Chapter 173 Silent Moan

Pei Qian skimmed through the online comments and couldn't help but worry about Finger Games.

"We didn't hire any shills to stir things up, so why are these players arguing among themselves?"

"The public opinion situation is not good, what should we do?"

"Should I hire some shills to say a few words online for Finger Games, to hype them up and boost their reputation?"

"No, that behavior seems a bit like a counter-attack, which may spark even greater resistance..."

From the bottom of his heart, Pei Qian was definitely on Finger Games' side. He sincerely hoped that their performance in the national and global servers would be strong, and the greater the threat to GOG, the better.

But in this situation, Pei Qian could only worry anxiously, unable to exert any strength.

Helping the players to scold Finger Games would be kicking his opponent while they were down; speaking up for Finger Games would seem like being sarcastic and fanning the flames.

Pei Qian thought long and hard, and it seemed that saying anything was inappropriate.

In that case, he should just remain silent!

Surely there would be no problem if he didn't say anything, right?

However, Pei Qian casually refreshed the page and saw another post being pushed to the top.

"Tengda hasn't made any statement so far, I wonder what their attitude is?"

"What else could their attitude be? Sliding to their knees in the living room, laughing their heads off! They didn't do anything, and IOI self-destructed."

"I don't think so. IOI's market share in the country is almost lower than *Enlightenment*. If you were President Pei, would you even glance at this kind of competitor?"

"That's right, GOG is just one of Tengda's industries, after all. President Pei has so many things to worry about, he probably wouldn't even care about this kind of tiny news."

"Then let's put it another way, GOG's operations team is sliding to their knees in the living room, is that okay?"

"Yeah, that's okay."

Pei Qian looked at the discussions of the gossiping netizens, and a question mark slowly floated above his head.

?

What do they mean by sliding to their knees in the living room and laughing their heads off?

I'm very worried about them, okay!

What do they mean by not taking a second look and not caring?

I care very much!

Ever since Lin Wan reported the actions of Finger Games, Pei Qian had been keeping this matter in mind, paying more attention to it than to any other industry.

The reason why he didn't express his opinion was that he was afraid of accidentally stirring up trouble and making the situation develop in an even more unfavorable direction.

It was like a weak little flame. Pei Qian wanted to blow on it to make it burn brighter, but what if he blew too much and extinguished it by accident?

As a result, even his silence was interpreted by the gossiping netizens as a major drama, and Pei Qian felt very hopeless.

Who can truly understand the suffering in President Pei's heart?

Pei Qian sighed silently. The things he could do now were very limited. In order to protect the last spark of IOI's national server, he could only watch carefully from the sidelines.

...

At the same time, Longyu Group headquarters.

The full name of Longyu Group is Shanghai Longyu Network Development Co., Ltd. Its main business includes a variety of online interactive entertainment content and services. Self-developed and agented games are one of its main businesses and a major source of revenue.

However, Longyu Group is also a company with a mixed reputation in China.

Longyu Group's self-developed games are mainly pay-to-win online games. Among all game companies, its transition to mobile games has been the slowest and most sluggish, but relying on its accumulation in client-side games, it is still among the top companies in the domestic game industry, a well-deserved giant.

The reason for its mixed reputation is that its self-developed games are all heavily pay-to-win online games, and they are not very subtle about it. Although they make a lot of money, they also get a lot of scolding;

At the same time, Longyu Group has agented many successful foreign games, but many of them have been poorly operated. The result of poor operation is often to give up and increase the amount of money players can spend to squeeze out the last bit of profit. It has also been scolded a lot for this.

But in all fairness, Longyu Group is not that bad, and its reputation is even better than that of "tumor" companies like Dayak Group. After all, there are many games that have been poorly operated, but there are also games that have been successfully operated. Compared with those domestic manufacturers that die after agenting a single game, it is not bad.

With the contrast of its peers, many players still have some expectations for Longyu Group.

As for why Dayak Group and Finger Games finally chose Longyu Group as the operator of the national server, there are many reasons.

First of all, one of the most important reasons why Dayak Group decided to find an operator was that they found that they really couldn't handle the localization operation of IOI in China.

Finding a local agent, especially a large company with financial resources and rich agent experience, does have advantages in localization operations.

Secondly, Longyu Group offered the highest price and made the most concessions among many companies. In Dayak Group's view, sincerity is the best.

When looking for an operating company, the permissions required by different operating companies are also different.

Dayak Group and Finger Games are relatively demanding in this regard. Although they have found an agent, they are still unwilling to let go of too many of these permissions, so they are more inclined to choose an operating company like Longyu Group that does not have so many permission requirements.

