Game Development: Starting with Recreating the Anime Game Style

Chapter 331 Lively
The 48-hour technical demo test of "Floating Dreams" came to an end that evening.

Tencent XGAME also quickly launched its service, and news about it flooded the internet that evening. However, "Floating Dreams" remained the most discussed "game news" that night.

It not only surpassed Tencent, but also the summer new product launch event of the Starry Sky Games platform itself.

It sounds incredible.

In reality, let alone Tencent and StarCraft's current lineup of single-player games, even two years ago...

In April 2015, the PC version of GTA5 was released. This globally popular game, however, didn't achieve the same level of popularity in China as the beta version of "Moonlight Blade".
This is the situation in 17.

For those who play single-player games, the clash between StarCraft and Xgame is a major event in the single-player game community in recent years.

However, in a larger context, free-to-play online games are what truly deserve attention.

A game that requires payment?

just forget it.

Of course, although "Floating Dreams" received a lot of attention, surpassing Starry Night and Tencent, the two sides still had some differences in their promotion, reactions after launch, and strategies.

On the Xingchen Games platform, the strategy is "one breakthrough, multiple support points".

You can see many activities of "Floating Dreams" by opening the platform.

The biggest activity is exchanging playtime for rewards.

For example, playing "Floating Dreams" for a certain amount of time can earn you free martial arts DLC for games like "Terraria," "What Mischief Can a Cat Be," and "Stardew Valley."

Although most of these DLCs simply add a character skin or some martial arts-themed items.

But it still has appeal.

In addition, Chu Chen was very cunning and didn't give it away directly, but instead agreed to play time and exchange it for time.

The conversion rate of things obtained through one's own "labor" is not only higher, but it can also in turn increase the number of players in "Floating Dreams".

For example, if you're a Stardew Valley player, you might try out The Legend of the Condor Heroes DLC just for this free version.

The gameplay of StarCraft can be summarized as follows:

"Direct and brutal"

To put it simply, it leverages the lingering enthusiasm players have after playing the demo to drive traffic to the entire event.

For example, during the peak of Genshin Impact's popularity, if a game had elements that collaborated with Genshin Impact, the amount of traffic it would receive would be staggering.

Of course.

For this approach to work, there is a prerequisite.

That means "Floating Dreams" needs to be popular enough at this point in time.

So, at this moment, how popular is "Floating Dreams" which is still in testing the next day?
"Mr. Chen! That's not even an exaggeration! That's a killer shot!!!"

In Jiao Xiaofei's words, the popularity of "Floating Dreams and Long Songs" at this time completely exceeded everyone's expectations.

In fact.

If we fast forward to 2025, the release of "Floating Dreams" might generate some buzz, but it certainly wouldn't reach this level.

For the past 25 years, neither martial arts nor fantasy has been very popular.

If we really have to categorize it, the only one that could be considered truly popular is probably "Shadow Blade," maybe with a slight overlap of "Sixteen Sounds of Yan Yun."

Secondly, 20 years later, large-scale sequels, led by Genshin Impact, quickly occupied popular niches.

Looking at the top-selling charts, there aren't any martial arts games in the top 20, let alone the top 10.

However, it is now 2017.

This is the last "golden age" of martial arts MMORPGs.

In the PC game market, JX3 (Sword Net 3) has maintained its dominance thanks to its rich social features and fan culture, while Moonlight Blade has attracted countless "scenery lovers" and "appearance enthusiasts" with its "cinematic" graphics and art style.

Besides these two giants, various martial arts mobile games are also emerging one after another. NetEase's "last PC game", Justice Online, has also entered the promotion and release stage.

They claimed they wanted to "redefine martial arts" and bring about a "breathing world of martial arts."

this point in time.

Wuxia (martial arts) is just like the open-world craze for domestic second-generation games brought about by Genshin Impact.

More importantly, at this time, a large number of players were "disappointed" with martial arts games, which is similar to the later stages of the release of second-hand games, where many players had already gotten tired of playing them.

It's like trying to find a refreshing "new game" among the "monotonous" second-hand games.

At this time, martial arts game players are also eagerly hoping for a game that will truly impress them.

With its popular subject matter and players eagerly anticipating a fun game, the release of the "Floating Dream Song" demo, coupled with the free-to-play model familiar to Chinese players, made it a perfect fit.

That was truly a perfect storm of favorable timing, location, and people.

The internet is in an uproar.

The uproar intensified after Xia Anbo uploaded his video.

Although Xia Anbo's video itself didn't generate a particularly strong reaction among players, the 1 views within the first hour of its release were still quite respectable.

However, his views in the video did attract a lot of media attention. For many gaming media outlets, people who have previously made "famous remarks" will receive special attention.

For example, Xia Anbo, who once wrote "Why Tencent is a Paper Tiger".

And so, very quickly!
The video features Xia Anbo's ingenious design of three event modes: "sequential, parallel, and radiating," as well as a dual-track development system of "cultivation technique construction" and "role switching," and a business model driven by "emotional connection."

This has been "borrowed" by many media outlets.

The editors at Youmin directly quoted Xia Anbo's "Three Relationship Models" theory, and the title was changed to be more impactful.
We played "Floating Dreams" for 24 hours and realized we'd wasted the last decade playing martial arts MMORPGs.

1717 Games Network, the title followed immediately.

[More than just cinematic visuals, "Floating Dreams" creates a truly vibrant and dynamic martial arts world!]

Duoniu Games.

[In-depth analysis! How will "emotional connection" disrupt the business model of MMOs?]

Gamebus.

Say goodbye to mindless grinding! The "Event Radiation" system gives NPCs their own "life"!

In short, it was a bunch of irresponsible hype. An event system that wasn't actually that innovative was quickly given a new twist by the media.

Judging from the news alone, "Floating Dreams" is simply not a game that could be made in this era.
Fortunately, the players were in the middle of their intense moment.

I don't think there's anything wrong with the media's analysis.

The popularity of a game's formula is directly proportional to the number of people who have played it; the more people play the game, the more topics related to it will generate.

As the second day progressed, the number of players increased dramatically, and the number of posts on Tieba, NGA, and other major game forums and related sections grew exponentially.

(End of this chapter)