Chapter 150: Time to Reap the Harvest
Early this morning.
Inside the experience store.
Wen Lingwei yawned while sitting in the massage chair: "Irresponsible store manager, when will *I Am MT* get another version update? I feel like this game's players are almost all gone by now."
Chen Mo was taken aback: "Huh? What, you're still playing *I Am MT*?"
Jia Peng said, "Yeah, I really admire Senior Sister's perseverance. I already quit ages ago..."
Wen Lingwei glanced at him: "You unlucky ones can never appreciate the fun of this game."
Jia Peng: "..."
Wen Lingwei continued, "Although the *Warcraft* and *Martial Arts Heroes* you released later are great, I still feel that in the long run, they're not as fun as *I Am MT*."
Qian Kun also chimed in: "Yeah, store manager, look at the games on the mobile market now. Card games are taking up almost half the market. Every single one of them copies the basic framework and numerical model of *I Am MT*. The most infuriating part is that they're all selling pretty well!"
Jia Peng nodded: "Right, at first, a lot of players went to criticize them, but then more and more of these games appeared, and many were exceptionally well-made. *I Am MT* hasn't updated its version in a long time, so players all left."
Qian Kun said, "There's no helping it. The store manager is basically always making new games. When does he have time to develop a new version for *I Am MT*? If he doesn't update, the players will naturally leave. But if he does update, it'll just be giving those copycat games a free boost. It's a lose-lose situation."
Chen Mo smiled: "Don't worry, I've already started working on a new card game. It'll be out soon."
Wen Lingwei's eyes lit up: "Really? What's it called?"
Chen Mo said, "*Three Kingdoms: The Card Game*."
Wen Lingwei: "..."
Jia Peng: "..."
Qian Kun: "..."
Wen Lingwei said, "Store manager, are you serious? You're going to make a card game about the Three Kingdoms? That theme has been done to death by other companies. There are at least a dozen Three Kingdoms card games on the market right now. Are you sure you want to jump into that red ocean?"
Chen Mo said, "Don't worry, I have my own ideas."
Wen Lingwei was skeptical: "Store manager, I'm not trying to discourage you, but the Three Kingdoms theme is really overused. Even if you make a great game, it'll be hard to stand out. Besides, the market is already saturated with card games. You're going to compete with all those copycats?"
Chen Mo smiled without saying a word.
He knew that the time had come.
Over the past few months, the card game market had expanded rapidly. Many B-level and C-level designers had jumped on the bandwagon, copying *I Am MT*'s core mechanics and pairing them with various IPs to make money.
For these designers, the emergence of *I Am MT* was indeed a huge blessing.
Before this, these B-level and C-level designers had to rack their brains to come up with gameplay ideas and figure out player psychology. The games they made might still flop, which was a huge risk.
But now, with the card game as a powerful tool, as long as these designers got a good IP and carefully copied the successful card games on the market, they could make money.
Even if the monthly revenue was only five million, after the channel providers took seventy to eighty percent, these designers could still pocket seven or eight hundred thousand each month, enough to live comfortably.
As for those designers who couldn't buy good IPs, they racked their brains to create their own IPs or leech off existing ones, stirring up topics and boosting visibility, putting effort into aspects outside the game itself.
Some designers also made adjustments to the gameplay, but mainly by adding new features. Basically, no one dared to make major changes to the core mechanics of *I Am MT*.
After all, as long as they copied it, they could lie back and make money. These designers had no motivation to make big changes. What if the changes backfired and the game stopped making money? That would be a huge loss.
What they didn't know was that the reason Chen Mo hadn't continued developing pay-to-win mobile games after *I Am MT* was because he was waiting.
The card game market was expanding step by step. Like in his previous life's domestic card mobile games, *I Am MT* had a monthly revenue of 55 million, *Young Three Kingdoms* had 200 million, and *Dota Legends* had 300 million, each one higher than the last.
Behind this wasn't just the evolution of gameplay, but also the continuous expansion of the player base.
The more card games there were, the broader the player base for card games would become. Many players who didn't originally play card games would be drawn in by a certain IP and convert into card game players.
This was a relatively long process. Only when the card game player base expanded to a sufficiently large scale could the innovative works in this genre, under the convergence of favorable timing, geographical advantage, and human harmony, unleash incredible energy.
For Chen Mo, letting other game companies copy *I Am MT* and lie back to make money was precisely his way of using their hands to expand the card game player base.
Now, the time was ripe. It was time to swing the sickle and reap a wave of heads.
Author's Note on Going Premium
First, let's get practical. Going premium tomorrow at 10 AM, 17 chapters.
Among these, 10 chapters are the guaranteed minimum for going premium, and 7 chapters are bonus updates for the rewards received so far.
Regarding the bonus (qian) update rules:
The daily base of 2 chapters remains unchanged; anything extra counts as a bonus update.