In his previous life, Plants vs Zombies took the world by storm, selling over a million USD in just nine days, breaking many records.
Based on 3 USD per copy, if Plants vs Zombies sold 1.5 million copies, it would earn 4.5 million USD, which was almost 27 million RMB.
What was the monthly revenue of I Am MT?
In 2013, when the Chinese mobile game market was still developing, it had already reached 55 million RMB.
Comparing the two, Plants vs Zombies relied on the global market, while I Am MT relied on the domestic market.
Plants vs Zombies was a standalone game that relied on sales to make money, and sales would slowly decline. On the other hand, I Am MT used a free-to-play model, and was still doing well after three to four years, and was even constantly updating.
The success of Plants vs Zombies couldn't be replicated, while I Am MT's model could be mass-produced.
Comparing the two, you could see how profitable Chinese card games were.
I Am MT took the 'Chinese card game' model to the next level, and found a way for Chinese game developers to make money. As the benchmark of this generation of card games, I Am MT was copied by many other games, until similar games appeared three to four years later.
Before Dota Legend made a revolutionary change to the card game, I Am MT, as a national card game, was undoubtedly the number one best-selling game for a long time.
Chen Mo wanted to use Chinese games to make money, and I Am MT was the first step. It had a few features that suited Chen Mo's current needs.
First, it was easy to make. I Am MT's art resources were mostly focused on the character cards. No matter if it was the numbers, level design, gameplay, or original art, it wasn't difficult for Chen Mo.
The gameplay wasn't complicated, and the rules were relatively clear. As long as the art resources were in place, it wouldn't take too long to develop, around two to three months.
Second, moderation. I Am MT wasn't like other Chinese games that incited hatred and made players spend money like crazy. On the contrary, this game gave out a lot of runes, which would be given out during the holidays, and was relatively friendly towards free players.
Moreover, the game didn't have high intensity PvP or GVG content like state wars or city wars, so free players wouldn't feel as much of a loss.
Chen Mo had to consider how accepting the players of the parallel world would be. If he gave them a hard pill right from the start, they wouldn't be able to take it. If they were to be scolded badly, their reputation would go down the drain, which would be disastrous.
From this point of view, I Am MT could be considered a good transitional work.
Thirdly, it's easy to publicize.
Chen Mo had thought about this carefully.
What was the core of card games?
It wasn't the gameplay, but the IP.
IP is intellectual property.
The abbreviation of property translated into Chinese means intellectual property.
In the domestic gaming circle, IP was a hot word. Many game manufacturers were willing to throw money at some big IPs. Many game designers talked about IP more frequently than eating or drinking.
Why was IP so important and so valuable?
This was because in card games, the IP determined the value of the cards. It was the same card game, but your orange card was Guan Yu and Zhang Fei, while mine was Eagle Eye and Zoro. Obviously, the number of users that these two games could attract was completely different, and the price that players were willing to pay in order to draw an orange card was also different.
The Three Kingdoms was basically the worst IP because there were too many people making Three Kingdoms games and everyone was too familiar with it.
In his previous life, works like Naruto, One Piece, Fate, and Jin Yong's works were all relatively big IPs. As long as he could get his hands on these IPs, he could easily make money with just a set of art resources.
If a card game didn't have an IP, it was equivalent to having no soul. Yes, it was that exaggerated.
To make a card game, one must have an IP.
When Chen Mo decided to make a card game, he thought about how to solve the problem of IP.
His first reaction was to buy some of the big IPs in the parallel world, but he gave up after looking up the prices.
This world had a strong sense of copyright protection and legal rights, and the price of IPs increased correspondingly.
In his previous life, some popular IPs could sell for seven figures. In the parallel world, this price would only be higher.
Of course, not all IPs were that expensive. Some novels and animations that weren't that popular could be bought for a few hundred thousand, but these works had limited influence, and Chen Mo didn't care for them.
You get what you pay for when it comes to IP. Buying an unknown IP was equivalent to not buying at all.
For Chen Mo, he didn't care about cheap IPs, and he couldn't afford expensive IPs. Of course, even if he could afford it, he didn't want to spend so much money.
Therefore, after much consideration, Chen Mo decided to make his own IP, and I Am MT was the most suitable IP.
Of course, Chen Mo had other options, such as …
Redraw One Piece or Naruto?
Rewrite The Legend of the Condor Heroes or Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils?
… Neither were reliable.
For things like novels and animations, it would take a long time from the moment they appeared to the moment they became popular. Leaving aside the question of whether Chen Mo's art skills could handle One Piece or Naruto, at a rate of one chapter a week, how long would it take for Chen Mo to make it as popular as it was in his previous life?
Novels were relatively faster, but novels weren't suitable for video games. It was usually done through movies, animations, and then games. It was rare to skip the movie and go straight to the game.
This was because the characters in novels were imaginary, while the characters in games were very concrete. From imaginary to concrete, it would usually take a lot of time and effort to make sure the IP would be popular.
After much consideration, I Am MT was the easiest to make, and was Chen Mo's best choice.
In this world, the animation industry in China was doing quite well. All Chen Mo had to do was provide the characters, art, story, and storyboards of I Am MT, and let the animation companies do the same. The quality wouldn't be any worse than in his previous life.
After all, I Am MT was created by a few anime and game enthusiasts in his previous life, so the cost wasn't high.
I Am MT was very popular. The first episode of I Am MT had over three hundred million views on iQIYI. It was a phenomenal anime, becoming a memory of the World of Warcraft players and anime enthusiasts.
Therefore, this anime could be made into a super IP, allowing Chen Mo's new game to take off.
Of course, there were risks.
The biggest problem was that the popularity of I Am MT in his previous life was partly due to the story of World of Warcraft and its huge user base. World of Warcraft didn't exist in the parallel world, so when the audience saw I Am MT, they wouldn't understand a lot of the settings.
For example, what was the meaning of a main tank? What was a main tank? Why was there a main tank? What was so special about this class? Why was he the main character of the anime?
These were things that didn't need to be explained to the players of World of Warcraft. However, for the audience in this parallel world, would they understand the culture behind I Am MT?
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