Restart life

Chapter 323 0320 [Continue to Soar Even After School Starts!]

The first Friday evening of the new semester.

The number of registered users for "Future Era" suddenly surged, and by 8 p.m. that day, all servers were completely full and at full capacity.

Fortunately, Game Science had anticipated this and urgently added more servers.

"What's going on?" He Zhichuan muttered, still shaken, after finishing his work.

Chen Guiliang said, "Students returned to school, exchanged ideas, and played games together after school on Friday. Many students who didn't know about 'Future Era' were pulled into the game by their classmates tonight."

As the two were chatting, an operations staff member ran over and said, "The Northern Wolf Guild and the World Destroyer Dance have started fighting! Each side has deployed thousands of people, constantly grinding maps and engaging in PvP in the arena."

Chen Guiliang was completely bewildered: "You can actually fight in a game that's all about dungeons?"

The operations staff member said, "The two guilds had already started fighting in other games. About two weeks ago, they began PK-ing in the Arena of Future Era. The Northern Wolf Guild joined earlier and has better Arena equipment, so they've been dominating World Destroyer. World Destroyer isn't happy about it, and I heard that besides members from World of Warcraft, players from other games are being recruited here. They're scattered across different regions and have agreed to see who can dominate the Arena leaderboard."

Chen Guiliang and He Zhichuan looked at each other in bewilderment.

The "Dance of the World" guild, abbreviated as KOK, was founded in 2000 and is active in dozens of online games.

These are a bunch of lunatics. Whatever game their rival guilds join, they join too. They often deploy thousands of people to compete with each other across games, and they've been doing this for years, and they'll continue.

In 2004, the World Destroyer Guild held a press conference, attended by more than 30 media outlets and more than 20 game companies.

Later, when Aion was launched, the World Destroyer Guild attracted thousands of players at once!
The Northern Wolves Guild is a rising challenger, emerging in "Perfect World". They specialize in challenging established large guilds and have already defeated many of them. Their conflict with the World Destroyer Dance Guild began shortly after the launch of "Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils" and has now extended all the way to "Future Era".

These two guilds alone have a total of more than 2000 people playing "Future Era".

Whenever someone from the "Dance of the World" faction shows up on a server, the Northern Wolf Guild will definitely come looking for trouble.

In other games, their competition mainly involves PvP, resource grabbing, large-scale guild wars, and first kills in new content areas. In "Future Era," however, they primarily compete for arena rankings, first kills in Abyss dungeons, and Abyss speedrun records, and occasionally even challenge each other to duels in the arena by name.

Often, after finishing a match in the arena, the winner would frantically shout in the public chat: "Guild XX, XX, has defeated Guild XX!"

Immediately afterwards, he posted game screenshots on Baidu Tieba and forums.

Extremely insulting.

Chen Guiliang went to watch the commotion for a while and couldn't help but complain, "They've really taken this game to a whole new level."

There's a saying in the online gaming industry: He who controls the guilds controls the world.

Whether an online game is popular or not can be judged by the number and size of well-known guilds that join the game.

Chen Guiliang reviewed the "battle reports" collected by the operations team from online forums and discovered that over 20 well-known guilds had already joined "Future Era." These guilds alone contributed tens of thousands of players.

The most interesting one is the Holy Clan Guild.

This is a group of players from a private server of the game "Yulgang," accustomed to dealing massive damage with a single hit and having equipment automatically picked up. This year, they switched to "Tian Long Ba Bu," but due to the tedious and lengthy leveling process, their guild, which once boasted a thousand members, has dwindled to just a few dozen.

Now, they've brought their friends back to play "Future Era," and surprisingly, they've adapted quite well. They keep contacting their old buddies via QQ, and the group has gradually grown back to several hundred people. They team up to clear maps, engage in PvP in the arena, and even go around buying cheat codes.

They feel uneasy if they don't use cheats.

With the immense popularity of "Future Era," many game forums have seen people seeking to purchase cheats. Skilled gamers, naturally, haven't missed this opportunity and are working overtime to develop cheats for "Future Era."

In the second month after the game's release, auto-farming bots started appearing!

The first wave of title conferment in Future Era has arrived.

