"Operation Apocalypse" was sued by Riot Games, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Tencent Games, for "plagiarism" overseas; Last year, NetEase announced the closure of its overseas servers, a move that may have been part of the reason for the shutdown after a brief public beta of the national server.

Original @ New Entropy

Author丨Iman Editor丨Fern Shadow

In 2024, NetEase's "shortest-lived" game, "Operation Apocalypse", announced its suspension 45 days after it was launched!

On October 14, NetEase's "Operation Apocalypse" suddenly announced that it would cease operations on December 12, 2024, and as of the date of the announcement, the game has only been in operation for 45 days.

"Operation Apocalypse" is positioned on the FPS (first-person shooter) track, benchmarking against Tencent's Valorant. It is understood that the official explanation for the suspension of the service is that the game performance failed to meet expectations. It is worth noting that on October 10, "Operation Apocalypse" also released a new event announcement, and the official account also left a message in the comment area "Wait for my next good news!" ”

"Just topped up and it stopped operating?" The players did not wait for the good news, but waited for the "bad news" of the shutdown. A player told "Sina Technology" that he had just charged 200 yuan in the game on October 12, and received a suspension announcement on the 14th. The official compensation is "stored in the player's NetEase mailbox/mobile account in the form of equal points as compensation", but he hopes to refund it directly, and NetEase Games has not responded to his request for the time being.

Before the public beta of "Operation Apocalypse" in August, the number of pre-orders on the whole network exceeded 10 million, and on the day of its launch on August 30, it briefly became the top of the iOS free list and the top of the TapTap new product list. Judging from Operation Apocalypse itself, the suspension of service is not due to substandard product quality, but due to the fierce competition in the hero shooting track.

Zhang Yi, CEO of iiMedia Consulting, told the "Daily Economic News" reporter that for most manufacturers, the FPS market is facing fierce competition. Game manufacturers are particularly important for market and channel control. Therefore, when some manufacturers enter this market, they can try and cut through relatively lightweight, even stand-alone products, and then gradually grow into more systematic products.

Suspected of plagiarism

However, in December 2022, "Operation Apocalypse" (overseas game name "Hyper Fromt") was sued overseas for "plagiarism" by Riot Games, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Tencent Games, which is a well-known game developer of "League of Legends" and "Valorant". As for the lawsuit, there are no reports pointing to the court's decision.

And after this incident, on April 10, 2023, NetEase announced the closure of Hyper Front's overseas servers. This move may be part of the reason for the shutdown of the national server after a short open beta.

The FPS market has grown rapidly in recent years. According to ZION market, the global first-person shooter (FPS) market size was approximately $28.99 billion in 2023 and is expected to grow to approximately $47.34 billion by 2032, with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of approximately 5.60% between 2024 and 2032.

is also a shooting game, "Operation Apocalypse" was officially launched and operated for 45 days before announcing the suspension of operation, and players were given a certain buffer time. Sony's "Star Attack", on the other hand, was released on August 24 this year and went offline on September 6, and all players received a full refund.

In terms of refunds, NetEase may be able to learn from Sony's approach. It is understood that NetEase Games has suspended 6 games this year, but there are many players who recharge krypton gold in it, and after the game is suspended, these recharges are usually "stored in the player's NetEase mailbox/mobile phone account in the form of equal points as compensation".

This is also a point that has been criticized by players.

Fu Jian, director of Henan Zejin Law Firm, told the Beijing News that after the game is suspended, operators should refund the virtual currency that users have purchased but have not yet used, in legal tender or in other ways acceptable to users.

Net profit declined

According to the data of the Game Working Committee of the Audio and Digital Association, as of the end of June 2024, the sales revenue of the domestic game market has reached 147.267 billion yuan. In terms of revenue scale, in the first half of this year, Tencent and NetEase led the way and became leaders in China's game market.

However, NetEase is increasing revenue but not profits.

In the first half of the year, the operating income increased by 6.69% year-on-year to 52.338 billion yuan, of which the net income of game and related value-added services was 41.516 billion yuan. However, the net profit in the same period fell by 1.61% year-on-year to 14.631 billion yuan. It is worth noting that NetEase's adjusted net profit attributable to the company's shareholders in the second quarter was 7.8 billion yuan, a decrease of 700 million yuan and 1.2 billion yuan respectively from the previous quarter and the same period last year.

NetEase pointed out in its second-quarter financial report that the decline in net revenue of certain mobile games was the main reason for the quarter-on-quarter decline in the gross profit of games and related value-added services.

According to Diandian data, among all the new games of NetEase in the first half of the year, only the mobile game "Naraka: Bladepoint" and "Beyond the World" exceeded 50 million yuan in the first month of iOS, and the continuity of market data is unsatisfactory. On the other hand, although "Egg Boy Party" has accumulated a large number of users, the relationship between users and income is low and not ideal. NetEase CEO Ding Lei said that the company may need a little time to find a balance in revenue for "Egg Boy Party".

It is worth noting that in the second half of the year, NetEase ushered in the return of "World of Warcraft" and "Hearthstone", which will increase NetEase's revenue to a certain extent. Nowadays, the global game market is becoming more competitive, and some games have not performed as well as expected after launch, and it is understandable that they will be suspended. No matter how big a factory is, it also needs to live a careful life, and NetEase still needs to launch more popular products to maintain its growth momentum.

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