New Update on XY2

My last article on XY2 can be found here:

http://chinese-net-gaming-stock.blogspot.com/2008/03/xy2-and-xy3-server-status-part-1.html

From the above article, I used my server count to derive an estimate of Average Concurrent Users (ACU) increase of 5.4% from the 1^st quarter 2008 over the 4^th quarter 2007. Because I only have partial server counts (I am not going to stay late and get up early every day to check for servers), there is always some doubt on how accurate my server count is.

On 4/29/2008, the CEO of NTES talked about XY2. One can get more information in the following article:

http://xy2.163.com/news/2008/4/29/1082_188228.html

Let me translate the main points:

1. NTES will no longer do players migration from XY2 to XY3. NTES will devote complete effort to continuing develop XY2.

2. Ever since October of 2007 when NTES revived XY2, the number of players continues to increase. Its PCU had increased to 409k.

3. NTES is working on the expansion pact for XY2. It will be out in the 3^rd quarter 2008.

Not much is new except for the new PCU estimate. In 4^th quarter 2007, XY2’s PCU is 387k. It means it had a PCU increase of 5.7%

Again, this is another confirmation that XY2 is growing nicely. Considering that XY2 starts commercial operation on 8/15/2002, it is a 6 years old game already.

Even though the complete transition from XY2 to XY3 had proven to be a failure, but its un-intended effects winds up to be better than what NTES can ever hoped for.

Now XY2 is behaving like a 2 or 3 years old games. It will most likely have another 2 or 3 solid years ahead. In addition, XY3 becomes a complete new game and have a solid start in its young life.

It never cease to amaze me how different the Chinese market is to the west.