In Beijing, in the headquarters of Jinyou Network, in the general manager's office, Cai Ping was lying on the sofa, looking sad.

The laptop in front of me shows the data of the last 7 days of several games that the company is currently acting on, and the performance is really unsatisfactory, among which the best performance of "Legend of Excalibur", 30% retention the next day, 12% retention in seven days, 8% average paid penetration, and an average ARPPU8.3 yuan, which was originally a project he was very optimistic about, but now the performance is not half a point away from expectations.

What do these numbers mean?

100 players enter the game, 30 people are left on the 2nd day, 12 people are left after 7 days, and the remaining 88 people are all lost;

For every 100 players who stay, on average, only 8 spend money to top up every day;

These 8 players who spend money to recharge have an average of 8 yuan and 3 cents per day.

The retention rate, in particular, drops so fast that no matter how many players are imported, they can't make up for it. The earliest S1 server opened, it's only been less than a month, and it's almost become a ghost suit, but where is there a server that has been directly merged in less than a month, and it must not be scolded to death by players?

This game can almost be said to have hit the streets, even if there are some more activities on your side, and the developers are also focusing on optimization, it is difficult to have a significant improvement. At the time of the initial test, the data was obviously good, and the company also defined this game as an A-level product, who knew that once it was imported into users on a large scale, it would become like this.

Cai Ping has no shortage of users in his hands, he was originally a grassroots webmaster, and later founded Jinyou, relying on Flash games to attract a large number of small game authors and accumulate a large number of users, almost becoming synonymous with small games, and at the same time holding a highly valuable navigation website hao6, which is almost all netizens have been exposed to the navigation website.

Since the beginning of the year, he has been thinking that he has so much traffic in his hands and can make a lot of money by hanging advertisements, so he founded Jinyou, looking for web games everywhere for agents, but he didn't expect the first batch of products he got to be like this.

When he first entered the web game industry, he realized that real web games and Flash games opened on the web page are completely different things.

When he was at a loss, the phone rang, Cai Ping connected the phone, and Li Zhi's voice came.

"Hello? Lao Cai, I'm Li Zhi. ”

"Lao Li, why did you think about calling me?"

"I heard you're working on a web game platform right now?"

"Yo, you're well-informed enough, I've only been open for a long time, you know everything, is it possible that you also want to make a page game?"

"No, I want to introduce you to a person who recently made a web game product, and you've heard of him."

……

……

The person Lao Li wanted to introduce was sitting in a coffee shop on the corner of the street at the moment, of course, he didn't appear suddenly, and there was a 16-year-old girl sitting in front of him, drinking coffee with a pair of eyes looking at him unscrupulously.

Ye Shenxi was stared at embarrassed: "Is it so good-looking?" ”

Lin Xinran generously admitted: "Well, it's pretty good." ”

Ye Shenxi spread out his hand and said: "Then you can watch enough, I have good psychological quality, it doesn't matter if you watch it all day." ”

Lin Xinran pouted: "Where is there such a thing as you, taking a girl out on a date, and sitting in a café and coffee, it's like a blind date." ”

Ye Shenxi smiled: "How old are you, the word blind date is still far away from you." ”

Lin Xinran's eyes flowed, and he said seriously: "Hey, you really do page tours, why do you do such boring things." ”

Ye Shenxi said: "What's the matter, disappointed in me?" ”

Lin Xinran shook his head and said: "It's very strange, you are obviously so talented, why do you do a page game, there is no picture, no operation, no gameplay, and the things you have thought about can't be played at all." ”

Ye Shenxi said: "Ouch, don't kill me, not all players are hardcore players like you, there are also many casual players, they usually have to work, study, take care of their families, they don't have so much time to play games, they have to have something for them to play." ”

Lin Xinran pouted: "Tsk, if you say it so righteously, they will rely on you to save it." ”

Ye Shenxi took a sip of coffee and said: "Of course, another point is that the production cycle of page games is short, and the money comes quickly, so you have to have money to make games that are suitable for you to play." ”

Lin smiled happily, and when she laughed, two cute dimples appeared on her face: "I knew that you were saving the country with curves, and I still wanted to play the game you made." ”

Ye Shenxi snorted: "Didn't you all transfer to Warcraft War 3". ”

Lin Xinran closed his eyes slightly and shook his head, and suddenly asked, "Do you know what the biggest flaw of single-player competitive games is?" ”

Ye Shenxi understood. This is Tracy's habit, and when she really wants to discuss a problem with someone, she often starts with a question, as if she subconsciously thinks that the other person can answer the question in order to continue the discussion with her.

