108: Chapter 108: The Biohazard Mode in CF is Different

Two weeks after the open beta of crossfire began.

Langchao Group.

Jin Shizhen stood in front of Qin Mo's desk, holding a freshly printed data report in his hand.

He was the person in charge sent by the South Korea-based Smilegate company to Great Xia. He had specifically assembled a team to stay here, responsible for the daily maintenance and localization of crossfire.

Smilegate was the developer of crossfire.

"President Qin, the latest daily active user data for crossfire is out."

He opened the report and placed it in front of Qin Mo.

"After 3.3 million on the first day of the open beta, some players left after claiming their skins, and the daily active users dropped a bit."

"But it didn't drop much, and it stabilized within three or four days."

"In the time since, the daily active user numbers have basically been trending upward."

He flipped to the last page.

"As of today, the number of daily active players for crossfire has reached four million, and it is still maintaining an upward trend."

Qin Mo leaned back in his chair and took a sip of the coffee on the table.

"Four million."

"About what I expected."

Looking at the latest data on the report, Jin Shizhen couldn't help but click his tongue.

"After receiving our report, the parent company didn't even believe it at first."

Within Smilegate, the game crossfire was originally treated as an add-on project that could be abandoned at any time. They had originally intended to bundle it with alliance of valiant arms and sell it to Tencent at a low price.

But Tencent only had eyes for alliance of valiant arms and didn't care for crossfire; they were even glad another buyer had broken the bundle.

And that other buyer was Qin Mo.

He really hadn't expected it.

This game, which even Smilegate had almost given up on, had surged to four million daily active users in just half a month since its launch in Great Xia!

This number.

In the current global gaming market, it was already second only to league of legends. Due to the impact of league of legends, the daily active users of dota 2 had dropped to just over two million.

In the field of shooting games, four million daily active users was unrivaled.

Of course, it was still quite far off from the more than 40 million global daily active users of league of legends.

Qin Mo put down his coffee cup.

"This achievement is just the beginning for this game."

"Once more modes and events are launched, crossfire will see another wave of growth in players."

"The Zombie Mode we are about to launch is one of the keys to that."

"At that point, the true potential of crossfire will be unleashed!"

Jin Shizhen nodded and put the file away. Just as he was about to leave, the office door was pushed open again.

Zhao Lei walked in quickly.

He was holding his phone, and his expression didn't look good.

"Boss, Tencent is going too far."

He turned the phone screen around to show Qin Mo.

On it was the Weibo trending search list, and a new trending topic had just been posted.

"Why crossfire can't compare to alliance of valiant arms"

This entry featured a video where some gaming bloggers specifically compared the two games frame by frame, frantically disparaging crossfire.

"Right now, apart from Douyin, the prevailing trend on other social platforms is basically hyping up how fun Escort Mode is, and claiming that once alliance of valiant arms launches, it will definitely surpass crossfire."

"They're saying alliance of valiant arms has better graphics and new gameplay, while crossfire just recycles old content."

Zhao Lei put the phone on the table, looking very angry.

"Do we really not need to do anything?"

"Tencent has been smearing crossfire the whole time."

"In the last few days, they've even started trying to find ways to buy traffic on Douyin!"

Qin Mo leaned back in his chair, his expression unchanged.

"For a game, the most important thing is whether it's fun to play."

"Everything else is unimportant."

"In these past half a month, has the number of crossfire players decreased?" Qin Mo glanced at Jin Shizhen beside him.

Jin Shizhen hurriedly shook his head.

"Except for the drop in daily active users in the first few days of the open beta, the daily active users for crossfire have been increasing consistently!"

Withdrawing his gaze from Jin Shizhen, Qin Mo looked at Zhao Lei.

"Calm down and just wait for our Zombie Mode to launch."

"Although it is also a mode that involves infecting humans, we have a completely different gameplay experience compared to the zombie mode in CSOL."

Qin Mo stood up and walked to the window.

He recalled the differences between the two games.

Although they looked very similar, the experience of the two modes was vastly different. The setting in crossfire where you gain points for dealing damage was far more satisfying than the zombie mode in CS.

In CS's zombie mode, it only counted as a point after you spent ages killing a zombie, but in the Zombie Mode of crossfire, you just needed to deal damage to constantly get kill feedback and points.

Not to mention.

The underlying logic of the two modes was also different, and the maps were one bright and one dark; the Zombie Mode of crossfire basically had no traces of horror.

Everything was designed for satisfaction and fun.

Not to mention the advanced versions of Zombie Mode already in pre-research, such as the Savior and Terminator modes.

Thinking of this, Qin Mo continued.

"Who says Zombie Mode must be scary?"

"Why can't it be satisfying?"

Zhao Lei was stunned for a moment.

He hadn't thought much about this question before, as he hadn't played the development version of crossfire and had been responsible for Douyin. After discovering that Tencent was actually trying to buy traffic on Douyin to smear crossfire...

...he couldn't help but run over.

In his impression, when mentioning zombie modes, everyone's first reaction was dark maps, scary music, and monsters suddenly pouncing out.

After all, the only one that had a zombie mode before was CSOL, and the core of that mode was horror.

Meanwhile.

Qin Mo turned around and looked at Zhao Lei.

"In the next half a month, Tencent will definitely take more actions."

"But we don't need to pay attention to them."

"Once alliance of valiant arms launches again, all players will know that Tencent's shooting game can't even touch the tail of crossfire."

After finishing, Qin Mo looked at Jin Shizhen to the side.

"Oh, right."

"In the half month since crossfire's open beta, have you received quite a few bug reports?"

Jin Shizhen nodded.

"Quite a few."

Qin Mo continued.

"Send the bug list to me."

Hearing this, a hint of confusion appeared in Jin Shizhen's eyes. He didn't know why Qin Mo wanted the bug list for crossfire; wasn't this something that should be left for them to solve?

And Qin Mo explained.

"Some bugs that don't affect the balance can be kept; they can even be used as game features."

The bug in crossfire where switching weapons cancels the recoil animation of sniper rifles to perform a "quick snipe" is a classic example, and even operations like "ghost jumping" are essentially bugs.

Half a month into the open beta, some people should have already discovered these bugs, and he wanted to keep these bugs that acted as features before Jin Shizhen received feedback and modified or optimized them.

Jin Shizhen understood, nodded, and turned to leave, ready to send the bug list over so Qin Mo could decide what to keep.

Zhao Lei watched his back disappear at the doorway and turned his head.

"Boss, your vision is truly impressive."

Qin Mo glanced at him.

"At first, I only thought you had gone to license crossfire. It was only a few days ago that I found out you didn't just license it; you directly bought a stake in Smilegate and bought out all the copyrights for crossfire."

"You could even say that this game belongs to Langchao Group."

There was a hint of belated admiration in Zhao Lei's tone.

Qin Mo leaned back in his chair.

"Licensing is only temporary."

"Back then, crossfire was a hot potato in Smilegate's hands, an add-on that could be abandoned at any time. Tencent didn't want it, and Smilegate didn't think much of it either, so I got it without spending much money."

He picked up his coffee, took a sip, and smiled.

"Now, even if Smilegate wanted it back, they couldn't."

"And even if Tencent finally discovers the potential of crossfire and wants to get the game back by acquiring Smilegate, they won't be able to do it at all."

"If Pony really did that."

"I would really like to see what his expression would be like at that time."