Text/Grey Pigeon

The reputation of NetEase's "Sixteen Voices of Yanyun" (hereinafter referred to as Yanyun) has gradually reversed.

It is not difficult to feel that the trend of public opinion has changed: many players who were not so optimistic before have changed their impressions, and it is not uncommon to praise "Yanyun" for its sense of immersion and substitution.

Doubts remain, though. For example, not long ago, the boss of a company lamented with Grape Jun that "Yanyun" has attracted a large number of users, but its commercialization ability is not enough, and he does not like to spend money to buy volume, which is a disguised way to lower the ARPU of the game industry, making the industry more and more volatile.

Recently, Grape Jun chatted with Beralt, the producer of "Yanyun".

Beralt said that "Yanyun" has no problem supporting itself now.

DAU almost did not drop, ARPU met expectations, and both ends also landed smoothly, and word of mouth and data exceeded expectations.

They also responded positively to everyone's doubts about "Yanyun".

Beralt believes that the essence of the twisting is not that they are on the wrong path, but that they have not done something well. Since you are doing something that does not conform to market perception or does not conform to the formula, it is normal not to be favored.

"Chivalry, a very important spirit is to use force to break the ban. It is important to break the ban, it is a free, rebellious spirit. We prefer to be creators, a lot of logic, formulas, to the analysts, we just do the creative things," says Beralt.

Here's what producer Beralt said, but with some adjustments for ease of reading.

01

Talking about grades: being able to support yourself,

It also exceeded expectations

Yanyun's performance really exceeded our expectations.

The question that everyone is most worried about is "Can Yan Yun support herself?" I can tell you right now: yes, it's pretty good. The gaming ARPU is up to expectations, and the number of active users of the game is very large, especially for PC, which is very stable in terms of activity and revenue, accounting for more than half of the revenue.

Now it seems that Yan Yun has indeed achieved the sense of martial arts that we wanted from the beginning. We are also very happy to see this open world of martial arts recognized by players and the market.

In fact, on the day I went on the PC, the direction of public opinion had changed.

Originally, we decided with the marketing side how to build up the reputation: first go to the PC, show the most immersive and high-quality side of the game, and then complete the mobile porting to provide convenience for everyone.

As a result, we expected that public opinion would reverse, but we still didn't expect such a strong rebound. Everyone didn't pass by to praise you for two sentences, this is good, that is good, and really wrote a lot of things, praising immersion, and having a sense of substitution; There are also many players who were not so optimistic about us before, but after playing, their impression of us has changed.

We have never seen Yanyun's data performance: generally speaking, RPG products are very high on the first day, and then fall every day; Yanyun is not, its DAU almost does not drop, the curve is particularly stable, and it has been hitting new highs for at least 7-8 days in the first 2 weeks after it is on the PC. We've only seen this curve in the competitive genre before, and we've never seen a heavy RPG game that move like this.

Later, the mobile terminal was launched, and the controversy about the mutual drag of the two ends also disappeared.

The mobile terminal of Yanyun is portable for everyone, not only to fragment the time to play leisure or tasks, I think, it makes the relationship between Yanyun and players more interesting...... Getting along – a sense of companionship, a feeling of immersion in the world.

Looking at the background data, mobile also wakes up a lot of PC users - the retention is inverted, and the specific data cannot be revealed, but the trend of 15 retention is better than 7 retention data similar to that of games.

On the night of the mobile launch, I turned on my phone and watched the characters there, watched the light change in the scene, and listened to our music. I watched it like this for a long time, and I smoked a couple of cigarettes, and I just stopped there, not wanting to do anything. Judging from the background data and player discussions, a lot of people will do similar things to me.

In fact, it was controversial before Yanyun went long. There's a lot of talk about this, and if you want both PC and mobile, are you going to be a drag on each other, or a waste of resources? This is also the first time I have made a real multi-terminal product, and I have only done a PC emulator before......

Fortunately, the double-end is now landing smoothly, it is better to say that Yanyun's current reputation and data are completely beyond our imagination.

There is a kinship.

In the past, it was really in the midst of all kinds of controversy, and we had to resist the temptation to stick to what we wanted to do.

For example, the subject matter. Do you want to stick to the direction of martial arts?

There were a lot of internal and external opinions before, mentioning that martial arts is very old, a very old theme, do you want to make it more fantasy, fantasy everyone may like it more.

When a lot of people say it, these are all temptations - you will have more users when you do this, and there will be bigger plates when you do that. And there are also a variety of styles that young users like. But this kind of thing, if you do a little, there will be two, three, or four points, and if you do more, the martial arts you originally wanted to do will be destroyed.

