Some time ago, when chatting with old friends in some circles, they deliberately or unconsciously talked about their past. I also had the privilege of being able to learn from them the status of the game industry a few years ago, and the general appearance of some of the game industry at the time. To sum up, in those years before 99 years ago, the game was a very simple cultural and leisure product, simple packaging, simple platters, and simple distribution... The only thing that people found difficult to match was that they couldn’t match it. High price. However, this and today's online games require players to continuously invest funds in it. Even a small number of players invest heavily in purchasing virtual equipment, the price of several hundred yuan is really nothing.
It must be admitted that the changes brought by online games to the Chinese game industry are enormous and can even be described in earthshaking. This is not only reflected in the great variety and variety of games, but also in the gradual rise of the game's surrounding markets. Compared with the packaging effect produced by the stand-alone games in the past for purely sales, the online game's periphery is more gorgeous and more imposing. This exquisite coat makes online games no longer simply play the role of entertainment tools, but also become an opportunity for many people to enjoy the perfect combination of cutting-edge technology and fashion. The online game packaging has gradually formed a new landscape in the competing debuts of major businesses!
Bring beautiful clothes to online games
When it comes to the packaging of the game, the first thing that players think of would be when buying a game's installation CD, then there is a beautiful box with a game LOGO. For a long time, everyone's understanding of game packaging has largely stayed at this stage. After several years of development, the packaging of the game is also the same as the quality of the game, and it is undergoing tremendous changes.
In the past, in the market dominated by stand-alone games, the packaging of games has gone from simple to complex. The game's packaging box began to shrink from a large box with a high selling price. With the release of some low-priced stand-alone games, the packaging of the game has also begun to be simplified. Since some games have fallen below ¥50, the packaging has also begun to shrink dramatically. For example, in the history of Chinese-made games, the most successful stand-alone game, Legend of Swordsman, was sold at a price of ¥200 or more at the time of its initial launch, and the large size of its packaging box also made players remember. However, with the development of the game industry and changes in market demand, this version of the game has launched a simplified version later, the game packaging is simplified to an ordinary CD box, the cover is just a familiar LOGO, The low price of ¥28 also completed the popularization of the "Sword".
The focus here is on stand-alone games, which seem to have nothing to do with online games, but attentive players will certainly find that the prices and packaging of online games are on the opposite path to stand-alone games. At the time of the initial distribution of some online games, there was no special packaging. Instead, only a bag-shaped folded paper was used to load the game's CD. The price was between ¥10-20 (the lowest client price ever appeared in China). It is the "King of Kings," which once used only a symbolic dollar to issue clients. Most players will not buy such CDs on their own initiative, and then the growing lineup of game media will begin to give away free online game clients with each issue of the magazine. This phenomenon is most evident in the game media of 2001-2002, and this situation is still continuing in the magazine that has been published in 2003. It can be said that with advertising campaigns in the publicity period, magazines are actually a kind of packaging for online games to increase distribution channels.
But for an online game player, it doesn't matter if you get the client through purchasing power. With the gradual improvement of the Internet access conditions and the gradual increase in the speed of the Internet, we have been able to easily acquire any client of an upcoming or already betad online game. Therefore, ordinary client sales have gradually become less attractive to players. For the average player, the root cause of their desire to purchase a client is that the purchase of the client can additionally obtain some points for the game, and the cost-effectiveness of these points is obviously higher than buying a point card. Any player who has played an online game is very clear that the client distributes game points. This is a phenomenon that any online game sales client has. In other words, the direct driving force that allows players to generate a desire to purchase a client is the number of game points that appear as a package, not the one on which the game can be installed.
Return to the previous comparison with the stand-alone game - the price and packaging of online games and the stand-alone game take the opposite path. When online games began to be widely used in China in 2001, the sales of online game client CDs came in the form of single discs. However, the description of the collocation game and even the detailed guide descriptions today are already normal. Such gifts don't just mean that more and more packages are available to the player for a one-time purchase of the client, but also that manufacturers pay attention to this part of the package and can issue exquisite packaging without any player fees.
Paying attention to the client's distribution is the result of an intuitive upgrade of online games. The client of "Xuanyujian ONLINE" changed its past online games to publish it in a simple package at the time of release and implemented the same package as the single game distribution. An online game appeared in the form of a stand-alone game package, and this approach was approved by most players. However, the reason for this agreement is not the exquisiteness of the game packaging, but the fact that, in the case of increasing the price of issuing more sophisticated clients, the number of points can be allocated even more, and this part of the difference between the price difference and the points obtained is similar to Buy points directly above!
There has been such a big change in the form of direct sales, and the media campaign has not been reduced. Businesses know that the media plays an important role in game propaganda, and the previously unchangeable form of disc distribution has to be transformed. If you often pay attention to the game media, then you must have never forgotten the packaging of the “Legend of Legends Online†beautiful user manual plus the client's CD that was given in a magazine subscription book some time ago. The well-crafted and uniquely designed book is similar to the commemorative handbook of an exhibition event. Though it is free to the hands of the players, it allows the player not only to get the client to distribute the points, but also to allow the player to get a gorgeous handbook. Learn the characteristics of the game. Such packaging is a classic of domestic game client packaging.
