63: Chapter 63 The Silent Blizzard and NetEase: Only One Million Daily Active Users?

The screenshots in the post were quite clear, looking as if they were taken directly from the internal system.

Every piece of data was quite complete.

Among them.

There was even one showing the daily active users (DAU) trend chart for heroes of the storm.

It clearly recorded how heroes of the storm's DAU surged to 3.2 million on the first day and how it started to drop from the fourth day.

Combined with the silence of NetEase and Blizzard during this period, it instantly sparked heated discussions across the internet.

heroes of the storm DAU cut in half.

heroes of the storm data leak.

Two terms rushed into the top ten hot searches one after another.

The comment section completely exploded.

"Dropped from 3.2 million to 1.5 million in half a month? Is this data for real?"

"I was wondering why I didn't want to play anymore after just two matches. It's not my problem; the game really has issues."

"No wonder NetEase and Blizzard haven't released any data; so that's why."

"Those screenshots look too real to be fake."

Of course, some people didn't believe it.

Most of these people were core Blizzard fans who believed the screenshots were fabricated by Penguin's people.

"Anyone can make screenshots like these. Why should we believe they're real?"

"Blizzard's fans are all overseas. What does poor domestic data prove? Overseas must still be stable."

"Waiting for the official refutation. I don't believe a Blizzard game would die in half a month."

But more people had already started digging up various recent signs to corroborate it.

This leak was just a catalyst.

"Have you noticed? The maintenance announcements for heroes of the storm this week are getting longer and longer."

"And the matchmaking time is also getting longer. Yesterday, I queued for five minutes just to get into a match."

"A game that just started open beta half a month ago requires a five-minute wait for matchmaking? Isn't that enough to prove the point?"

For a time.

Bloggers appeared across the internet, analyzing whether the leaked data was real and if heroes of the storm really only had 1.5 million DAU left.

You should know.

It had only been half a month since the open beta of heroes of the storm, and many players who pre-registered hadn't even started playing yet. If the DAU halved in half a month...

It could only mean that heroes of the storm was a complete failure.

After all.

The leak said 1.5 million wasn't the end; heroes of the storm's DAU was still falling!

Soon.

This leak post was translated into English and posted on Twitter.

In overseas.

The player base for heroes of the storm was larger than in China, and core Blizzard fans were more concentrated.

The post's retweets on Twitter exceeded 20,000 within an hour.

The comment section was full of angry rebuttals from Blizzard fans.

"This is fake news. Blizzard never releases daily DAU data. These screenshots are forged."

"heroes of the storm is very popular overseas. I get instant matches every time I log in."

"Blizzard and NetEase should come out immediately to debunk this and sue the person spreading rumors."

Under Blizzard's official Twitter and NetEase's official Weibo, a large number of players flooded in, demanding the official release of real data.

"Come out and say something!"

"What exactly is the DAU for heroes of the storm now? Post an announcement if you have the guts."

However.

After this leak appeared.

A whole day passed.

The official accounts of Blizzard and NetEase made no response.

The post with the initial open beta battle report was still pinned, with the figure of 3.2 million on the first day of open beta flashing on the screen.

More and more new comments appeared in the section.

"It's been a day, why aren't you talking?"

"What does the silence mean?"

"Could it be true?"

...

Another day passed, and a video by a game data blogger on Bilibili went viral.

The video title was very direct.

"Latest Internet Cafe Popularity Ranking Released: heroes of the storm Has Dropped to Fourth."

At the beginning of the video, the blogger directly posted the latest weekly game popularity ranking for internet cafes nationwide.

dota 2 was first, CS was second, and dota 1 was third.

heroes of the storm was fourth.

"Last week, heroes of the storm was still second."

As the blogger spoke, they pulled out last week's ranking for comparison.

"In one week, it dropped from second to fourth, overtaken by dota 1, an old game that has been in open beta for several years."

"Think about it yourselves."

Then the blogger showed several clips of footage he took in internet cafes in different cities.

"I specifically visited a few internet cafes to take a look."

In the video, on the rows of computer screens in the internet cafes, dota 2 screens accounted for the vast majority.

Occasionally, one or two computers could be seen running CS.

The blogger pointed the camera at a corner, at a computer playing heroes of the storm.

"This is the only one I found playing heroes of the storm in an internet cafe in Shudu."

"In an internet cafe that can seat over a hundred people, only this one is playing heroes of the storm."

In the footage.

That player was controlling the Queen of Blades, wandering in the jungle, their expression not exactly excited, looking more like they were just passing time.

In the second half of the video, the blogger posted the Baidu and Google Index curves for heroes of the storm.

"Look at this search index."

The trend on the curve chart was exactly the same as the DAU trend in the previous post.

Reaching its peak on the first day of open beta and then dropping all the way down.

"Now the search index for heroes of the storm is not even half of dota 2's."

"It's not even at the level of dota 1."

At the end of the video, the blogger looked at the camera.

"So the data in that post from the day before yesterday should be real."

"heroes of the storm's DAU halved in half a month."

The view count of this video exceeded two million within half a day.

The bullet comments were uniformly shocked.

"Data doesn't lie; this is solid proof now."

"I was wondering why ranked games were getting harder to find; turns out everyone has left."

"Blizzard really messed up this time."

"Isn't it 'Blizzard produces only masterpieces'? Does a masterpiece die in half a month?"

As time went on, more and more evidence surfaced.

On the heroes of the storm game forum, a player posted that they waited nearly five minutes to find a match in ranked last night.

"This was on a Saturday night, weekend prime time, and it took five minutes to find a match."

"When I play dota 2, I get instant matches on weekends."

The heroes of the storm Tieba was dead silent.

The posts on the front page were from three days ago, with very few replies.

The grand occasion of the Tieba being flooded on the first day of open beta had completely vanished.

Several days passed, and Blizzard and NetEase still hadn't announced anything.

So many bloggers speculated that during these few days, heroes of the storm's DAU was likely still dropping, possibly even reaching the one-million level.

However, at this time.

This was all just speculation, with no accurate evidence to prove it.

But the next day.

An announcement released by Penguin's official Weibo completely confirmed this point.

This announcement was released at 8 PM, prime time.

The content of the announcement was very brief, and the wording at the beginning was very restrained.

"dota 2's global DAU is stable at over three million."

"Since the open beta, the DAU has never dropped below three million."

"Thank you to every hero for your company and support."

If it were just this sentence, then this announcement would be no different from the usual data battle reports.

But at the end of the announcement, Penguin added a sentence.

It was this sentence that almost confirmed the fact that heroes of the storm's data had plummeted, and it was because of this sentence that a term 'Heroes is Dead' appeared on the hot searches.

And the last sentence of this announcement was:

"dota 2 is currently the only MOBA game on the market with a DAU exceeding one million!"