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Imagine having a book that was written centuries ago that's considered one of the four pillars of great Chinese novel classics. Have that book be arguably the
by alienchow 2y ago
Imagine having a book that was written centuries ago that's considered one of the four pillars of great Chinese novel classics.
Have that book be arguably the most popular of the four. (Debatable with 3 Kingdoms)
The story is told to children since they're young.
During a time where the story was adapted into plenty of derivatives like Dragon Ball, one TV show stood out. Every single Chinese, and Southeast Asian kid has watched it growing up. It was THE weekend TV to wait for. The theme songs are extremely catchy. The TV show is put on reruns every once in a while. Entire nations have watched it.
Then China, who arguably never had a AAA game title this widely marketed before, writes a sequel loosely based on the original novel and lined the game full of homages and music remixes from the TV show.
Western audiences can review however they want, any person who can hear this song in their head "dun dun dudun dun dun dududuuuun pewpewpew pewpewpew" is going to love it even if it's only mildly playable, let alone being actually fun to play.
And have you seen the animations?
If power rangers were a centuries old story, with statues, temples and mythos around them, and it's the first ever AAA game from the US to be published. The moment you hear "Go Go Power Rangers" you're buying the game.
- seanmcdirmid 2y agoI thought the big problem was that most Chinese gamers were biased to mobile multiplayer games, or at least 2D isomorphic games that could be played on tablets. Those games are already pretty famous outside of China at least, this is the first time I’m seeing a 3D game take center stage instead. There are so many versions of the monkey king that I lose track. Like the one that was reincarnated in the modern world as a handsome brother for some reason (late 90s?), then there was a movie with Jackie Chan and Jet Li in it 15 years ago. It made 53 million in the USA at least, which was more than it made in the mainland.
- alienchow 2y agoThey were biased to mobile games because it's the most lucrative, and so game studios index on that. If you go further back, there were wildly popular CRPGs that just weren't very widely marketed outside of China. They were AAA grade of that era, but never officially translated nor marketed. Jinyong Heroes, Calamity of Heaven and Earth, Heroes of the Celestial Sword were all popular CRPGs within China on the level of Final Fantasy, but were merely cult classics outside the country. None of them were homages, and didn't have this ethnic level of cultural influence.
- seanmcdirmid 2y agoThey were (are?) widely regarded and almost always based on costume dramas, which are very Chinese in cultural influence. It will be interesting to see how this wukong plays out and if it sets a new gaming direction for the mainland.