“Not bad—the distribution channels cover both online and offline, with multiple platforms and payment methods. It’s pretty thorough.
For a newcomer who’s never done distribution before, this is already quite impressive,” Sister Shan praised.
Rong Mu breathed a sigh of relief upon hearing this. With a professional’s approval, it meant his week hadn’t been wasted.
Last week, Luo Ming had gone to Shanghai. To avoid affecting the game development progress, Rong Mu first found a senior schoolmate from university he was close with to help set up Zhuoguang’s official website, then chatted with the people at Sony about releasing the game on PS4.
Sony’s game prices generally range between 2,500 and 4,000 yen, which works out to roughly 20 US dollars and up.
After trying out Plants vs. Zombies, the Sony people were very optimistic about the game and more than willing to have it released on PS4. Their suggested price was 29.9 US dollars.
Rong Mu thought about it and insisted on the 19.9 US dollar price, because Steam had already agreed to that price. If they raised it at the last minute, they’d have to renegotiate with Steam—not only would it waste time, but it would also hurt Zhuoguang’s corporate image with Steam. Not worth the loss.
And although the Sony people expressed regret about this, they didn’t refuse to cooperate.
PS4 was Sony’s important monetization channel for the coming years—they couldn’t reject an excellent game over such a small issue.
Besides, Sony only takes a cut; the bulk goes to Zhuoguang. If Zhuoguang itself didn’t mind earning less, what could they say?
Finally, Rong Mu also discussed payment software for activation code purchases with WeChat and Alipay.
At this stage, both companies were in the midst of fighting for the payment market. Even for a small workshop like Zhuoguang, both sides showed great sincerity and sent dedicated people to talk with Rong Mu.
Perhaps because they saw that Zhuoguang had made 2048, a game that caused a small-scale sensation, both companies coincidentally gave Zhuoguang some small perks. Tencent, which started with games, had a big advantage in this regard. Tencent said that if Zhuoguang was willing to kick out Alipay and let WeChat be the exclusive payment method, they would be willing to give Plants vs. Zombies a pop-up push notification on QQ.
Rong Mu was tempted right then and there—he really wanted to agree.
Unfortunately, he couldn’t, because neither Tencent nor Alibaba was something the current Zhuoguang could afford to offend.
Besides, Zhuoguang’s online store still needed to open on Taobao! The online store was also one of the sales channels.
So Rong Mu could only painfully decline Tencent’s offer and added both WeChat and Alipay to the payment list.
Naturally, Tencent’s pop-up recommendation was gone, but the small perks from both sides remained. The two sides tacitly offered a random instant discount campaign.
Whether using WeChat or Alipay, purchasing Plants vs. Zombies activation codes directly on Zhuoguang’s official website had a certain chance of drawing an instant discount—minimum 0.1 yuan, maximum a complete free order, and the probability of drawing a free order was one in ten million.
Rong Mu synced all this information to Sister Shan. After hearing it, Sister Shan nodded: “Not bad. Mr. Rong, you’ve basically done everything you can do. Next is my job. Would it be convenient for you to tell me how much money is in the company account?”
Rong Mu secretly glanced at Lin Shuwen.
Lin Shuwen nodded at him.
Since “Luo Ming” had nodded, Rong Mu no longer held back: “Sister Shan, Miss Lin previously invested a total of 5 million in us. After deducting purchases of computers, office desks, renovation, and other miscellaneous expenses, 4.2732 million remains.
Then there’s the income from 2048. The profit from 2048 the week before last was 2.9732 million, and last week’s revenue from 2048 was 9.6685 million—averaging 1.38 million a day.
This week, pirated versions of 2048 have appeared on the market, and our revenue was cut in half. On Monday, we only had just over 600,000 in revenue.
Yesterday, which was Monday, Luo Ming called and asked me to wire 3 million to a research group at Fudan University. I sent the money over in the morning.
Then we also spent 50,000 yuan as a deposit for pressing the game discs.
So as of now, the company account has a total of 14.4639 million yuan.”
“So roughly 14.5 million? Making this much money in just over a month since founding—you two really have some skills!” Sister Shan exclaimed.
“I’m only in charge of business matters. The main thing is that Luo Ming’s game is well-made.”
“Still being modest. With your division of labor, isn’t it just one doing technology and one doing management? Each fulfilling their own duties is great.
Luo Ming, I need 10 million of Rong Mu’s 14.5 million for marketing and promotion.”
“10 million!” Rong Mu was startled.
Beside him, Lin Shuwen was also full of surprise.
“Yes, 10 million.”
“Why do you need so much money, Sister Shan?” Lin Shuwen asked.
“Luo Ming, are you playing dumb?” Sister Shan asked with a half-smile.
Lin Shuwen looked completely bewildered. Had Luo Ming done something she didn’t know about?
“You’re still pretending? Your game—from the house owner’s name Dave, to the notes given after each major level being in both Chinese and English, to Dave’s voice lines like ‘wabby wabby’ and ‘wabby babbo’—I suspected from the start that this game’s target was never just domestic, but aimed overseas.
Just now I heard Rong Mu mention your sales channels—four sales channels, two of them facing overseas. That further proves my guess.”
After hearing Sister Shan’s words, Rong Mu suddenly remembered—Luo Ming had always said he wanted to sell Plants vs. Zombies on Steam.
Later he even had Zhao Ningyuan find his friend at Sony. Was this kid’s ambition really that big?
The key thing is—big ambition is fine, but he didn’t even tell him?
Thinking of this, Rong Mu turned to look at “Luo Ming.”
To be honest, Lin Shuwen was still in a dazed state at this point—she didn’t know anything!
But her expression was a smile, looking as if she had everything under control.
Seeing this, Sister Shan rolled her eyes and continued: “Luo Ming, since your game is aimed overseas, you shouldn’t have been so petty from the start.
Your game’s quality isn’t bad, so just go all out with promotion. Domestically, we can use a little trick, then borrow that trick to garner sympathy and buy trending topics.”
“What kind of trick?” Rong Mu asked curiously.
“Simple—game leak.”
“Game leak? That…”
“Don’t worry, it won’t be a full leak. Just leak the first few levels, up to around 2-5, plus one fun bonus level.”
Rong Mu was still a bit confused, but Lin Shuwen, who had spent a year navigating the entertainment industry, understood.
“Sister Shan, you want to use this move to win netizens’ sympathy?”
“Right. Before coming here, I did some research. Domestic game users aren’t keen on buy-to-play games—they prefer getting things for free. At times like this, you need to use some tactics to win their sympathy.
Influenced by Confucian culture, most people domestically sympathize with the underdog.
Normally, game companies and players are opposed to each other. Game companies can never be seen as the underdog in players’ eyes. But what if a game company’s game—which took years of hard work to develop—gets leaked ahead of release? Years of effort about to go up in flames. At that point, doesn’t the game company become the underdog?”
