China vs USA - player data on a new game

Discussion in 'Public Game Developers Forum' started by 1stSPIN, May 13, 2015.

  1. 1stSPIN

    1stSPIN Well-Known Member

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    #1 1stSPIN, May 13, 2015
    Last edited: May 13, 2015
    We are having good success with a game in China we just launched yesterday stickHero (My Hero in China)

    It is available on iTunes and 2 Chinese sites.

    After a day the results are 88 to 1 for China.

    This is consistent with the previous game launched which brings in 2,000 to 6,000plus rmb or $300 to $1,000plus a day in ad revenue. The current game is testing in apps purchases plus free play ads.

    I will give you some more data tomorrow.
     
  2. psj3809

    psj3809 Moderator

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    Think you should keep this to one thread. You have a lot of threads about your experiences in China
     
  3. 1stSPIN

    1stSPIN Well-Known Member

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    You might be right. Delete this if you feel it is out of place
     
  4. 1stSPIN

    1stSPIN Well-Known Member

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    As I said if you feel you need to delete this thread then it is ok with me. In the meantime here is day 3 data

    USA accounts for 9% of the downloads and China 91%

    and it seems Chinese play longer

    USA plays 4% and China 96%
     
  5. MGP Studios

    MGP Studios Active Member

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    #5 MGP Studios, May 15, 2015
    Last edited: May 15, 2015
    Hi there 1stSPIN,

    Thanks for sharing your experience.

    We are about to release our new game Roll'd and planning on distributing the Android version on the Chinese market. We found Appsborg.com who supposedly put/publish your game on the major Chinese Appstores, have you or anyone else here had any experience with them?

    Also is it difficult to put you Android game on their major stores, like 360, hiapk etc or is finding a publisher the better compromise? The first barrier is of course the language, as signing up for 360 seems impossible without a Chinese cell phone (which is supposed to be filled out upon registration for receiving a verification number).

    Seeing as you have experience on the matter at hand we would greatly appreciate some advice and tips. Thanks in advance.

    Edit: Just saw the other threads about requirements for releasing on the Chinese marketplace, so it seems going via publisher is the only option for us as of now. Of course if there are other viable options/tips we will greatly appreciate the info! :)
     
  6. 1stSPIN

    1stSPIN Well-Known Member

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    The best is that you do it on your own but may be impossible if you are not in China. The 2nd best is to publish it with some Foreigners who are in China and willing to publish your game but I don't know of any at this time. The 3rd is to hand it over to a Chinese publisher and hope they are ethical and provide you with real data weekly on a given day every week. Keep us posted.
     
  7. MGP Studios

    MGP Studios Active Member

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    Thanks and will do. Wrote to a few other publishers and will post the results/impressions. Cheers
     
  8. 1stSPIN

    1stSPIN Well-Known Member

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    #8 1stSPIN, May 16, 2015
    Last edited: May 16, 2015
    If you can design your games to have a Chinese feel to them you should be more successful. One thing for sure the free game ad return in China, Tencents if far, far, greater than it is with Google. What you need to do is attract a bit of attention so that players start to share with their friends on QQ and Wechat. My wife is doing a business in Wechat and withing a month she has a huge following. One person I know in Beijing who was struggling and started the same business using Wechat she now make about 150,000rmb a month which is not bad seeing that the average income is about 4,000rmb a month.

    I am working on a game now that has a Renoir look with a girl dancing through a field hoping to attract the attention of teenage to early 20 girls. Here marriage, boyfriends is big with young girls and they fantasize about romantic relationships. I should be clear that China relationships are far different than that of USA. Hand holding in public is a huge hurdle for them to jump. And girls love to share these with the girlfriends via QQ and Wechat. I think the social media here has a huge opportunities because it is very clean and not polluted with spam and scam and trash like other social medias. Everything starts at a friend level and friend to friend so there is a lot of trust in what is being shared. about 10 years ago I built a successful business that earned millions using forums in the USA and tagging my nicknam as myself (tranparent) but that time has passed. If you expect to grow via facebook, forums, etc coming out of the blocks with zero you will not go far.

    Good luck in China. I have been here for over 15 years but still learning because I too thought the market was not here and got some surprising data that changed my mind
     
  9. 1stSPIN

    1stSPIN Well-Known Member

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    The numbers are consistently higher for China but huge numbers. We still only have the game on 2 sites because of the in-app purchases which requires a limited company and we are working on that. Another game was launched without in-app purchases and will monitor it to see if we can pull the same results on all 5 sites.
     
