I Just Want Players to Save Money, They Insist on Giving Me!
Chapter 111 - 61: The Flowing Water Rankings are Released!_1

Chapter 111: Chapter 61: The Flowing Water Rankings are Released!_1

After a whole day of intense competition at the Ice and Snow Festival, the rankings were gradually taking shape.

No matter if it was the D~C level regions, B~A level regions, or even the higher tiers.

Card-drawing games almost completely overwhelmed the pay-to-own model, firmly occupying the top 20 spots in each sub-ranking.

Although players from Blue Star were gradually experiencing aesthetic fatigue with card-drawing games, logically speaking, the gaming market should have been due for a change.

But it’s undeniable that gamers as a demographic still constitute too small a base percentage of the global population.

So small that even the graphics card company NVVDA (intentionally misspelled, fictional world view) rooted in gaming

was slowly abandoning the gaming market, shifting towards larger sectors like enterprise, intelligence, technology, and medicine.

Looking at the previous eight major arts: painting, sculpture, architecture, music, literature, dance, drama, and cinema.

Only sculpture and drama have seen a gradual decrease in their audience.

The other arts, in terms of both audience/users and practitioners, all overwhelmingly eclipse gaming in scale.

This has resulted in a majority of non-gaming bystanders.

If they were to encounter gaming, the purely luck-based gameplay of card-drawing could bring a very thrilling experience upon first try.

So what if the user demographics don’t match?

Over thirty and not fond of anime-style card drawing?

No problem.

How about card-drawing in RPG style? Like it?

What about historical-themed card-drawing? Or sports?

Various simulation-rich sports club themes, where spending money gives you a chance to draw famous stars and create a star-studded team! Do you like that?

As long as there is a market, manufacturers can make anything for you.

Moreover, the world will always have its younger generation.

For the new generation on Blue Star, card-drawing games were not only not tiring, but rather exciting and novel.

"The competition is as fierce this year as it has always been," Yu Xiao remarked at noon the next day, during the same time slot when the previous day’s rankings were refreshed.

Yu Xiao was gathering in the conference room with several core executives from his company—directors, planners, supervisors—all seven or eight of them having a small meeting.

Watching the first day’s ranking projections.

Although there wasn’t much of interest in terms of revenue regarding the company’s new games this year, it was still good to see if any hit titles had broken through early, setting a direction the company could replicate for its next game.

Making money, after all, involves a lot of copying in the gaming world, and there’s no shame in that.

His gaze swept toward the leaderboard.

Firmly taking the top three spots of the S~SSS tier were still.

The same old industry giants: Tengjing, Netcom, and Silver Brilliance.

They were respectively—

Netcom’s new game "Amy Cupid’s Legend," with a first-day revenue of 733 million

Tengjing’s new release "Wogon Continent," with a first-day revenue of 719 million

Silver Brilliance’s new game "Country Ink and Fragrance," with a first-day revenue of 698 million

...

Even the tenth place had a substantial revenue of 300 million plus.

Among them, Netcom was the parent company of Yu Xiao’s Jinhai Company.

With the parent company surpassing Tengjing and Silver Brilliance to take the lead in this festival, Yu Xiao, as a "son," naturally felt delighted.

In high spirits, he asked his secretary to retrieve some fine tea from his office to serve to everyone present.

After pouring tea for everyone, Yu Xiao lifted his cup, blew on it, then motioned for the director to change the screen.

"Director Lin, let’s switch to our region now," he said.

For the regions above S level, it was just for show; a company like his, that could barely count as entry-level in the A tier, could hardly produce the kind of quality those top-tier companies did.

Moreover, if his company had any outstanding talent, the upper echelons would bleed them dry and transfer them away immediately.

Many large platforms like to foster subsidiaries or support small workshops/studios.

Making money is minor; the main purpose is still to exploit them.

Any company that produces a hit, drain it!

Anyone with talented individuals, drain them!

Even succubus would say they’re scared.

Just as Director Lin was about to switch the screen.

"Hold on!" Yu Xiao snatched the controller and quickly switched to the B~A level region.

He then swiftly scrolled down, so fast that one couldn’t even make out the top three revenues before the cursor slid to beyond the 200th spot.

"Start from here, and slowly flip upwards," he told Lin Ze, tossing the controller back.

Though he was about eighty to ninety percent sure, Yu Xiao was still somewhat apprehensive.

He feared that he might suddenly see Number One Player Company’s name ranking high up.

Better to start from the bottom, while also checking if those companies that had promised to collaborate with his own had secretly changed their minds, leading to a significantly higher ranking, so he could consider giving them a shake-down next time.

If Jinhai can’t make money, you all think you can make money on the sly?

Absurd!

Are you not afraid that if my dad gets tough, he’ll play a hand that bans you across all platforms?

Taking in Yu Xiao’s instructions, Lin Ze did as told and began to slowly control and gently scroll the cursor upwards.

Among the B~A level companies participating in the Ice and Snow Festival this first day, there were more than two hundred domestically, both big and small.

However, there were differences even within B level!

Most were relatively minor B-level companies.

For instance, companies that had managed only one quality work after ten years, and even that quality work was barely at the threshold.

These companies, with insufficient successful experiences, were prone to failing with their new releases.

Some companies had first-day revenues that were embarrassingly low, in the hundreds, which almost made Yu Xiao laugh.

