By chance, while Kingsoft's "The Legend of Gods and Demons" was launched, "The King of Kings" was also introduced to the mainland from Wanwan.

Many young friends may not have heard of "The King of Kings". The novel "Mercenary World" that was not a master back then was written using the worldview of this game. Of course, "Mercenary World" is too old, it was an online novel from more than ten years ago.

These two games are advertised in major forums and chat rooms at the same time, with almost no offline promotion, and there is no cooperation with Internet cafes to sell point cards. Anyway, the operation team is relatively rough, and there is a bit of a taste of pecking at each other. I guess when the game is charged, many players don’t know how to recharge the point cards. Even if they know, they will get out of trouble.

Xishanju Game Studio.

Zou Tao visited several forums in a row and read the related game posts, and his face became very bad. Because players' evaluation of "King of Kings" is far higher than Kingsoft's "The Legend of Gods and Demons", which is a big blow to game developers.

"Boss, don't think too much. "The King of Kings" just has the advantage of emotions." A group member comforted.

Zou Tao sighed and said, "Our game content is indeed not as rich as "King of Kings".

In fact, neither of them said it through. The reason why "The Legend of Gods and Demons" was not highly praised is because Song Weiyang asked for "simple and crude".

The simple and crude thing is to attract novice, and the ones who post game posts online are undoubtedly Lao Bai. Most of these Lao Bai are old players of "The King of Kings". "The King of Kings" and "The King of Kings" are derived from the same mud, and they are born with friendly nature. The first choice is of course to play "The King of Kings".

One month after Kingsoft's "The Legend of Gods and Demons" was launched, there were only a pitiful 800 registered players, and the number of online users at the same time of "King of Kings" is almost 3,000.

With this number of players, let alone recovering R&D costs, the money from selling point cards is not enough to maintain servers.

what to do?

"Mr. Lei, I'm not doing well enough, I've made the online game project bad." Zou Tao directly found Lei Jun and admitted his mistake.

Lei Jun said with a laugh and cry: "It's not your fault. I've learned about the game. You did a good job, but the players are more familiar with "King of Kings".

Throughout the 1990s, Chinese players came into contact with online games.

As early as 1995, Wanwan launched the first mud "Oriental Story 2". At that time, Fang Zhouzi was studying abroad and fell in love with this kind of game, but he was unhappy, so he decided to make a pure martial arts online game.

So Fang Zhouzi launched a call online, and everyone worked together to create "Xia Ke Xing" and quickly became popular among Chinese people around the world. So far, "Xia Ke Xing" has more than a dozen mirror servers in mainland China, including servers in North America, Europe and Southeast Asia, as well as countless private server versions, and global registered users have long exceeded the 1 million mark.

To be honest, Fang Zhouzi, an anti-counterfeiting fighter, is also considered the originator of Chinese online games.

However, "Xia Ke Xing" involves the copyright of Jin Yong, and there are many internal contradictions. Fang Zhouzi has long announced that it will not be used for commercial use. "King of Kings" and "Xia Ke Xing" both originated from "Oriental Story 2". The content and gameplay are very similar, but they have changed from pure text to graphic. Now they have been introduced to the mainland, and naturally they have successfully accepted the old players of "Xia Ke Xing".

It is not a battle, Kingsoft's "The Legend of Gods and Demons" is inherently deficient.

Zou Tao said: "Or, we should withdraw the online game project before we start charging. Although the number of registered players is increasing, the number of online players is declining at the same time. The main reason is that there are too few people, and it's okay to say on weekends and at night, and we can't even see a few ghosts during the day."

"Retreat..." Lei Jun suddenly changed his words, "I'll ask Boss Song first, this is a project he forced to launch."

Lei Jun immediately called Song Weiyang to explain the situation and solicited opinions: "Boss, the online game project is not good, why not withdraw it first. Or temporarily close the server and revision, and improve it according to the content of "King of Kings". Our current game is not very playable."

"I also think the game content is too complicated," Song Weiyang smiled, "Your marketing positioning is problematic. If you don't have "King of Kings", it would be fine if you bump into it, you will definitely lose. The target group of "The Legend of Gods and Demons" is those who have never played Mud before, or even have not been exposed to online games. You have to find a way to promote the game."

Lei Jun said: "Then you have to go offline, the promotion cost is too high."

Song Weiyang said: "To form a special promotion group, first go to major cities such as Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai and Shenzhen. One Internet cafe and one Internet cafe to install our games in the Internet cafe, otherwise the Internet cafe will download the Internet cafe too slowly. Also, if you cooperate with those Internet cafes, you will give the Internet cafe a 10% commission and the Internet administrator a 5% commission. Do you understand what I mean?"

Lei Jun understood it instantly and flattered, "This idea is instant. As long as they get commission, the Internet cafe and network administrator have become our salesmen. They will try every means to actively promote the game!"

...

July, summer vacation.

Fei Xiaodong, who had just finished his high school entrance examination, was taken to the Internet cafe by his cousin early in the morning.

The charges for Internet cafes have been reduced this year. From Monday to Friday morning, it only costs 4 yuan per hour; from more than two hours of play, it only costs 3 yuan per hour; if you book one morning, it will only charge 2 yuan per hour. In the afternoon, evening and weekends, the charges will be much more expensive, at least 5 yuan per hour.