"Updates, of course." While single-player games can also be played online via Battle.net, and games like Warcraft War 3 or Heroes of Counter Terrorism can also rely on a LAN or Battle.net platform to interact with each other, the biggest problem is updates. Stand-alone games can only be updated by releasing patch packs, allowing players to download and install them by themselves, especially in areas where piracy is rampant, many players don't know what the latest version number of this game is, and even rely on some foolish patch packs integrated by folk gods to update.

The biggest drawback is that they can't continue to stimulate players, each version of the feature, even if it is balanced, players will always feel tired after playing for a long time, they need continuous freshness to stimulate, new content, new graphics, new character races, new strategies. And single-player games are obviously unable to do this in this era without platforms.

“bingo！” Lin Xinran snapped his fingers and continued: "There is another important point, this is something I have been thinking about recently. ”

Ye Shenxi showed a very interested look, he had always trusted Tracy's depth of thinking about games.

"I think the single-player competitive game may be outdated." Lin Xinran's expression was serious.

"Huh?" Ye Shenxi didn't sort out the meaning of this sentence for a while.

Lin Xinran sorted out the wording and said slowly: "As you said, I think from the perspective of ordinary players. I've been playing Warcraft 3 for two years, and when I first started it, I didn't play the computer, and went directly to Battle.net to find someone to fight, and I kept losing, and I lost until I doubted my life. ”

"I thought it was me, if others were afraid that they would have lost it a long time ago."

Ye Shenxi said uncertainly: "You want to say that the threshold is too high?" ”

Lin Xinran sighed and clapped his hands: "I like to chat with you, transparent!" ”

Ye Shenxi nodded approvingly: "What you said is indeed very right, from "Star Wars" to "Warcraft Wars 3", it can indeed be seen that the glass slag has deliberately lowered the entry threshold, the number of operating units has decreased, and new hero concepts and RPG elements have been introduced, and they have also realized that the entry threshold of the game represents the upper limit of their number of players. ”

The quality of the game is certainly one thing, but if too many people fall into the game and don't have time to taste the most interesting and fun places, such a game may be popular, but it will not become something that everyone wants.

It's like opera is high-end enough, and stage actors are professional enough, but the market is still pop singers.

"What if the operating unit limit is reduced to one? And even competitive games with these elements of leveling up and equipping them. Lin Xinran tilted his head and asked, very cute.

"That's RPG, the ultimate RPG in competitive games, which reduces the difficulty of players to get started as much as possible."

"Not only that, but it's also very important that a game of individualism can't magnify the glory of victory, but on the contrary, it magnifies the frustration of defeat!" Lin Xinran's eyes were bright and bright, and the brilliance was blooming. "It's something I've been thinking about for a long time."

Ye Shenxi fell into thought, this is why he and Tracy have been able to talk for so many years, she is a pure experiential, but she can often stand on a high level after the experience to reach a thought-provoking conclusion.

After a while, he understood what Lin Xinran meant: "You mean, no one can share the honor when you win, and you can't escape the reality that your strength is too weak when you lose." ”

After thinking about it, he continued: "Yes, if it is a multiplayer online competitive game, no matter how weak a person is, it is possible to win because he is matched with a strong teammate, and that strong person can also gain the adoration of this rookie player. At the same time, even if the game is lost, regardless of the real reason, everyone will subconsciously think that it is not their own responsibility, but because their teammates did not perform well, because the frustration caused by the failure of the competition will be released. ”

"To sum up, you can pretend to be forced if you win, and you can dump the pot if you lose."

Lin happily applauded: "It's worthy of Pasca, incisive!" You said this more thoroughly than I thought. ”

The more Ye Shenxi thought about it, the more he felt that this statement was reasonable, this is the real reason why MOBA games in later generations are so popular! He looked at Lin Xinran and was surprised: "How do you have a big head, I think you are really a waste if you are not a game producer." ”

Lin Xinran said: "My talent for playing games is higher than making games, and making games is so tiring, like you, I work overtime every day, and I don't have time to play games, so ah, I just need to play things made by others." The small body leaned forward again: "How is it, is there any heartbeat?" ”

Her tone was slightly ambiguous, and it looked like she was talking about the idea, but it was a bit like talking about her own taste.

Ye Shenxi said truthfully: "Yes." ”

Lin Xinran squinted: "I haven't watched Warcraft War 3 for a few years, you've been watching it for so long, and there hasn't been a new competitive game hit on the market for a long time, so ah, my future career will depend on you." ”

Ye Shenxi waved his hand and said, "It's up to me what you say." ”

Lin Xinran stretched his eyebrows and said: "When your page game is online and you get the money, go and do a multiplayer online competitive online game, with your ability, you will definitely be able to make a game that is popular all over the country and even the world!" I'm going to spend the rest of my career on this game of yours. ”

"Eh, can you speak better, what do you mean by cheating money?"