It's hard to resist the temptation.

Another example is content. Do you want to use some systems that everyone is using to urge players to go online?

We also discussed whether or not to do a daily commission, and then the team convinced me not to do it, saying that what we want to do now is a world that is free enough, relaxed, and a world where everyone can go up to it. If you want the core of freedom, then don't have a design that makes people anxious every day.

If you want to build a society, everyone is just competing for combat power, in the volume, when they are worried that they will not be able to keep up with the team if they don't do something one day, users will not have the energy and time to do role play and other games, or sink down to read your content.

I remember reading a book on psychology a long time ago. It has an interesting case that I can't remember the details, probably:

If I want to promote "energy saving" now, I can do two things: one is to put in rewards - how much energy you save, I will give you any actual reward, such as ten bags of rice or something. The other is that there is no reward, only to promote it.

Finally, we compared the two methods, compared with the simple publicity, we found that the latter users are more recognizant of energy saving, and can adhere to it for a long time. But users who are induced by interests don't agree with you so much, and they can't stick to it for a long time.

My understanding is whether you would give up something short-term for a long-term goal that is possible.

On the day of the launch, the marketing side forwarded me a player comment, especially poking me, saying that in the context of this era, we do our own aesthetic preferences, do what we insist on in our hearts, and are willing to make such products, which is a kind of chivalrous embodiment in itself.

So there is really a feeling of "if you don't forget, there will be an echo". We concentrate on making a longboard, to treat this work sincerely, and in the end, many players can feel it, will recognize you, will be moved by this thing, and tolerate our other shortcomings......

It's really related.

I've been quite busy lately. The game has stabilized, and we are looking at a lot of everyone's data and feedback, and we can intuitively feel that the distance between us and the players is very close; Marketing is also collating player feedback for us...... We are trying to prepare Yanyun for long-term operation and become a service-oriented game that communicates with players enough.

It's also a process of revisiting the product and listening to the voice of the user. Some things that we have doubts about, or that have drums in our hearts, are verified little by little; Some of the new gameplay developed by everyone has also given us new inspiration; There are also some things that we haven't thought about before......

Yanyun is a very new product. At the moment, the core is that we want to make a long-term and stable product. Therefore, we need to look at the user's recognition of the product in the long term little by little, to verify a road that belongs to Yanyun.

02

Talking about twisting: It's just not doing a good job,

But that doesn't mean you're on the wrong track

Everyone said that Yan Yun was twisted, and I also saw the matter of our forcible fusion.

I think that the essence of twisting is not that we can't integrate, it's simply that we haven't done some things well.

There are many aspects of twisting that are discussed. For example, some players say that if you want to play both solo and multiplayer, the two must be irreconcilable; Someone asked me internally, Yanyun does the commercialization of appearance, you don't socialize, who do I buy clothes for? Some people guess that Yanyun's main creator is torn apart, and the heroes are divided...... Surely not.

It's just that it doesn't conform to market perception or doesn't fit the formula, so everyone is naturally not optimistic about this matter.

Personally, I'm not a big fan of the possibility of negating things. Just because it didn't exist before doesn't mean it's impossible. It's not that users just give up because you're a multi-person person. Everyone's likes and dislikes are very pure, and players don't care about your methodology, whether it's fused or not. Fun is fun, and wanting to play is wanting to play.

One player criticized us with a deep impression of the words, to the effect that if it works or not, you have to do both sides well first. You Yanyun haven't done a good job on both sides now, it doesn't mean that this matter is not valid. When it's all done, it's really not going to work, and then you can say that this thing won't work.

Yanyun is the first large-scale product to explore in this direction. We have made a lot of attempts at integration, and there are indeed many things that have not been handled well, such as socialization and commercialization, and we are too constrained by the MMO set of things. But we can't deny the new model just because Yanyun didn't do a good job.

I still believe that this direction is feasible. And we now have confidence: if this model doesn't work, Yanyun won't have the current reputation and data. The data has amply demonstrated that the direction is OK, the idea is good, and the user can accept it.

Some people also questioned, why don't you do things more specifically, simply throw all your resources to MMOs, or do you all go standalone?

I think the key is how the team organizes its own capabilities and experience. If we want to compare in the field of other people's longboards, it is difficult for us to compare; In the future, Yanyun will not be completely in the form of an MMO, because there are meal replacements there, and others are already very satisfied.

Some players' evaluation of Yanyun is: "a martial arts game without meal replacement", and I think it also comes back to these questions: What are the core values of Yanyun? What value can we offer that other MMO products can't? I think we need to find our own value anchor.

