Chapter 69: Calculating the Revenue
Soon, the game reviews for "I Am MT" started piling up on the official app store.
"What the hell is this? I wanted to see epic battles between the Alliance and the Horde, what are these few cards supposed to mean?"
"It's actually a card game, and a genre I've never seen before..."
"What should this kind of game be called? Battle cards?"
"Completely doesn't meet expectations! Refund!"
"Upstairs, this game didn't charge any money, it's free..."
"I was going to give it a one-star bad review, but after playing it a bit, it seems okay. I'll give it a temporary three stars and wait to see how it goes."
"Am I the only one who thinks this game is actually fun? I think the cards wiggling around are super cute. I gave it five stars."
"Is the person upstairs a girl? Have you never played a good game before?"
"Heh, I'm the one upstairs, and I've got something bigger than you, believe it?"
"People giving bad reviews are hilarious. Chen Mo is a C-level designer making a mobile game. Use your brain—there's no way he could recreate the entire world. I think it's fine to show the anime characters this way."
"Right, as a mobile game, I think it's decent."
"Don't you all think it's generous? Free, no in-app ads, and they give away so many runestones. Chen Mo is betting on monthly revenue, after all."
"I think, considering all these runestones, I'll give it a temporary five stars."
"Bought off by the money, huh?"
"So what? I support Chen Mo. If you've got the guts, make 'Spring Guardian' free too!"
...
Currently, "I Am MT" had a rating of 7.6. A very small number of people gave it one-star bad reviews, most gave it four stars, and a few gave three or five stars.
Chen Mo estimated that in a couple of days, when players realized the game was expensive, the rating would drop further, maybe to 7.4 or even lower.
But the rating didn't matter much to Chen Mo, since it was a free game. As long as the score didn't fall too badly, new players would still give it a try.
On the other side, Qiu Bin was also studying "I Am MT."
"Is that it? This is way too simple! The combat system is monotonous, the difficulty curve is nonexistent—just steamrolling through everything. It's free, and they give away so much currency. Anyone can play without any pressure."
"Who would even spend money? This game relies entirely on in-app purchases, and all they sell are cards and stamina? Who would buy that?"
"Is this a loss leader? Giving away tons of stuff to get people to play? But you're betting on monthly revenue with me! Don't end up with such low revenue that you lose too badly. Winning wouldn't even be fun."
Qiu Bin played for about an hour.
The dungeons were still a breeze, the currency kept flowing, and he even did a ten-draw, pulling a rare purple card.
"This game has no hope. They didn't build the world, it's free, and they give away so much. Players have no incentive to spend later."
"Collecting cards looks like a profit point, but how many players are willing to spend money on that? And with all this free currency, they'll get the cards eventually anyway."
"No need to look further. This game is doomed."
Qiu Bin deleted "I Am MT" from his phone. In his view, even if the game had high downloads, what was the point? If players didn't spend money, the downloads were meaningless!
...
The next day, both games had been live for exactly 24 hours.
"Spring Guardian" had 24-hour sales of 38,938, just under 40,000, roughly double what "Plants vs. Zombies" had at the same point.
"Plants vs. Zombies" had picked up steam later because its promotion on the official app store gradually increased, giving it strong momentum.
"Spring Guardian's" first-day sales were mostly boosted by the Imperial Dynasty Game Platform's heavy promotion, so its momentum might not last.
But Qiu Bin didn't care. Even if sales declined later, "Spring Guardian's" first-month sales shouldn't fall below 800,000, meaning monthly revenue would be at least around 8 million, with hopes of hitting 10 million.
Qiu Bin couldn't estimate "I Am MT's" sales data because it wasn't sold per copy; all in-app purchase info was only known to the developer.
But Qiu Bin wasn't worried. In his view, Chen Mo's game could never achieve monthly revenue over 10 million. This bet was already a foregone conclusion.
...
At the experience store.
Chen Mo looked at the various data on the screen.
Jia Peng and the others crowded behind him, all staring at the numbers on the screen, looking them over but unable to make any sense of them.
"Boss, explain it. What do these numbers mean?"
"Yeah, 'Spring Guardian's' revenue is already out. What about 'I Am MT'?"
"Come on, tell us! We're dying of curiosity."
Everyone asked in a flurry.
Chen Mo studied the numbers on the screen again and then said, "Don't worry. Beating 'Spring Guardian' is no problem."
Wen Lingwei sneered, "Tsk, really? Are you just saying that to save face? What can you tell from these numbers? Where's the revenue? Seriously, if you want to run, I know some friends in the underworld..."
Chen Mo was speechless. "Can you stop bringing up those underworld friends of yours..."
Chang Xiuya asked, "Well, boss, at least give us a hint. How exactly are you going to beat 'Spring Guardian'?"
Jia Peng nodded. "Yeah, give us the general idea."
Su Jinyu squinted, desperately trying to see the connection between the numbers, but she couldn't figure it out.
Chen Mo said, "Let's put it this way: first-month revenue won't be less than 20 million."
Jia Peng nearly choked on his own spit. "What? What did you say, boss? 20 million?"
Su Jinyu was also shocked. "20 million is way too much! This is a mobile game!"
Wen Lingwei counted on her fingers. "If monthly revenue is 20 million, you'd make over 10 million in a month?!"
Everyone was stunned.
20 million! That would be double the monthly revenue of "Spring Guardian"! It seemed like Chen Mo was bragging!
Chen Mo stood up. "When the first-month revenue comes out, if my guess is wrong, I'll tell you what these numbers mean."
Su Jinyu asked, "Huh? If it's wrong, why would you tell us then?"
Chen Mo chuckled. "If it's right, I definitely won't tell you!"
...
These numbers represented some key data for "I Am MT," and terms like "DAU" and "LTV" sounded fancy but were just English abbreviations.
DAU: Daily Active Users.
ARPU: Average Revenue Per User.
ARPPU: Average Revenue Per Paying User.
LTV: Lifetime Value, the total revenue generated by an average player over their entire playtime.
There were other data points too, like day-one retention and day-seven retention.
The significance of these numbers was that by calculating them, you could reasonably estimate the game's ecosystem and infer its overall state.
As long as the weak spots in the data were improved, the game could make money.
"I Am MT's" first-day data: about 130,000 daily active users, 14,330 paying players, with a 10% paying rate.
Unlike "Spring Guardian," "I Am MT" sold value-added services. Players who had already spent money would continue to spend.
Based on Chen Mo's estimates, in the first month, "I Am MT" would accumulate at least 2 million active users.
Within a month, paying players would make multiple purchases, even spending more, while some free players would convert to paying ones.
Chen Mo estimated that after a month, the average ARPU for paying users would reach at least 150.
Calculating from that, even if the average paying rate dropped to around 8%, monthly revenue could still reach 24 million.
For reference, in March 2014, "Dota Legend" had 2,925,630 active users, 312,407 paying players, with an average ARPU of 204.89 per paying user, resulting in monthly revenue of 64 million.
In this parallel world, due to various factors, "I Am MT" would certainly perform worse than its predecessor, and it couldn't compare to "Dota Legend," which often broke 200 million in monthly revenue. But overall, as long as the user base was secured, monthly revenue of around 20 million was achievable.
That was Chen Mo's calculated result.