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Tencent’s Next Big Gaming Bets Draw On Viral Phenom ‘Palworld’ [Bloomberg]

Super

Super

Studied the Buster Sword
Member
Jan 29, 2022
6,625
Tencent Holdings Ltd.'s two most accomplished creative studios are making mobile games in the style of this year's biggest viral hit, Palworld, in hopes of rebooting the company's core business.
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The teams at Timi and Lightspeed are both building games in the style of genre-blender Palworld, replete with pet companions and stylized violence, according to people familiar with the matter. The studios operate autonomously, but both seem to have landed on that new formula to seek out another Honor of Kings that can power Tencent's next wave of growth.
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Indie PC title Palworld was crafted by a tiny studio with limited resources and became the world's most downloaded new title upon its release in January. Going after a game in that mold could be done comparatively quickly and yield instant monetization, especially when backed by Tencent's vast resources and promotional reach, the people said.
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www.bloomberg.com

Tencent’s Next Big Gaming Bets Draw On Viral Phenom ‘Palworld’

Tencent Holdings Ltd.’s two most accomplished creative studios are making mobile games in the style of this year’s biggest viral hit, Palworld, in hopes of rebooting the company’s core business.
www.bloomberg.com www.bloomberg.com
 
Ikon

Ikon

Member
Oct 26, 2017
1,064
I wonder if we'll see them get bolder with drawing "inspiration" from other developers' graphic designs on this path or not.
 
Bengraven

Bengraven

Member
Oct 26, 2017
26,909
Florida
I'm not shocked. Tencent loves money and mobile developers love money and there's money in Xtreme Pokemon so these aren't going to be the first. I'm expecting so many clones.

Now the question is, will it actually be as fucking fun as Palworld is?
 
Dyle

Dyle

One Winged Slayer
The Fallen
Oct 25, 2017
29,962
Clearly a project doomed to fail, no one is interested in Palworld knockoffs when they could be playing Balatro and Helldivers knockoffs
 
Spacedad

Spacedad

Member
Mar 17, 2024
7
Oh boy oh boy oh boy here comes the market-flood of crummy knockoffs of a sucessful game.
 
Ceerious

Ceerious

Member
Oct 27, 2017
2,230
Asian
Glio said:
Why several identical games. Won't they cannibalize each other?
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That is exactly the intent. Since its inception, Tencent's gaming department has frequently used multiple teams to build identical games in the same genres, even going so far as releasing them to the market simultaneously to determine who will come out on top and become the flagship. It produced a vicious competitive atmosphere among teams inside the same firm.

This is how they made it to the top of the mobile market. They can only do this because they have the budget and unmatched marketing prowess in China.
 
Aaron D.

Aaron D.

Member
Oct 25, 2017
9,337
Inspirations can be great sometimes.

Graveyard Keeper is a stellar Stardew Valley knockoff.

Palworld is an awesome hybrid of survival, monster collecting and colony management genres. I'd love to see more takes on the novel formula.

Tencent may not be the one to bring the goods with their talk of monetization strategies, but with Palworld's success I have to imagine other studios are looking at the formula and cooking up their own ideas.

Bring it.
 
PachaelD

PachaelD

One Winged Slayer
Member
Oct 25, 2017
1,507
Two Tencent games, one Netease game, and the new Azur Promilia game... And Palworld has scarcely been out for two months.
 
808s & Villainy

808s & Villainy

Member
Oct 27, 2017
42,705
giphy.gif
 
Mesoian

Mesoian

▲ Legend ▲
Member
Oct 28, 2017
26,585
A super large publisher chasing three year old concepts in a desperate attempt at relevancy.

Name a more iconic duo.
 
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00Quan[T]

00Quan[T]

Banned
May 12, 2022
2,990
It begins, as expected.
The new super good idea every executive will suddenly have, all at the same time, pokemon-likes.
 
Sho_Nuff82

Sho_Nuff82

Member
Nov 14, 2017
18,451
This is why I think it's an old money way of doing business for large publishers to spend billions on devs just for an IP. In the modern dev environment nearly any IP can be stripped to its bare bones and iterated upon until you find something that clicks. Unless you're investing in Spiderman or Mario, your best bet is to invest in people.
 
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