseas could be described as skyrocketing, and following this trajectory, the successful union of ioi’s domestic and international servers was just a matter of time.
Besides, Pei Qian had been secretly helping Lin Wan.
After learning about ioi’s frantic update schedule, Hu Xianbin had anxiously approached Mr. Pei, hoping to increase staffing, but was politely declined.
“With Shangyang Games and Lin Wan’s capabilities, just giving them a little help should be enough, right?”
Pei Qian clearly understood the principle that “in martial arts, speed conquers all.” From his memory, Riot Games had rapidly expanded its market share through crazy update speeds while maintaining quality, which was why it achieved such tremendous success.
Now Finger Company was following the same path, and the effect would be immediate.
Pei Qian couldn’t say he was gratified—after all, whether GOG or ioi became popular, he’d still make money. He just felt that the world had returned to normal, developing in the direction he had anticipated, which made him a tiny bit happy.
As soon as Pei Qian arrived at the office area, the employees spotted him.
“Mr. Pei!”
“Mr. Pei, what brings you here?”
“Please, have a seat.”
“Sorry, we’re busy launching a new hero.”
The office area looked extremely busy. Ye Zhizhou, Wang Xiaobin, and others were each occupied with their tasks. They just greeted Pei Qian briefly before continuing to type away at their keyboards, eyes fixed on their computer screens.
Pei Qian was unfazed: “Carry on with your work, I’m just here for a casual look.”
Lin Wan emerged from her office with a document in hand, looking brisk and energetic: “Rewrite the update announcement. I’ve circled several parts that don’t flow well. And make sure to emphasize that this is the first simultaneous update between the domestic and global servers—we’re no longer playing an outdated version of the global server. This point is very important!”
“…Mr. Pei, why are you here?”
Lin Wan looked slightly surprised, as Mr. Pei didn’t often visit Shangyang Games.
Although Mr. Pei frequently provided guidance to Shangyang Games, it was usually when they sought his advice during major difficulties that he would offer a few words of direction, and whether they could understand depended on their own comprehension.
Visits like today’s were quite rare.
Seeing Lin Wan’s current state, Pei Qian couldn’t help but smile, very satisfied.
Well, she had quickly grown from a novice who knew nothing into a department head who could handle things independently and an excellent designer!
Seeing Lin Wan so seriously promoting the ioi domestic server, when ioi successfully explodes in popularity globally in the future, Lin Wan should have proven her ability and be able to return to Shenhua to inherit the family business, right?
Although there were serious deviations from his envisioned script in the process, the result would be the same.
Come to think of it, Lin Wan should now be one of the few employees whose diligent work didn’t cause Mr. Pei discomfort.
“It’s fine, I’m just here for a casual look around, to understand the situation with the ioi domestic server,” Pei Qian said.
Lin Wan nodded: “I see. Then please come to the meeting room, Mr. Pei, and I’ll give you a brief report.”
Pei Qian: “Finish your work first.”
Lin Wan smiled: “It’s okay, the work has already been arranged. Besides, the report will only take a few minutes, it’ll be quick.”
Pei Qian nodded and followed Lin Wan to the meeting room.
“Mr. Pei, shortly after receiving the task of operating the ioi domestic server, we found ioi’s trump card against GOG, which is update speed. So our operational activities mainly coordinate with Finger Company, integrating the promotion of new heroes with game promotion.”
“Take this promotional activity as an example. The new hero provided by Finger Company is ‘Bloodthirsty Lone Shadow: Shalerge,’ a dual-form werewolf.”
“Finger Company provided promotional animations for this hero, which we’ve updated to the domestic server’s login client. We’ve also purchased some video and website advertisements to promote this new hero.”
“There’s a new hero promotional campaign every two weeks, ensuring that ioi’s popularity remains at a high level.”
“At the same time, we reasoned with Finger Company, demanding they seriously consider the domestic server’s situation. After the domestic server’s review is complete, we’ll update simultaneously, achieving version synchronization between domestic and foreign servers. This way, one of ioi’s major shortcomings has been addressed!”
“If nothing unexpected happens, GOG probably won’t be able to produce new heroes within the next month. In comparison, quite a few people will switch to ioi due to the update issue.”
“Mr. Pei, you said to go all out, and we haven’t shown any mercy to GOG!”
After hearing the report, Pei Qian kept nodding.
Good, reliable!
These people at Shangyang Games, especially Lin Wan, are directing their backstabbing energy from me to GOG—the effect is outstanding!
Previously, Pei Qian didn’t have a deep understanding of the ioi domestic server’s situation. After hearing Lin Wan’s report, he discovered that Shangyang Games had done a lot of work in less than a month!
Not only had they completed the most basic tasks of server launch, maintenance, and version updates, but they had also facilitated version synchronization between domestic and global servers, and seized upon GOG’s weakness of slow new hero updates.
Perfect!
Pei Qian nodded slightly, praising: “Very well done, but you must not become complacent. Stay vigilant against pride and impetuosity, understand?”
He wasn’t thinking of any way for GOG to turn the tables; he was simply speaking from experience, feeling that things wouldn’t be so simple.
After all, he had too much experience fighting with these people and knew that what they excelled at was making comebacks from desperate situations, suddenly reversing the situation just when Mr. Pei thought it was “in the bag.”