In fact, I have always been very firm before the launch, but it is the place that is questioned the most by the outside, such as the commercialization logic of coexistence of single and multi-person people and only selling appearances...... I think that even if Yanyun doesn't make it, there must be products that can get through it later.

That's what I want to do.

So I think screwing is a solvable problem.

Before, we were more borrowed, there was no big data feedback, there was no more user experience, and we didn't know what possibilities to try, so we just crudely put some shells on it.

Now, we're going to study this as a topic. We need to be more aware of what users want, what they reject, and what users absolutely cannot accept. It's like that the second dimension and the eldest cousin all have their own design rules, and Yan Yun also has to find their own standards.

Now, I think Yanyun has two points that he didn't do well before, and there is a lot of promise in the future, one is socialization, and the other is commercial appearance-

In the social area, we were still discussing the "chat channel" a few days ago.

What role should chat channels play for our users now? What are the needs of its original users? What kind of needs do Yanyun's users have? Can the current chat channel meet the social needs of Shangyanyun users? Apparently not.

A chat channel is an MMO-biased messaging. Everyone is looking for social efficiency. But the premise of MMOs is that all users are social. Therefore, MMOs will have a large number of pushes, which may or may not have some social precipitation. It's okay, I'll talk about it later.

But Yan Yun is not this logic. The user mix of our games is complex: we have MMO users, we have single-player users, we have single-player online users, and we have 30%+ pan-users - it's hard to categorize them based on their past gaming experience. Everyone's social demands are different.

Nowadays, many players don't want to be efficient, they want precision, and they want to point to stronger cherishing emotions. As soon as you throw everything in my face, it means that these things are cheap, and you send me a bunch of flyers like you advertise at the supermarket door.

I'm a single-player player.,Every time I click on the red dot on the dialog box.,I see a bunch of friends pushing.,It's all strangers.,I don't know any of them.,I don't even know why my buddies want to add me.。 You may just have a push from the system, and you have to add me. It's boring.

In fact, users of single-player online games can now hide it in the settings, but even if they can, the design of all the reminders is still not friendly to them. I hope that if Yanyun had social networking, it should be more precious.

A lot of times, people don't socialize because of insecurity: I'm afraid that someone else will hurt me, or I'm going to hurt someone else, and I'm afraid of the negative feelings that come with that possibility. If you can feel positive things from a safe distance, and not be destroyed to a safe distance, I believe you will not resist.

For example, the asynchronous social interaction done by Yanyun Road sign already has a good interactive atmosphere; Another example is cure, everyone will now grab the patient, or walk on the road and meet a person, you have to see if he is sick or not, and you want to treat him.

Previously, marketing also asked us to make a social system, called "Pan Gui", which is a family tracing system that is linked to reality. In cooperation with the portrait experts of the Public Security Bureau, we put up many portraits of lost children in it. It's the social relationships we want to see.

Personally, I love the Death Stranding example. I can make roads with others, I can't see others, and people don't interfere with me, but I can feel the presence of these people, and the traces of these existence are all positive. And we're doing things that make the world a better place.

In the future, what kind of social interaction will Yanyun use to make everyone feel better? What is Yanyun's social interaction? This is the part of our doubts that we have been convinced of in the past.

There is also a lot of room for exploration in the commercialization of Yanyun. To be honest, our commercialization is in a state where we can't do anything right now.

It's not that as everyone guessed, making too little money, and being radical later. It's about making money, I think that's the case-

The primary goal of commercialization is to feed the team. We now have a large number of users, and the long-term retention is better than any previous test. And the ARPU is basically in line with expectations - Yanyun's original payment is also lower than MMO, which is between a competitive appearance game and an MMO. So that's what we did.

The second point is that we cannot undermine our commercial advantages. The advantage of Yanyun's payment is that there are no shackles, and there is no set of values, so since there is no burden, why should we put those shackles on ourselves? These things will ruin the Yanyun experience.

So under this premise, we don't need to be aggressive in the future, and there is no need to add values, we must only do appearance.

But we also know that the current appearance system is quite primitive, and both the content and the way of selling are still in the stage of exploration.

In addition, the aesthetic preferences of appearance that everyone is very concerned about, although it is difficult to adjust, we know that this must be a process of continuous run-in with players.

Now many users will say, why is Yanyun's free clothes better than paid ones?

We have seriously thought about this matter, and I think that there are more problems not in the aesthetics itself, but in the choice of aesthetic paths. Whether it is this road to go down, what we see in the end, is the path, or the specific people on the path.

