Game Development: Starting with Recreating the Anime Game Style

Chapter 147 Hard Alliance! Stable!

"This is a huge problem!!"

It is day and night.

Behind the heavy doors of a high-end club in Shanghai.

Zhang Guangtai was half-closing his eyes, comfortably leaning back on the leather sofa, when suddenly a commotion erupted outside.

As the operations director of the Hardcore Alliance, CNJOY is his most glorious time every year.

On the one hand, CNJOY has a large number of manufacturers gathered here. As a representative of the Hardcore Alliance, it is always in the "C" position no matter what summit it attends.

As a representative of the Hardcore Alliance, he may not have a high-ranking official position, but he wields considerable power. He controls channel traffic, and even Tencent and NetEase have to show him respect.

In addition, since the manufacturers he deals with are all from the "operations" department, showgirls are a must-have part of the annual experience.

The joy here cannot be told to outsiders.

However, Zhang Guangtai wasn't too happy at this year's CNJOY. He was nearly killed by Xingchen Tap's surprise attack a couple of days ago, and only just managed to get through it today and was about to enjoy himself...
It was interrupted again.

"Old Zhang! Old Zhang! We're in big trouble!"

The heavy soundproof door of the club was suddenly pushed open from the outside, and a man in a suit rushed in, completely disregarding the erotic atmosphere inside.

Zhang Guangtai was enjoying a grape fed to him by a showgirl he had just met. The sweet juice had just melted in his mouth when this noisy noise spoiled his enjoyment.

Although their mood was spoiled, the person who pushed open the door was a high-ranking executive of the Hardcore Alliance.

The other party must have something important to say to come looking for him at this time. There was nothing he could do but spit the grape seeds in his mouth into the trash can next to him, wave his hand, and signal the girls next to him to go out first.

"Hey Qiang, why aren't you enjoying this wonderful time? Are you just being so impulsive that the sky is going to fall?"

"The sky hasn't fallen, but it's almost fallen. Boss Wang just called me."

"Boss Wang called!?"

Zhang Guangtai raised an eyebrow, and the ease on his face instantly faded.

The Hard Alliance, though called an alliance, is essentially a large enterprise. Boss Wang is the boss of the alliance, although he doesn't usually get involved.

The specific business operations are handled by Zhang Guangtai and a few other senior executives.

But this doesn't mean the other party can't take charge.

Why would he call you at this hour?

Zhang Guangtai sat up straight and waved to the waiter next to him to remove the drinks from the table and replace them with strong tea.

The man called "Brother Qiang" is Dong Qiang, the vice president in charge of data monitoring in the alliance. At this moment, fine beads of sweat had already seeped out of his forehead. He didn't even bother to drink tea and handed over his phone directly.

"What else could it be? Star Tap, of course."

"No, aren't we going to analyze Star Tap? We've done all the necessary suppression; there's no threat from it."

Although Zhang Guangtai was greedy and lecherous, he still possessed basic professional ethics; otherwise, he wouldn't have reached his current position. He received the news on the very first day Xingchen Tap appeared.

At that time, he held a meeting with Dong Qiang and other executives of the Hardcore Alliance. After discussing it, this is what they wrote in their final report to the boss.

"There may be some short-term disturbances, but in the long run, it does not pose a threat."

The reason for this seemingly "outrageous" conclusion is that, in the first half of 16, the Hardcore Alliance had just defeated Tencent's App Store by using a series of methods such as "security reminders".

With manufacturers constantly promoting their apps, many users have become accustomed to having their basic needs met by the pre-installed app store on their phones. This has led to App Store being "opened infrequently and used for short periods," "uninstalled after use," and "looking big but actually being unreliable."

The most obvious example is Honor of Kings, the most popular Tencent game in 2016. The top four download channels were all Tencent's own mobile app stores, with Tencent's App Store only coming in fifth.
Incidentally, this is also why Tencent started developing WeChat Mini Programs in 2016.
However, returning to the present, for the Hardcore Alliance at this moment, it is a time of "pride," if it weren't for the fact that StarCraft Games has indeed been a dark horse recently.
When Star Tap first came on, its momentum was indeed strong, and they probably wouldn't even glance at Star Tap.

In short, with the launch of StarTap, Zhang Guangtai and his team from the Hardcore Alliance began contacting mainstream game developers in China.

Despite the large size of the domestic game market, in reality, there are only about a dozen companies that can truly make a name for themselves in the domestic game market, especially the mobile game market.

As for smaller manufacturers in larger circles, there's no need to consider them at all, because they are too small and have low trial-and-error costs. They wouldn't dare to switch to Xingchen Tap, let alone Tencent's App Store.

In the past, it wasn't until WeChat mini programs became wildly popular thanks to games like "Jump Jump" that these small companies started to piggyback on other traffic sources.

At present, these small manufacturers would never voluntarily leave the Hardcore Alliance.

Furthermore, it happened to be CNJOY at the same time, and almost all the major manufacturers' operations representatives were present. The Hardcore Alliance easily threw the "choose one of two" dilemma to the manufacturers.

At the time, Zhang Guangtai laughed at Xingchen for being reckless, actually causing trouble the day before CNJOY. Wasn't that like stirring up trouble at the very end of the year?
After all this fuss, most manufacturers have made their positions clear. Even Tencent and NetEase, while not explicitly stating their positions, have expressed their concern about the matter.

This is why Zhang Guangtai is enjoying the "grapes" so easily and leisurely at this moment.

Compared to the fledgling StarTap, the alliance formed by major domestic mobile phone manufacturers has the same influence on mobile game channels as Google overseas.

Are there any app stores overseas that can rival Google?

No.

So, would it be possible to have it domestically? Zhang Guangtai didn't believe it; it was impossible.
In his words.

"It's like opening a supermarket. If you don't have anything to sell in your supermarket, no matter how big the opening event is, it will only be a short-lived event. How can such a supermarket survive?"

These words, though crude, are not without reason; upon careful consideration, the logic is indeed sound.

Therefore, even though Starry Night Games had over 30 million registered users in just three days after its launch, its global daily active users had already reached 10 million, and were still growing rapidly.

Zhang Guangtai simply tried to maintain good relations with his clients, telling them to "see again next month."

This tactic did work, except for a few anime and manga companies such as miHoYo and Huanmeng, which had not signed with the Hardcore Alliance before and chose to join Xingchen Tap.

Most manufacturers are currently in a wait-and-see mode.

Therefore, at least for now, the Hardcore Alliance still controls the channels and can remain firmly in control, exhibiting a rather arrogant attitude of "let others be strong, the breeze still caresses the mountain."

(End of this chapter)