In-game announcements appear every 10 minutes, warning players that using cheats will result in account bans, while also encouraging players to report cheats.

Hundreds of accounts are banned every day, and the "death list" of banned accounts is displayed on the official website.

More and more people are contacting customer service to appeal, all claiming they were wrongly banned. When their accounts aren't unbanned, they throw tantrums and even go to the game's online community to hurl insults, calling "Future Era" a trash game that randomly bans accounts.

Under these circumstances, on the second Saturday of the new school term, the peak number of concurrent online users of "Future Era" exceeded 50!
The release of the new World of Warcraft expansion has not hindered the progress of Future Age.

On the contrary, other games were influenced by Future Age.

Some players of free-to-play online games such as "Legend of Mir," "Legend of Mir 2," "Zhu Xian," "Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils," "The Legend of Mir 2," "Conquer Online," and "Magic Domain" have been drawn to "Future Era."

……

Seeing that "Future Era" was gaining momentum and stealing the limelight from "Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils", Zhang Chaoyang felt that he should do something.

He has already invested tens of millions of yuan in online advertising.

Next, we're going to advertise on CCTV!
Shi Yuzhu was the first to break the ice on CCTV, initially placing borderline advertisements on CCTV-1 that only promoted the company's brand and did not involve the game. He then spent money on CCTV's financial channel, hiring "Economic Information Broadcast" to report on the monthly revenue of "Zhengtu".

Shi Yuzhu took the first bite of the crab, and now Zhang Chaoyang is following suit.

Sohu's role as the exclusive online sponsor of the 08 Olympics brought not only economic benefits but also immense social influence. Zhang Chaoyang, in particular, saw a significant boost in his connections within Beijing's television and entertainment circles.

This time, he directly called the head of CCTV's financial channel and invited him out for a meal.

The details of the collaboration were finalized on the spot, and the program planning began the next day. The production team went to Sohu Changyou in the second week.

Going a step further than Shi Yuzhu and "Zhengtu", this time they used an entire program to report on Sohu Changyou and "Tian Long Ba Bu".

Yes, they were on "Wealth Storytelling," and the main character was the CEO of Sohu Changyou.

Then CCTV-1 aired a scene where Hu Jun, dressed as Qiao Feng, was drinking alone in an inn… He rambled on with a bunch of lines, but dared not mention the game "Tian Long Ba Bu," only promoting the Sohu Changyou brand. “Xiao Chen, come out for a drink,” Zhang Chaoyang inexplicably called Chen Guiliang.

This guy has been getting really cocky lately and doesn't think there's anything wrong with calling someone "Little Chen".

Chen Guiliang said, "Come to Peking University for coffee. I'm very busy these days and can't leave. I have to go back to the company to keep an eye on things."

Zhang Chaoyang laughed and said, "You're personally overseeing both of your companies? What are your executives doing?"

"Special circumstances," Chen Guiliang said.

Zhang Chaoyang suddenly realized: "Could it be that they're going public? ByteDance or Youke?"

Chen Guiliang neither admitted nor denied it, but simply laughed and said, "How could it be so fast?"

The IPO is indeed imminent, and the American inquiries are in their final stages. Next week, there will be a video conference with Goldman Sachs, followed by another Goldman Sachs team coming to rehearse the roadshow.

In October, Chen Guiliang will lead the company's senior executives on a formal roadshow in the United States.

If ByteDance doesn't raise funds soon, it will run out of money!
No matter how much money is made from ringback tones and advertising, it can't cover the continuous expenses of more than a year.

The Series B funding round was completed after the Spring Festival last year, and that money has managed to barely last until the end of this year. For a Web 2.0 company in 2007, that's quite impressive, demonstrating ByteDance's remarkable profitability.

Chen Guiliang even proactively demanded shareholder dividends (ByteDance's shareholding portion) from Tao Chenggang for "The Emperor's Reign" in order to prepare for the possibility of a failed IPO.

Zhang Chaoyang's company is nearby, less than two kilometers from Chen Guiliang's place.

He simply drove straight to Peking University Science Park and strolled over to ByteDance, observing the company's situation: "Your place is pretty good. How many employees do you have?"