Two months ago, WYD's distribution strategy for colleges and universities in Chengdu also allowed us to see another aspect of packaging online games. At that time, operators recruited some staff members at various universities to send hundreds of thousands of game client CDs to the hands of colleges and universities with the strategy of delivering discs. Whether or not he or she played WYD, the content of the discs Guided articles such as beginner guides have also been added. While sending CDs, some quiz questions also become another means of packaging games. In conjunction with these packaging and other promotional activities, WYD's registered users suddenly doubled one day after reaching 1 million. This growth rate is also a model for domestic packaging games.
Different from the fact that these games distribute gifts in a big way, some online games are also beginning to take a simple path. The packaging strategy of "Tianjiao - The World of Qin Shuo" is quite unique. Although the client of the game is also in the form of a magazine-supported CD, the game's account issuance is not accompanied by the CD but is attached to the poster delivered by the magazine in the same period. Hundreds of thousands of posters formed a unique landscape of domestic online games in the game media of the beginning of the year.
Many manufacturers make big fuss on the game client, so that when the online game enters the player's field of vision for the first time, it seems to put on a beautiful dress. This dress has changed with the release of different online games. But such packaging is only the beginning for online games. Just like the essence of online games, the client's sales are only one-time consumption. This is only a superficial touch for the development of the entire online game. The real charm that makes players feel that online games are large packages is those Overwhelming benefits, kitsch enjoyment. How to benefit, how to enjoy, here we will let us take a closer look! $Page break $
Online game gifts
Nowadays online games are all about attracting players' attention. However, this is a problem that many businesses are bothered by. With the expansion of this market, more and more merchants have entered the game circle, and they are all starting with online games. This phenomenon makes the online game market full of smoke, the average monthly launch of 2 to 4 online games is already quite normal, and in the peak month of 10 new online games is not a surprise. Although the player's group is expanding, it is really dwarfed by the demand for online games.
Therefore, China's online game market has put forward such a strange demand - first regardless of the quality of your game is good or bad, the works that can attract players' attention can only continue to develop. Therefore, any propaganda that can attract the attention of players has begun to be used in the packaging of online games.
At present, more domestic methods used are game activities. Most of these activities take place in the nature of rewards, such as essay, competition, and prize testing. What keeps the players concerned is not the form of this activity, but what they can get after winning.
Perhaps we will evaluate this phenomenon as the player's mentality is not normal, but it should be an old Chinese saying - there must be Yongfu under the reward. At the beginning of the online game-related activities, the general thousand-dollar rewards seem to have been quite good, but in order to attract players from numerous online games, ordinary rewards are almost abandoned by manufacturers. When the "Three Kingdoms Online" was initially tested, it gave up on the way that online games consistently rewarded with prizes and adopted a cash reward system. The activities of the “all over the country, who is the king†were deeply rooted in people’s minds at the time. One of the main reasons for this was that the players of the first unified Three Kingdoms could receive ¥5000 in cash. Net Three's cash incentives stimulated the nerves of domestic online game companies. Afterwards, many cash reward systems have emerged one after another. Forms are no longer important, and what is important is what players can get. Later, even the upcoming agency online game for the company has become one of the activities that the player can win.
What makes players crazy is that packaging online games is not just about cash or simple prizes, but also includes many of the world's dream luxury products. In June 2001, Taiwan’s online game “The Wonderland of Heaven†took the lead in implementing large-scale awards for games. Announced that as long as participating in the "Heaven Qi Yan Rock City Challenge", there will be opportunities to obtain a Porsche sports car valued at NT$1 million. Other related prizes include valuable prizes such as IBM laptops, IBM personal computers, IBM TFT LCD monitors, and IBM PDAs. The relevant rewards for "The Rock of Paradise" are not only focused on the competition, but also able to win the IBM notebook as a prize for the final winner of the championship. On July 9th, after the official release of "The Rock of Paradise", the number of members has exceeded 1 million within a short period of less than a month. This kind of packaging allows manufacturers to see the huge benefits of big investment, and afterwards similar activities of some manufacturers began to emerge one after another. On September 1, 2001, Taiwan Teili Multimedia announced that it will launch the first large-scale event for its upcoming online game "Happy Submarine" as a promotional package for the game, and this time the champion will receive a value of up to 300 TWD's luxury homes, and this mansion is a super-luxury case of the “City of the Sky†that has caught the attention of the architectural community in Taiwan. In addition, Yitaili Multimedia also prepared 128 SOGO thousand dollar coupons and 16 Laos round-trip ticket as other prizes. After the end of the game in November, in addition to the championship won the luxury house, two or three players respectively obtained quite good locomotives.
Domestic similar packaging also began to allow mainland players to participate in similar activities as the market changed. Also in 200