Our current path is somewhat dependent on previous experience. For example, the payment of appearance has not yet jumped out of the MMO system: the expensive appearance emphasizes more ostentatiousness -

That is, it doesn't matter if my appearance looks good or not, the important thing is that everyone knows that it is expensive as soon as they see this appearance. For example, those with gray hair must be expensive, and those with special effects must be expensive. This is a typical MMO show-off logic, which only holds true for some players and not for others.

We also talked before, Yanyun doesn't do social, how to look good? Is there really no need for appearance in weak social? Apparently not. Singles also have the need to please themselves and make themselves look good, and it must be different from the show-off system.

The reason why users will say that free is better than expensive is because players think that showing off is ruining the atmosphere of the world. What these users care about is a sense of substitution and a degree of integration with the world. We paid attention to everyone before, but we didn't have a concept, and now we need to slowly establish an aesthetic system that everyone recognizes.

That's what we're inspired by, and that's what we're trying to make up for.

By the way, the battle is also the part of Yan Yun that is discussed a lot.

To be honest, we didn't have enough time to polish the battles, and we didn't have enough experience. Back in the day, we started with MMOs, and then we completely changed to the single-player experience we now have. After calculation, the new system has only been polished for one year, and the pressure on the cycle and output is quite high. So there are a lot of problems left behind in the battle.

For example, most of the designs that started with zero frames and didn't have a good experience were designed by bosses that were designed earlier, and they were later used. At that time, the basic rules and design standards were not very clear. Our current arrangement is to do a good job of the design standards of the new boss in the future, and then change the old things little by little.

Some people wonder if we're fighting for the sake of a multiplayer experience? Not at all. This combat system is completely single-player, but multiplayer has been trying to be compatible with this side. Speaking of which, when I tested it before, it was precisely because the single-player and multiplayer combat systems were completely irrelevant, which led to a lot of criticism.

You ask me if I'm going to overhaul the fight? At least for a short period of time, Yan Yun will not overhaul this existing combat framework.

Our later planning is more to make the quality better on the existing framework, for example, the depth & richness of our current battles are more backward, and the hidden things are deeper, which also makes players feel that the combat is relatively monotonous and simple at the beginning. These are all things to slowly explore with the player where the "degree" is......

I think that the battle itself is not a good or bad thing, not that a certain mode is necessarily better than others, but more if I choose this combat mode, how to do this set well, so that everyone has a better combat experience.

And it's interesting that many people criticize the battle a lot, but in fact, when we did a questionnaire on retained users, we found that the praise rate of the battle was the second highest among all the positive reviews. Yes, in fact, combat is also very polarizing, just like social and commercial.

So, as with social and commercial issues, combat is true that we didn't do a good job, we didn't polish the parts such as the 3Cs and design standards, but at the same time, the current combat has also proved its value, with character, recognition, and the exuberance of action-oriented games. Everyone thinks it's fresh.

This is also the part that was neglected in the past and will take a lot of effort to make up later.

But no matter which module is adjusted, we are ultimately thinking about this question: what is the experience that Yanyun should have?

The reason why Yan Yun can impress players now is that we make the longboard long enough - the sense of martial arts possessed by this open world is the core of the spiritual resonance that Chinese will have when they see it.

We need to improve the other details without destroying this longboard.

03

Talking about the core: a mysterious and mysterious aesthetic orientation,

and the self-expression of each individual

You ask me how Yanyun's longboard is made? Is there any methodology? It's hard for me to explain it to you.

I've also thought about it, and it's actually a mystical question: immersion and substitution.

The sense of immersion should be constructed in multiple dimensions, including art, music, and ...... There are too many, it is all the details, they are not a question of quality, but an expression of the whole, and all the elements shape a certain atmosphere.

This is a kind of chaos theorem, which is a huge project and system, and many modules can only be realized by working together. It's hard to summarize in one point.

Speaking of which, it is easy to understand the core of Yanyun as a "story". But I don't think so.

I move the same words, the same language, to other games, and everyone doesn't necessarily feel this way. Yanyun has a lot of invisible and subtle things, influencing it behind the scenes and supporting it underneath. It's just that some content, such as art and story, is floating at the top and is the easiest point for players to capture.

The shaping of the sense of the world, I always believe that it is a complex project, a multi-post, multi-system, and cooperative project, a very large, complex, mysterious and mysterious thing, and even, if there is an anachronistic gameplay in your game, it will destroy the sense of substitution in the world.