Chen Guiliang invited him to the meeting room: "ByteDance has expanded to more than 260 people, and it's almost overflowing. The company's coffee is so-so, but you'll have to make do with it."

Zhang Chaoyang sat down with his legs crossed, and commented with a rather arrogant air: "The new games launched this year, apart from 'Tian Long Ba Bu' and 'Future Era,' are all doing poorly. I heard that Tencent's two QQ series games were no good after the second month, and now their peak concurrent users are only around 20. Our two games have lasted longer, and they both have over 50 concurrent users now."

Chen Guiliang laughed and said, "I thought you were going to say: The only heroes in the world are you and Cao Cao."

"Haha, that's exactly what I meant!" Zhang Chaoyang laughed as he took the coffee from the receptionist.

Chen Guiliang asked, "Mr. Zhang, what brings you here?"

Zhang Chaoyang said, "I suddenly wanted to come and sit for a while. Your place is full of vitality, much like the first two years of my business. 'Future Era' is quite good. I even played it myself. It has its own advantages, just like 'Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils'."

Chen Guiliang didn't mind the other party's tone. The other party was in a great mood and everyone had moments of arrogance and showing off.
The two sat in the reception room, drinking coffee and chatting idly.

Zhang Chaoyang even revealed the revenue of "Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils" last month, saying it had already exceeded 4000 million yuan, and this month it might approach 5000 million yuan. He then asked how much revenue "Future Era" would generate.
Chen Guiliang said that he had not yet compiled statistics.

After chatting about games for a while, Zhang Chaoyang extended another invitation: "Are you free tomorrow night? I've invited some popular celebrities to a party."

"Let's do it another day," Chen Guiliang politely declined.

Although Zhang Chaoyang is currently riding high, he occasionally feels lonely and depressed.

He thought Chen Guiliang was pretty good; he had publicly criticized Li Yanhong last year. Now that Chen Guiliang was good at making games, he was qualified to play with him, so he wanted to take Chen Guiliang out for some fun.

Chen Guiliang asked curiously, "Which celebrities are in the group?"

Zhang Chaoyang refused to reveal anything, saying, "Why don't you go and find out for yourself?"

"Zhang Ziyi?" Chen Guiliang asked.

"Hehe." Zhang Chaoyang smiled without saying a word.

Damn it, forget about talking about it, I have important business to attend to.

Zhang Chaoyang said, "I recently discovered that investing in film and television dramas is quite a good business. It's very rewarding if a show becomes a hit. I invested in Zhao Baogang's 'My Youth, Who Decides?' and I'm sure this show will be a success."

Chen Guiliang's expression was strange: You didn't sleep with the female lead, did you? She's Li Xunhuan's future wife.

However, Sohu's investment is probably not large, and it's possible that he slept with the second, third, or fourth female lead.

After chatting for a while, he went downstairs to visit other companies. He knew quite a few entrepreneurs in the Peking University Science Park, some of whom were even his former subordinates.

But Zhang Chaoyang seems too relaxed, wandering around aimlessly on weekdays.

Zhang Chaoyang was in a good mood today, but it quickly turned sour. On various game channels and communities, "Future Era" was climbing the charts incredibly fast, easily leaving "Tian Long Ba Bu" far behind.

Take 17173's weekly chart as an example: "Future Era" has been soaring. It not only beat "Tian Long Ba Bu" but also climbed to third place on the list. As for the two games ranked higher, it goes without saying what they are.

World of Warcraft is always number one, and Fantasy Westward Journey is always number two.

It's difficult to overtake these two games because the charts consider more than just revenue and online players. They also take into account player searches, votes, reviews, editor ratings, and more.

In other games, I'm only aiming for third place now.

Whoever reaches third place will be considered the most popular online game right now. The first two will not be evaluated; they've already transcended the three realms and five elements.

Chen Guiliang couldn't resist showing off, posting on his personal account: "Can 'Future Era' break 100 million concurrent users by the end of the year? If so, there will be a surprise."

……

(I recommend Hama's "The Mortal Immortal". I bet this book will be over a million words long. What do you guys think?)
(End of this chapter)