Soon, the cursor slowly floated into the top 100 range.

There he saw a familiar name.

Feishang Entertainment.

Then he looked at the revenue.

Thirty thousand dollars.

This fellow really knew how to survive, honestly to a fault.

When told to lower prices, he really took it to heart and lowered them to death...

How on earth did he sell for thirty thousand dollars...

You couldn’t be also emulating Number One Player Company’s previous stunt of clearing out at one dollar apiece, could you?

Too naive, so naive that Yu Xiao was even at a loss for words.

However, in business there is no room for sentiment, and so Yu Xiao simply paid a brief homage in his heart before continuing to focus on the big screen.

As the cursor climbed up the list, the ranking had already leaped into the sixties and seventies.

The companies at these rankings were beginning to have some real value.

Even the lowest daily revenue had reached 100,000 yuan; based on this daily active user count, maintaining the momentum without faltering would mean a monthly income of one to two hundred thousand was no problem. At least, it was enough to scrape by.

Here, he saw many familiar ’partners’

Their first-day revenue hovered mostly in the 100,000 to 150,000 range.

In fact, if these joint companies wanted, they could instantly shoot up to the top of the B~A league.

"Surely, the hardcore players of these companies must start to wonder when they see such first-day revenue?"

"This is the first step to success."

Following this, Jinhai Entertainment finally appeared at 47th place.

Jinhai Entertainment, first-day revenue: 271,336.57 yuan, new game title "Final Defense Line: Battlefront"

The first day, 270,000!

Even if it was reduced to one yuan, this was just the cost of drawing cards.

Character upgrade packs, stamina acquisition packs, item and materials training packs, and the like—Yu Xiao had still sneakily increased some of these.

Of course, this time he really only adjusted them slightly; after all, if Jinhai, playing the role of big brother, were to betray its trust and desert at the last moment, it would also make the other companies lose heart.

Increasing it slightly was nothing more than the intention of getting back a little bit of energy; it wasn’t a serious matter.

But what made Yu Xiao frown was...

He didn’t see the name of Number One Player Company.

From 200th place, he had scrolled all the way up to 47th.

In the conference room, seven or eight top executives, with a dozen pairs of eyes, were watching intently.

But they failed to find Number One Player.

This made Yu Xiao feel a bit uneasy.

Could it be that this guy had suddenly changed tactics?

Not going for the ’people-friendly’ pricing, but instead, uncharacteristically, shooting straight to the top?

Just as Yu Xiao was worrying internally...

Suddenly, a voice rang out beside his ear.

"Director Yu, look, 33rd place! Revenue of 480,000!" Director Lin shouted.

Yu Xiao heard this and immediately felt jubilant, his gaze shifting toward the big screen.

Indeed!

480,000!

Little brat, did I catch you?

"Heh, trying to play with me?" Yu Xiao picked up his teacup, took a sip, and finally let out the breath he had been holding.

The tactic was effective!

Given the recent trend of Number One Player Company dominating the industry limelight,

even with squeezed pricing, the first-day revenue of a new title should have broken a million to be considered decent.

Yet it had been cut by half.

This proved that the price suppression scheme proposed by his few factories did indeed have a disruptive effect.

After all, the daily active users of several top B factories added up to a substantial number.

Everyone’s expensive, except for Number One Player which is cheap, so they could really rake in the goodwill.

But now, with several leading B factories in the mix,

players would see that Number One Player, once known for its affordable prices, had become more expensive than the established giants.

Then who would play Number One Player’s games?

"Director Yu is insightful."

"Unworthy as Director Yu, such a business mind."

"We’ve resolved a major worry, and next year our Jinhai will soar even higher."

The executives in the conference room started to flatter profusely.

Yu Xiao enjoyed the praise, his gaze inadvertently sweeping over the screen again.

Huh?

Something seemed off.

He took a closer look.

Just one glance.

"Pfft!!!"

The tea he had just sipped, along with the tea leaves, was all sprayed onto Director Lin’s shiny forehead.

The screen clearly displayed.

33, Number One Player, first-day revenue: 480,059.33 yuan, new game title "Goose Duck Kill: Fashion DLC"

...

Dammit, Goose Duck Kill???

What era’s game is that?

How can you use a sword from six months ago to slash today’s rankings?

He looked more closely at the details.

Well, this cunning company played quite a game.

This fashion DLC had indeed gone on sale synchronously with the winter festival event, still priced conscientiously at one yuan. With over twenty new outfits updated and bundled for sale, it also showed their sincerity.

Our company’s pricing will never be modified once set, and the operational environment will continue to be maintained well in the future, patching patches and releasing new products as needed.

Moreover, due to its super low price and pioneering psychological gameplay, Goose Duck Kill also tended to handle the toxic gameplay environment promptly. Now, its daily active users stabilised around 200,000, with the monthly active users exceeding a hundred million.

With such a conscientious game, players at the first opportunity to get the DLC, even if they didn’t log in, would still buy a copy to collect.

Selling 480,000 was not surprising.

But now a new problem emerged.

If 33rd place belonged to their Goose Duck Kill DLC,

Then where is their new title "Arknights"?

Suddenly, Yu Xiao had a foreboding feeling.

"Flip through more quickly!" he urged, his breath becoming rapid.