That is, the world does not just rely on words to tell the story. All the basic small units that build an open world, copywriting and levels, gameplay and values, as well as art and music, etc., should cooperate with each other, and everyone should make concessions to each other to achieve consistency.

I can't say if it's flat, but it's definitely a cross-post connection.

Take music as an example, our music design is very closely integrated with the gameplay and story. A ballad in the Kaifeng area, it will appear in the scene, sing in the mouths of NPCs, appear at the climax of the main story, and will appear in some boss backgrounds......

These things need music classmates to do cross-departmental discussions, sit together and brainstorm: the music says, I will do a pitch change, can I use it in that place again; When other students see that the music is very good, they will do an adventure level specifically for the music to enhance the immersion of the world.

In the final analysis, I think the core of Yanyun is a subjective aesthetic orientation.

I'm convinced that there are a lot of teams that do it in a rational way. Especially in creation, the line between art and business is very blurred, and some teams are more interested in whether many business models can be followed or can be copied.

But at least for us, we're more emotional. We go in a subjective direction and do things according to our own experience and intuition. In other words, the aesthetic system and preferences that have been formed in the cooperation of so many years will ensure that we will not deviate in this process.

We will make such a product, the original intention also comes from our aesthetic preferences, as well as what we insist on in our hearts, it may be in line with martial arts. Personal expression is a very internalized core.

Our personal expression may be a little stronger than the traditional commercial products, but it is true that it has not completely achieved the pure convergence of independent products, after all, we are still a relatively complex, large, and industrialized product, and when we realize it outwardly, we will extend a lot of industrialized content.

The general direction of this aesthetic will be controlled by the producer. When it comes to setting the tone of the product, the producer should present the idea clearly and convey to the team what the state of our project should be, what is important, and know the cost-effectiveness of the investment...... Something else has to give way to this.

However, if we want to discuss in more detail why Yanyun was able to succeed, I want to emphasize only each specific person.

All the details, it can't be that the producer, or the person in charge, write something, let you do it, let others do it, it must come from everyone who wants to write this thing, so that there will be such energy. The cooperation between all students is regardless of the level or the department.

Our dominance is fluid. In the open project of the whole team, it is really every specific student, many, many people, who devote themselves to this matter and fully implement what everyone loves.

I can feel the hard work that everyone has put into the product. It's not just about doing a job, it's about having a ...... for everyone I said that Yanyun has a strong personal expression, because it comes from the expression of every classmate, and when it comes together, people can see that this product has a lot of expressions and a lot of details.

Every time each of us comes up with a good idea, we are really excited.

My favorite thing is to have an "open world module" workshop, sometimes called an acceptance meeting. You will see that students will continue to submit a lot of fresh ideas and ideas. Every time I finish that meeting, I feel like I really want to make this game faster.

Now players are discussing a lot about the funeral in Thousand Buddha Village, and that's it: that is the idea that the level classmates put forward. As soon as the idea came out, the whole meeting became very excited, and everyone quickly finalized the details. It's a design that we really like.

The same is true of Hexi in the future, which is an idea proposed by our copywriting students. You will find that Hexi does not border with the existing map, which is to break the rules of our original map. Our original logic was that each new map should be a plot that completely borders the existing land boundary, such as Qinghe, which can go directly to Kaifeng.

But we like the creativity of Hexi so much, what if it doesn't border? Just populate the map later......

So, I don't really have much methodology to tell you.

Probably, I don't know what the system should say. We also have some systems, such as Feature Team, three pipelines developed in parallel, all from original theology; Another example is the acceptance of L0-L3, which is also learned from Ubisoft, and will accept the number of POIs on each layer and the distance between them......

But I don't think there's anything about all of this that we're original or very creative. I think this set of tools is the basis for you to make this thing happen, but there is no way to ensure that the quality of the thing you make is OK.

My answer is only people. Of course, this is something that has taken us several years to slowly grind out.

After so many years, our team is very, very connected, and after so much public opinion, everyone who has persevered is because they really believe that we have created something together to make this happen.

There's something very emotional and idealistic about everybody. This may be why we can use this model to make products. So, when I saw that player say that we have a martial arts spirit, and some people say that we are hand-rubbing atomic bombs, I really feel very relatable.

Chivalry, a very important spirit is to violate the ban with force. It is important to break the ban, it is a free, rebellious spirit.

Speaking for myself, we prefer the identity of the creator, a lot of logic and formulas, leave it to the analyst to do, and we just do the creative thing.

This article is from Xinzhi self-media and does not represent the views and positions of Business Xinzhi.If there is any suspicion of infringement, please contact the administrator of the Business News Platform.Contact: system@shangyexinzhi.com