Fei Xiaodong has been to the Internet cafe several times before, but his cousin brought him to play stand-alone players like "The Legend of Sword". Some time ago, the class monitor took out a memorial book and asked everyone to leave a message, and he asked him to leave a QQ account. Fei Xiaodong didn't know what QQ was.

"Network management, two machines, one morning!" My cousin said after selling 20 yuan.

The network administrator laughed and said, "There is not enough money."

"The price has increased?" My cousin was a little unhappy.

"It's normal for summer vacation, price increases, and the charges are the same as usual on weekends," explained the network administrator.

My cousin could only make up for the difference of a few dollars. He did some small business by himself and was not short of that few dollars.

Fei Xiaodong happily started the computer. Anyway, his cousin was treating him, so he could let go of it. First of all, he had to register a QQ account. Many students in his class had QQ, but it seemed too out of date if he didn't have QQ.

The network administrator enthusiastically introduced: "There is a new game called "The Legend of Gods and Demons", a masterpiece of Kingsoft Company. You can play with it when you have time."

"Is "Red Alert" fun?" my cousin asked.

The network administrator said exaggeratedly: "What is "Red Alert"? "The Legend of Gods and Demons" is an online game! Do you know what an online game is? That is, you can play games with hundreds of thousands of players across the country, chat in the game, and team up to do tasks and equipment together!"

My cousin was extremely surprised: "There are still such games?"

The network administrator immediately taught my cousin to register an account step by step, and then took out a game guide booklet to teach me how to get tasks and learn skills.

Fei Xiaodong also built an account, and he seemed to have been opened to the new world, cutting monsters and then cutting monsters, having a lot of fun.

"Damn it, I exploded a pirated iron sword. This is a level 10 weapon!" My cousin yelled excitedly.

Well, Song Weiyang ordered Xishanju to increase the equipment explosion rate and asked them to produce some small and top-notch products, which is one or two more attributes than normal products.

In a blink of an eye, it was 1 pm, and the time for Fei Xiaodong and his cousin to surf the Internet was up.

The network administrator came over to remind me that my cousin directly sold a hundred-dollar bill: "Renew the fee... No, apply for me to the Internet card (membership card), and buy me some bread and mineral water!"

Fei Xiaodong suddenly shouted: "Cousin, someone robs our monster!"

"Kill him!" My cousin rushed up with a big sword, chopped a few times and said depressedly, "Why doesn't he lose blood?"

Netmart said: "You didn't switch attack mode, but it doesn't matter, and the other party didn't switch either."

Two players in peace mode cut each other for a long time, and the network administrator finally switched his cousin's mode to pk.

Soon, the opponent's player lay on the ground and typing and scolding: "CNM, you cheat, why can't I cut you off the blood?"

An indescribable sense of superiority arose in my cousin: "Idiot, do you know what the PK mode is? You can't even play games even if you can't play."

More and more people were online in the afternoon, and more than half of them were fooled by the Internet administrators to play "The Legend of Gods and Demons". The entire Internet cafe was filled with fighting sounds. Others were attracted by this kind of situation and did not need the Internet administrator to promote it. They spontaneously began to ask what game it was and how to play it.

Then it exploded...

"Damn it, the network administrator is here, why are you breaking the internet speed?"

"It's stuck, it's stuck, I can't run."

"Oh, I was beaten to death by the Wolf King, and I was so paralyzed that I couldn't even release my skills!"

"No more playing, this game is a good card!"

“…”

I really don’t care about Kingsoft’s Xiaobawang server, but the internet speed in the Internet cafe is too stuck.

The 128k network dedicated line is standard, and there are even many Internet cafes with 64k, so it’s a damn hell that it’s not stuck when playing.

Many players were stuck and automatically gave up the game, but many were still persisting. They were happy to get stuck several times after cutting it with one knife. There were a lot of people in the afternoon and evening, and most of them were spectators. They played the computer alone, and there were at least five or six people watching behind them.

"Wow, this game is so awesome!"

"Are all the fights in the game real people?"

"Brother, does this game cost money?"

“…”

Now the game has been extended for free, and it will only start charging money in August. For every point card sold, the Internet administrator can get a commission of 5%, and the Internet cafe can also get a commission of 10%.

When the network administrator saw that more than half of the players were stuck in the game, he felt that he had lost several hundred million yuan. He quickly called: "Boss, didn't someone come to promote broadband some time ago? I think we can install broadband. Really, broadband has faster network speeds, and it's better to upgrade sooner or later. It's better to upgrade as soon as possible when there are discounts now!"

After all, Kingsoft has limited manpower, and each person promotes two Internet cafes every day. It will take half a month for the big cities of Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen.

However, the number of online users in "The Legend of Gods and Demons" has been rising steadily, and at its peak it has exceeded 10,000, but a large number of users have been lost due to the speed of the Internet.

The same thing is true. In 2000, China's Internet speed was not enough.

Fortunately, more and more Internet cafes have begun to install broadband, and "The Legend of Gods and Demons" has also made a contribution to the popularization of broadband in China.
Chapter completed!