  10. 1stSPIN

    1stSPIN Well-Known Member

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    It's Monday afternoon in China and the data shows China with 91% of the downloads for today. It is evening in the USA so the numbers may change before the day ends
     
  11. 1stSPIN

    1stSPIN Well-Known Member

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    We are heading into the weekend which is when China goes wild shopping, eating and playing. So far the data is the same with China at about 92% and USA with 8%. This is why the ad payout is higher in China but China is mainly and Android country and we still have some problems with Google getting our game up with in app purchase and still have to open a LTD company in China to get it up on some important site. We have it up with Xiaomi so we may decide to put up our youku video trailer (China's version of youtube). I would also like to run an ad in China but I have to find out how to do that and where to buy space. We are working on 3 new games and will also push China part of the business.
     
  12. MGP Studios

    MGP Studios Active Member

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    Thanks for sharing.

    We are finding it difficult to engage in a regular conversation with Chinese publishers as they have a very strange tendency in replying to messages: despite being usually enthusiastic they usually reply after a long delay with no substanial info.

    I do not recommend Appsborg: the initial impression is bad: they state on their website they reply within 24 hours. and now after 3 weeks we only received one email from them with hardly any concrete info and are now into our second week of waiting for the follow-up reply.

    Seems like we will just try our luck with the smaller stores that don't require a Chineses .Ltd etc like Xiaomi, but first have to get over the language barrier :/
     
  13. 1stSPIN

    1stSPIN Well-Known Member

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    #13 1stSPIN, May 28, 2015
    Last edited: May 28, 2015
    Dealing with Chinese is not easy, communication is very difficult because if there is an issue they go silent even if you are on the phone (a friend of mine from Texas who represents a huge company in the USA and have 20 years of experience in the orient says it the deer looking into the head light problem, when they are caught they just go silent), getting paid is questionable, transparency is questionable, you cannot take legal action because who and how do you sue? The best is if you can do it yourself or with some foreigners who are in China and partner with them. You could try some websites like Shenzhen Party and Shenzhen Stuff and try to connect with some foreigners who are making game apps.


    One of our games is still making about 2,000RMB a day in China when overseas it is only a few bucks. All the other games without promotion are bring in about 10 to 100 times the return with Google and Apple. We still have not solved the paid app problem yet, when we do I will give you some idea on the returns.
     
  14. freeBozeForSomeOfYou

    May 31, 2015
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    How do you localise for China? Do English-only games stand a chance?
     
  15. 1stSPIN

    1stSPIN Well-Known Member

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    I would not go with English only but that does not mean it would not work.
     
  16. 1stSPIN

    1stSPIN Well-Known Member

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    This is the Children's day holiday in China which means revenue goes up as much as double the normal weekend revenue. Chinese play and shop hard on the weekend and that is magnified during holidays. The big one, Spring Festival is coming and I be ready for that with a number of new games.

    So far we have some data on a game that show even 200,000 plus players is not enough to go viral in China, not good news. That may be premature because things can change in one day. In the outside market if you had to buy that number of downloads with advertising you would $400,000 to $600,000 USD and those downloads may not be quality. Building a brand by designer and company may come back in loyalty which once you get to a few million players will be the foundation of building a company that can promote new games with inhouse ads.

    No need to continue with updates unless there is some dramatic change. I hope this has been helpfull.
     
  17. Destined

    Destined Well-Known Member

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    How do you determine 200K is not enough to go viral. I think there is a pretty good chance that would be enough if your product was outstanding.
     
  18. 1stSPIN

    1stSPIN Well-Known Member

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    #18 1stSPIN, Jun 1, 2015
    Last edited: Jun 1, 2015
    This product is much better than DNC which went viral with over 5,000,000 downloads with the in house promotion of DNTW. But I mention this time and time again. Many good games don't make it because they don't have the push they need to go viral. That is not to say it won't on it's own steam. In this business you take what you get and try to make the next push better.
     
  19. Destined

    Destined Well-Known Member

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    That is your definition of better. It probably isn't the same as everyone else.

    Yes many games won't, but I feel if you have 200K downloads you have given it a pretty good shot.
     
  20. 1stSPIN

    1stSPIN Well-Known Member

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    I only say better because the same main person is behind the game logic but both games were not promoted the same. I short if you have some muscle behind you it can boost you over the wall into fame.
     

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