Lin Wan nodded: “Of course! Mr. Pei, I believe the battle with GOG will be a long-term process. So far, I only have a 50% chance of winning.”
Pei Qian was a bit speechless: “50% chance?”
Although caution was warranted, it shouldn’t be that low, right?
It should be at least 70%.
Lin Wan was taken aback: “What, Mr. Pei, did I overestimate? Do you think we don’t even have a 50% chance?”
“Uh…” Pei Qian was at a loss for words; the two weren’t on the same wavelength again.
Why was there not even a bit of tacit understanding between him and his employees?
Pei Qian was about to explain when urgent knocking came from outside the meeting room.
Lin Wan was startled and looked toward Pei Qian.
Pei Qian nodded, indicating she could open the door.
Lin Wan quickly went to the door and found that Ye Zhizhou was knocking.
“Bad news, GOG has updated their official website!” Ye Zhizhou’s expression was grave, as if facing a great enemy.
A question mark appeared above Pei Qian’s head.
?
Updated the official website?
It wasn’t a game version update, just a website update, so what was the big deal?
Surely just updating the website couldn’t overshadow the buzz around ioi’s new hero?
That couldn’t be possible, right?
Lin Wan and Pei Qian followed Ye Zhizhou to the office area with confusion, checking his computer.
On GOG’s official website, in a prominent position, was an activity title written in large artistic font: “GOG Creative Community Launches, Every Player is a Hero Designer!”
Below was a line of smaller text: “If your creative idea is adopted, you can receive 5% of all skin profits for that hero as an indefinite cash reward!”
There were many activity rules, including special sections on the official website, player submissions, participants being able to like submissions, official regular selections, and so on.
Ye Zhizhou had just discovered this, his expression grave: “Min Jingchao has a knack! I never thought he’d use this method to leverage player creativity!”
“This way, they can skip a lot of creative work and directly select according to players’ preferences. The design team just needs to handle the production part, saving a ton of time!”
“Not only that, but this activity seems to have caused quite a stir among GOG’s player community because the rewards are so generous!”
“Anyone participating in this forum, whether their creative ideas are adopted or not, even if they’re just enthusiastic bystanders giving likes, can receive rewards!”
“Although GOG hasn’t launched any new heroes yet, players’ attention has been completely stolen by this activity!”
“With our new hero ‘Bloodthirsty Lone Shadow’ going live, it’ll be difficult to capture players’ attention under these circumstances…”
Lin Wan’s expression also became serious.
“I see… What a brilliant counterattack.”
“Indeed, the most formidable opponents are our people.”
“This way, they can fully utilize players’ wisdom and accelerate hero production; use part of the profits to bind players to GOG’s chariot, preventing defection; most importantly, this move can only be used with a large player base, and GOG precisely holds the numerical advantage from previous competition.”
“Without launching any new heroes, just by simply creating an activity page and posting an announcement on mobile clients, PC clients, and the official website, they’ve immediately mobilized players’ emotions…”
Ye Zhizhou was somewhat defiant: “Then can’t we also…”
Lin Wan shook her head: “We can’t.”
“We can’t interfere with Finger Company’s development. Even if we collected opinions, Finger Company probably wouldn’t adopt them.”
“Moreover, we’re just operators. Our pricing strategy must broadly align with the international server, making it difficult to offer such generous rewards to players. Naturally, we can’t fully mobilize players’ enthusiasm.”
“We thought we had found GOG’s fatal weakness, but it turns out, they found ioi’s fatal weakness…”
“I heard that Li Yada had stepped down and Hu Xianbin was busy with a new game, so I thought Min Jingchao wouldn’t be so difficult to deal with.”
“It seems I underestimated the enemy. Everyone at Tenda Games can stand on their own, and any newcomer who can be promoted to lead designer shouldn’t be taken lightly…”
Lin Wan looked at Pei Qian and sighed: “Mr. Pei, no wonder you think our current chances of winning are less than 50%.”
“Indeed, with GOG making this move, our chances are probably only 40% now.”
“As expected in a clash of masters, one wrong step leads to a series of errors. Starting one step behind, trying to catch up later is truly as difficult as ascending to heaven.”
Mr. Pei’s only reaction was to blink slightly, with no other expression.
Lin Wan had a look of sudden realization: “Mr. Pei, did you already anticipate they might adopt such a strategy, so you were mentally prepared?”
Pei Qian: “…”
After reacting for a few seconds, question marks finally appeared above Pei Qian’s head.
???
What the hell is this!
Pei Qian indeed had no expression, but not because he was calm—it was because this incident was so sudden that his brain hadn’t had time to catch up.
So…
Because I didn’t let Tenda Games hire more people, they came up with the idea of crowdsourcing from players and riding on hero creativity.
Shameless!
As a designer, not using your brain to design heroes, just thinking about freeloading on players’ creativity—is there any justice, any law?
Finger Company is properly designing heroes, while you guys are directly copying homework!
Too shameless!
Pei Qian was almost trembling with anger. This feeling was like preparing for a marathon, finishing your warm-up, only to see the competitor next to you suddenly bring out a motorcycle, rev the engine, and disappear.
Although they were giving players many benefits, this money was all from profit-sharing, which doesn’t help with creating profits at all!
Hmm? Giving players many benefits?
Pei Qian suddenly realized he might have overlooked some crucial information.
“Wait, what did you just say was the highest reward for adopted creativity?”