Text: Yan Jinyan

On November 27 last year, ByteDance's game business ushered in a major adjustment, which many people called the Byte Games earthquake, and its aftershocks lasted for nearly half a year, during which internal personnel and business have been undergoing changes.

As of yesterday, it has been a year since the adjustment of the byte game business, and Grape Jun has also learned some of their current status from many sources.

Contrary to what many people have speculated, Byte Games has not fallen into a slump. With the appointment of Zhang Yunfan, the new head of the game business, in May this year, Byte Games has sorted out the organizational structure and completed a round of personnel appointments.

Zhang Yunfan

Recently, Zhang Yunfan also said in the podcast "Zhixing Bistro" that one of the reasons why he joined Byte is that the current era is undergoing great changes, such as the development of AI technology, "It's no longer enough to think about it, you have to actually come in and do it yourself." ”

After joining Byte, Zhang Yunfan has withdrawn from the company he invested. On the one hand, he believes that if the invested company has business dealings with bytes, it may have some "connections"; On the other hand, he believes that "one cannot have both, and if one thing is to be done well, one must give up other things." There is no time to be gained for a minute, and this moment is the most important thing here. ”

According to a number of people close to Byte Games, in the past six months, the speed of self-development of Byte Games has returned to the normal level, and it is even somewhat amazing. They have signed a lot of IP, absorbed a lot of R&D talents and teams, and added a large number of new projects.

Previously, the three project teams of "One Piece: Bloody Route", "Moon of Flowers and Mountains" and "Hatsune Miku: Colorful Stage" in Shanghai merged into Zero36 Studio, with Lu Lingqing (Hades) as the studio leader.

Lu Lingqing joined Tencent in 2018 as the distribution producer of "Honor of Kings" and the head of operations of TiMi L2 Studio, and later joined Youzu in September 2023 as COO, in charge of distribution business. Now, he is also responsible for the distribution of Mu Tong's "Decisive Victory" (MLBB national server).

According to a person familiar with the matter, at present, Zero36 Studio has absorbed Lu Jiaxian, the founder of Mu Qiqi (representative works: "Adventure and Mining", "Card Monster", which announced all layoffs in 2022), as the producer, and is brewing a CCG card product with Star Wars IP. According to Byte's recruitment official website, Zero36 Studio is recruiting talents for an overseas co-research European and American card project.

In terms of the Guangzhou studio, they absorbed the R&D team of the original "Grim Reaper" IP product "Realm Realm Knife Sound". At the same time, they are also promoting a self-developed product of "Burst Squad like".

Previously, Byte Games also had a UGC sandbox project in Guangzhou called "Jungo Jam" (codename: Block), which had been tested in several overseas regions. A middle and senior management of Byte's game business once revealed that the most core executives of Byte have tried the product and attach great importance to it. Currently, the project is not affiliated with any studio, but reports directly to Zhang Yunfan.

Recently, the product has also been tested overseas. Through player reviews, store introductions, and people familiar with the matter, Jungo Jam's project direction has changed. Originally, the direction of the project was to make a game platform, with an app and an official PC editor, but now it focuses on "role play", encouraging players to play a variety of roles in the virtual world and create their own RP universe through AI.

Comparison of the before and after versions of the game introduction

In Beijing, Byte Games originally had Oasis Studios ("Crystal Nucleus"), as well as Youai Division. Previously, it was rumored that Oasis was working on a "Darker and Darker like" product, and according to the recruitment website, they also have a global casual game in the pipeline. In addition, the recruitment information also revealed that a chess and card project also belonged to Beijing.

As for Youai, a person close to them said that although "Red Alert OL" was previously sold to Ruyi Jingxiu, the team is still incubating new SLG products. After the new head of the studio took office, they are also steadily advancing the incubation of "Idle Girl 2". It can be seen from this that there is love still holding on to its own longboard.

The Jiangnan Studio in Hangzhou, judging from the recruitment information, is maintaining the long-term operation of "Planet: Reboot", while focusing on the exploration of AIGC and UGC projects.

It is worth mentioning that according to a person familiar with the matter, Byte Games has also set up a new self-developed studio in Shenzhen, led by Liu Qian, the producer of the original "Counter War" and "PlayerUnknown's Battle", and the team is developing a new shooting product. According to the recruitment information, the keywords of this project are: UE5, PC console games, PvE, and 3A.

Of course, in Byte's game business, everyone may be most concerned about Mu Tong.

Someone told Grape Jun that this year, MLBB's overseas revenue and DAU have hit a new high. At present, Mutong is actively promoting the IP-based development of "MLBB", has established an IP architecture team, and hopes to jointly build a product matrix by multiple project teams. Recently, the IP-derived auto-chess product "Magic Chess: Go Go" will be launched in some overseas regions.

At the same time, the person told Grape Jun that compared with the relatively conservative project strategy in the past few years, Mu Tong is now taking a more open step.

The two IP incubation projects of "Tide Tower" and "Youmingzhi", which were previously affiliated to Youai Guangzhou, have now joined Mutong's Guangzhou branch after a series of adjustments.

At the same time, according to Mutong's recruitment page, they established IGNI Studio in Guangzhou in February this year, and the products under research cover two categories: mild two-dimensional / simulated operation.

Many of Mutong's positions are also labeled as athletic, light athletic, and new projects, and the keywords involve open world, ACT, and so on.

In addition, there is also a rumor that Mu Tong is seeking further capitalization development, but some insiders denied the authenticity of this rumor to Grape Jun.

Again, if the above information is not marked, it is a rumor that has not been officially verified and responded, and the authenticity needs to be verified. However, if the above rumors are true, then we can also see some changes in Byte Games.

First of all, Byte Games is focusing on the development of self-research and reducing the number of agency projects. This should also be the consensus of most companies today, when the environment changes and the game industry becomes increasingly oligopolized, it is safer to tighten resources, focus on core products, and be optimistic about profits, rather than fighting for traffic business.

Secondly, the adjustment of Byte Games in the past six months is not small, and it is reported that there are still a large number of new projects in the arraignment stage, from which it is not difficult to feel their investment. However, this is a little different from the soaring and miraculous development of their game business when they first developed their game business - they looked much more low-key, without the excessive competition of high expansion and market grabbing.

For example, the direction of new projects and the talent formation of the team are mostly determined by their own advantages and accumulation, and there is not much follow-up behavior. For another example, they did not choose to give up all the old projects in the past, but re-optimized, such as "One Piece: Bloody Route" has undergone a big revision this year, and once rose more than 100 places on the iOS best-selling list.

The above two points should also be in line with the internal letter released by Byte Games in May this year - they are looking at the game industry from a long-term perspective and becoming more pragmatic.

Of course, many readers may feel that spending money on IP may still be following the old path of the game industry in the past, using IP to improve the success rate of the project. This statement is naturally true, but from another point of view, many of the IPs currently signed by Byte Games have a certain influence on a global scale, just like the previous "Marvel Snap". Therefore, behind the IP, there may be their ambition to adhere to globalization.

Judging from the recruitment information on the official website, the publishing department ONE Studio is recruiting special talents for Europe, America, Japan, Southeast Asia and other countries and regions. In the recruitment information of R&D personnel, "global" and "overseas" are also high-frequency keywords.

Finally, Byte Games is also seeking more advanced technology to promote new forms of game products. For example, in the construction of AIGC and UGC projects, they have released a large number of technical positions. Considering ByteDance's overall exploration of AIGC, the application of AI in the game field may also become the focus of the company's attention.

Of course, whether Byte Games can regroup in the future still has to speak with actual results, and Grape Jun will continue to pay attention in the future.

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