Finally, there are some other considerations. For example, Longyu Group has an existing account system that can directly divert traffic to IOI through its own games. Also, the headquarters of IOI Greater China is in Shanghai, and the headquarters of Longyu Group is also in Shanghai, which is more convenient for timely communication.

Regardless of what the players think, Dayak Group and Longyu Group are very satisfied with this cooperation.

For Longyu Group, although IOI is being impacted by GOG around the world, it is far from losing and still has a good influence; as for the national server of IOI, although it is dying, this is exactly a good opportunity to buy at the bottom.

Longyu Group also really needs a good enough client-side game project as the focus of its next stage of operation.

Therefore, the two sides hit it off, and both attached great importance to this cooperation.

At this time, at the headquarters of Longyu Group, representatives of both sides were conducting friendly negotiations.

Zhao Xuming, senior vice president of Longyu Group, once served as the marketing director of Longyu Group. Because of his outstanding work performance, he was promoted to vice president two years ago.

This time, Longyu Group and Dayak Group cooperated to establish a special IOI operation cooperation department. Zhao Xuming is the person in charge, fully responsible for IOI operation and the connection with Finger Games.

On the Finger Games side, the representative at the meeting was of course Christian, who had just taken office and strongly promoted this cooperation.

The content of this meeting was mainly to discuss the operation strategy of the IOI national server and the relevant matters of the first IOI World Finals.

Zhao Xuming smiled and said, "We have been paying attention to the current online public opinion. We don't know about the foreign public opinion, and it is not within our scope of responsibility, but as far as domestic players are concerned, I can guarantee that there is no big problem."

"The most vocal about this at present are mainly the old players. But according to our questionnaire survey data, casual players are still holding a positive attitude towards this change."

"Considering that the current market share of IOI is already very low, our main purpose is definitely to attract more new players. If we only satisfy old players in everything, and there is insufficient fresh blood, then old players will gradually be lost sooner or later."

"On the contrary, if we serve the new players well, the old players, even if they are scolding, are actually more tolerant and will not immediately lose a large number. When there are more and more new players, the old players will naturally be 'slapped in the face.'" (become unexpectedly enthusiastic about it)

"Of course, we will definitely consider public opinion, at least on the surface. For example, some people have suggested giving old players some compensation. I think this is a good way. Developing an exclusive skin for old players, or a commemorative avatar, should be able to calm public opinion very well."

Christian nodded: "Well, we believe in the ability of President Zhao and Longyu Group. We can also fully cooperate in the development of skins. So, what are President Zhao's plans for the World Finals?"

Zhao Xuming smiled: "That's easy to say. GOG's Global Invitational Tournament is more than two months earlier than ours. Although we have been preempted, we also have advantages: we can fully learn from their experience."

"The prize pool must be larger than theirs, this is a matter of face. Moreover, using the champion skin for bonus draw is a good thing, we can also learn from it. Moreover, our skin prices are higher and the draw is more, so the prize pool will definitely look better."

Christian nodded: "Well, we are also considering this. There is definitely no need to worry about the money."

"The cash flow was a little tight before, but now it has been eased a lot. What's more, this time we are jointly funded, so there is no reason to have less resources than Tengda."

"But what we are worried about now is the issue of participating teams."

Christian paused slightly and added, "There is definitely no problem in Europe and America."

Zhao Xuming immediately understood what he meant.

He meant that there was a big problem with the domestic clubs and IOI teams!

The fact is indeed the case, because IOI's market share in China has been severely squeezed, and there is a lack of soil. A lot of IOI division members have transferred to GOG recently, so even if the Global Finals are held, it is questionable whether there will be enough domestic teams to participate.

Zhao Xuming hurriedly said: "Well, this is also what we are worried about."

"But according to our preliminary investigation some time ago, the situation is still relatively optimistic."

"Because Eric provided a certain amount of subsidies to various clubs to promote IOI before, some clubs still retain the IOI division."

"Moreover, many original IOI players did not integrate well after switching to GOG, and many people still want to come back to play IOI."

"These people can't play as the main force in GOG's first-tier teams and don't have many opportunities to play. If they can play in the IOI Finals, they will definitely be very happy."

"I have already arranged the itinerary and will contact various domestic clubs in the next two days. There will definitely be no problem with the teams."

"But I hope that you can take care of the schedule and arrange some weaker opponents for these teams in the group stage as much as possible, otherwise the scene may be more difficult."

Christian nodded: "That's no problem. However, the performance of these teams can't be too bad, otherwise it will be useless to rely on grouping alone."

Zhao Xuming smiled: "Of course! I have already sent people to investigate and have also locked in some good seedlings. We will definitely be able to pull out a few strong teams!"