148. Current State of the Gaming Industry (Part Two)

Apart from that, there was another game development company that Jiang Yu felt had a conscience, and that was Activision Blizzard, which had long enjoyed the reputation of "making exceptional CGs, but terrible games."

In Jiang Yu's impression, this seemed to be the only game developer that had independently created multiple blockbuster titles in succession. From the Warcraft series to the Diablo series, followed by StarCraft. Even Overwatch, which was born out of the remnants of the Titan project—a major game concept that was abandoned almost willfully—could be considered a massive hit for a time.

Of course, this was perhaps also the only gaming company that could make countless players shout "Blizzard Daddy" and then willingly empty their wallets. Although, the thing this company loved to do most was ignore players' opinions and place itself above the gaming community, commonly known as "Blizzard Daddy teaching you how to play games."

The only difference was that World of Warcraft, as the epitome of MMORPGs, seemed to have an even longer vitality than in Jiang Yu's past life, which meant that Blizzard, whose revenue had consistently remained high, apparently had not initiated the crossover project known as Hearthstone.

Seeing this, Jiang Yu couldn't help but curl his lip. Blizzard actually failed to create the game that would become its most lucrative title in the future? Heaven knows why a collectible card game that relied entirely on skill (luck) could rake in so much money, while simultaneously triggering an endless, fierce struggle between players and designers.

Looked at this way, the entire gaming industry did not differ much from Jiang Yu's impressions. At most, the specific works varied; under identical or similar themes and core essences, similar stories unfolded between different characters.

So, what about the island nation's gaming industry? Naturally, Jiang Yu's gaze shifted to the environment he currently found himself in.

Just as he was about to check the state of the island nation's gaming industry, a controller was handed over to him. Jiang Yu was momentarily stunned. He raised his head to see Domaru Umaru's pouty face expressing her dissatisfaction.

Glancing at the screen out of the corner of his eye, the game had naturally finished loading long ago. Even for a gaming console with a relatively slow loading speed, it was impossible for it to still be loading after Jiang Yu had finished reading the brief history of China's gaming development and the introduction of European and American game developers.

Putting down his phone somewhat awkwardly, Jiang Yu took the game controller, preparing to play the game with his younger sister. Although, until just then, he hadn't paid any attention to which game Domaru Umaru had actually opened. All his attention had completely derailed the moment he saw that familiar Capcom logo.

Shaking his head, Jiang Yu focused his attention on the television screen in front of him. To his surprise, he found that this seemed to be a title similar to Resident Evil, the representative work of Capcom from his past life. Perhaps due to the correction of the Gaian will (nonsense), while the gameplay mode remained similar, the character names throughout the storyline had changed to varying degrees.

Overall, it was simply a zombie-blasting game set against an apocalyptic backdrop, largely indistinguishable from the post-Resident Evil 4 series in his past life, weakening the horror elements while strengthening the action elements. Although Resident Evil 7 in his past life began to pick up the series' original concept of "survival horror" once again, it remained to be seen whether Capcom here would make such changes to its signature franchise.

Well... it's an action game anyway, right? I'm an expert at this! You foolish zombies, feel the terror of the Level 820 Lord of Cinder!

Thinking this, Jiang Yu nonchalantly embarked on this journey of apocalyptic survival. Then... he suffered miserably. Even with the addition of numerous action elements, since shooting remained the primary combat method... Jiang Yu declared that without a mouse and keyboard, he was completely incapable of playing FPS games.

What happened to our Level 820 Lord of Cinder, you bastard! Jiang Yu could only weep silently as he played the awkwardly controlled pseudo-survival action shooter.

Consequently, until both of their stomachs began to rumble, Jiang Yu suffered endlessly amidst his sister's complaints and mockery, relying entirely on the god-tier player Domaru Umaru to carry him—a total dead weight—and clear the game by her own efforts alone.

...

During the brief break after dinner, Jiang Yu naturally recalled the train of thought that had been interrupted earlier and began searching for information on the island nation's gaming companies.

Unsurprisingly, the entire island nation's gaming scene was still dominated by those familiar names: Sony, Nintendo, Capcom, Bandai Namco, Koei, and so on.

The representative works under each gaming company were also quite similar to those in his past life, such as Nintendo's Mario and Zelda series; Capcom's Resident Evil-like and Devil May Cry series; and Koei's persistent Romance of the Three Kingdoms series, among others.

Sony remained the same as in his past life; the games it developed independently gradually decreased, and its focus shifted to other areas, but it had signed many exclusive studios for its PlayStation platform. For instance, Uncharted, which was critically acclaimed in both the previous world and this one.

Occasionally encountering an unfamiliar name, Jiang Yu would copy, paste, and search, only to find that the works were not much different from the famous games stored in his memory.

Viewed in this light, the island nation's gaming industry in this world—especially on the console platform—still maintained a huge advantage globally. In comparison, the currently declining ACG circle could truly be considered pitiful.

Moreover, perhaps because the island nation was one of the earliest places where home video game consoles emerged, even to this day, its market share remained heavily skewed toward the console platform over the PC platform. Of course, mobile platforms still held the undisputed top spot, claiming over 50% of the market share.

This could be considered an oddity among the world's three major gaming markets. By comparison, China's gaming market was roughly centered around the PC end, while the European and American gaming markets showed smaller gaps in market share across various fragmented platforms.

However, what puzzled Jiang Yu the most was that after scouring all the well-known Japanese gaming titles, he couldn't find the Souls series—the hardcore ARPG masterpieces he had quite adored in his past life.

Neither the original Demon's Souls, nor its subsequent breakthrough Dark Souls, nor the PlayStation 4 exclusive Bloodborne series, nor even games with similar high learning curves, malicious level designs, and novel online mechanics were to be found anywhere.

At this thought, an imbalance—ahem, a sense of responsibility—arose within Jiang Yu! It was bad enough that the players in this world had never felt the love from "Old Xu," but not even getting to experience the malice of Hidetaka Miyazaki? How utterly tragic!

Consequently, Jiang Yu immediately plunged into a daydream where, after introducing the Souls series, he reaped countless gaming awards amidst the curses of global players while breaking sales records one after another, until...

"Big brother, it's starting, okay? Today Umaru is definitely going to finish this game's storyline!"

"......Right."

Amidst Domaru Umaru's high-spirited and enthusiastic tone and Jiang Yu's feeble response, the brother and sister once again embarked on their journey of apocalyptic survival.