Chapter 30: Special Promotional Techniques
Early the next morning, the experience store opened its doors.
Not long after opening, Jia Peng arrived with a few male students.
“Good morning, boss. Is the game going live today?” Jia Peng asked.
Chen Mo nodded. “Yeah. Why are you guys here so early today?”
Jia Peng said, “Since *Plants vs. Zombies* is about to launch, and we don’t have classes today, we came by to cheer you on, boss.”
Chen Mo said, “Great, welcome. Come on in, make yourselves at home. How many rounds have you all reached in Endless Mode?”
Jia Peng replied, “Round 84. Boss, is Endless Mode truly endless? No upper limit?”
Chen Mo chuckled. “Only round 84? Let me put it this way: reaching round 100 in Endless Mode is just the beginning.”
Jia Peng was speechless. “Damn, is it really that brutal? I’m already struggling at round 84—it’s hard to advance even one more round.”
The other male students nodded in agreement. “Yeah, round 100 is just the beginning? Boss, are you talking about the same game as us?”
Chen Mo smiled without saying a word.
Three or four days had passed, and Jia Peng and the others, as the first batch of players, had basically cleared Adventure Mode. Adventure Mode wasn’t particularly difficult; Chen Mo had designed it with the same difficulty as the original version. As long as players had normal intelligence, they could beat it after some time playing.
Originally, Wen Lingwei, Jia Peng, and the others thought the game was over after clearing it. After all, it was a puzzle game, and spending three or four days obsessed with it to finish it already made the game content quite rich—far richer than most puzzle games.
But then they discovered there was an Endless Mode!
Playing that was like opening the door to a whole new world. The difficulty in Endless Mode kept escalating round after round. They thought they had fully mastered the game, but Endless Mode made them realize their naivety.
On the current leaderboard, the highest record was Wen Lingwei’s 93 rounds. Everyone else was hovering between 60 and 80 rounds, and the clear feeling was despair!
In Adventure Mode, they all had strategies they thought were strong, but in Endless Mode, those strategies were ruthlessly crushed. It felt like playing a completely new game.
So, these people often came to Chen Mo’s experience store to play, both to exchange tips and to try to extract the latest techniques from Chen Mo, hoping to climb higher on the leaderboard.
Jia Peng and the male students skillfully turned on the computers, launched *Plants vs. Zombies*, logged into their accounts, and continued challenging Endless Mode.
“Boss, what time is your game going live?” Jia Peng asked.
Chen Mo said, “At noon.”
Jia Peng nodded. “Alright, we’ll download it right away and give you a five-star rating.”
For a new game, the exact launch time didn’t matter much, but it was usually set at a whole hour to make it easier to track data.
The data from the first 24 hours after a new game’s launch was crucial, mainly downloads and ratings, which directly affected subsequent app store recommendations.
When companies like Di Chao Hu Yu or Chan Yi Hu Yu released new games, they often did extensive promotional warm-ups in advance, drawing in a flood of players on launch day and dominating the new game charts without question.
Chen Mo didn’t have that much money for promotion, but he had his own methods.
At 10 a.m., Chen Mo had already uploaded *Flappy Bird* to the app store, with an in-game ad featuring a promotional image for *Plants vs. Zombies*. Players could click it to automatically jump to the download page for *Plants vs. Zombies* in the app store.
How many players did *Flappy Bird* have? Chen Mo himself wasn’t sure, but it couldn’t be few. A large portion of them were casual gamers, making it perfect for promoting *Plants vs. Zombies*.
Chen Mo wasn’t planning to make money from *Flappy Bird* for now. It was completely free to download, just to generate buzz. The more downloads, the better, aiming to convert all those players into *Plants vs. Zombies* players.
Additionally, Chen Mo had his eye on some gaming media outlets.
Normally, as a D-level designer, releasing a new game wouldn’t attract much attention.
These gaming media outlets had resources, but who would give them to an unknown new designer?
However, Chen Mo had a title and a topic!
He was the champion of the design competition, and he’d had a verbal spar with Shi Huazhe not long ago. These gaming media outlets were well aware of that.
Chen Mo posted a Weibo update.
“*Flappy Bird* is now on the app store, completely free to download (permanently free!). The new game *Plants vs. Zombies* launches at noon, available on both PC and mobile. Everyone, please bear witness to whether its first-month sales can reach 100,000 copies.”
@Shi Huazhe, @Game News Network, @Sky Net, @WeChat Game Channel, @Heng You Net Game Channel…
Chen Mo tagged over a dozen gaming media outlets in one go. This Weibo post also included a promotional image, directly using the loading screen of *Plants vs. Zombies*—the one with plants on the left and zombies on the right.
Ten minutes later, these gaming media outlets exploded!
The media operations staff managing the official Weibo accounts all came out, sensing the scent of a big story.
“Chen Mo? Isn’t that the champion of the design competition? The creator of *Flappy Bird*?”
“His new game is about to launch? That’s only a little over three months! Way too fast! And he wants us all to witness it? Does he really think his game can sell over 100,000 copies in the first month?”
“A development period of just over three months is way too short, and that includes testing and adjustment time! Is it another mini-game like *Flappy Bird*?”
“A game like *Flappy Bird* can’t be replicated. If he makes something similar again, he’s digging his own grave.”
“The name is *Plants vs. Zombies*. It looks like the game content should be fairly rich, but it’s still a casual game.”
“Back then, Shi Huazhe predicted Chen Mo’s first game wouldn’t sell over 100,000 copies in the first month. Now Chen Mo wants everyone to witness it. That’s bold—isn’t he afraid of messing up?”
“Hurry up and repost! Track and record all the data for *Plants vs. Zombies* after launch!”
These gaming media outlets all sensed a big story and one by one reposted Chen Mo’s Weibo.
They knew exactly what Chen Mo was trying to do—ride the hype for free promotion of his new game!
But this was like Zhou Yu hitting Huang Gai—one willing to strike, the other willing to be struck. The gaming media also needed hot topics to stir things up!
Moreover, even if these media outlets didn’t hype it, the topic would naturally heat up through Weibo’s organic spread.
As these gaming media outlets reposted, more and more players caught wind of the news.
Chen Mo’s first real game, *Plants vs. Zombies*, was about to hit the app store!
Many were watching, but the promotional image still piqued a lot of interest.
Cartoon-style plants and zombies, a unique style that quickly left an impression on players’ minds. Many were already wondering: how exactly do plants fight zombies?
As for the gaming media, they were more focused on the data for *Plants vs. Zombies*, especially first-month sales.
If first-month sales reached 100,000 copies, with each copy sold for 10 yuan, that would generate a revenue of 1 million yuan, with an estimated profit of around 500,000 yuan. That would be an impressive achievement.
[Note from the author: This site’s address is a genius’s one-second bookmark.]