http://chinese-net-gaming-stock.blogspot.com/2008/07/ntes-dt2-and-ff2-go-into-beta-testing.html
It never ceases to amaze me how different NTES is from other Chinese and American companies. The following is another demonstration of the idiosyncrasy of NTES.
DT had been a failure for NTES. But the game is still in operation. But there are hardly any updates for the game. NTES decided to develop its sequel and on 7/21/2008, DT2 entered into Final Internal Beta.
But it turns out it is not the end of the story. From NTES’s forum:
http://dt.netease.com/viewthread.php?tid=379113&extra=page%3D1
http://dt.netease.com/viewthread.php?tid=379310&extra=page%3D1
From the above two posts, NTES is going to start to develop DT again. It is also going to build another game from DT. DT2 development will still be following its original schedule.
I think NTES is mimicking what it had done for the XY2 series of games. I am going to try to draw the two series of games. First, I will draw the XY2 series of games:
One starts out with XY2. It is a serious 2D paying game. Then it branches out to XYQ. XYQ is a cartoonish 2D paying game. XY3 is supposed to be XY2’s sequel. It is also a serious 2d paying game. XYW branches out from XY3. It is a free-to-play 2D game. While the graphics of XYW will be not be cartoonish, its game-play will be closer to that of XYQ and is much more light-hearted.
The XY2 series of games had been extremely successful. XYQ is a 2 million player’s mega game and is the most popular game in China. XY2 is another mega-game that has close to 1 million players. XY3 is pretty solid game while the just released XYW (according to the server statistics) looks to be NTES’s next mega-game.
NTES is going to duplicate what they did for XY2 for DT. Now I will draw the DT series of games:
DT was a game that was left for dead. But NTES is going to re-start the development of DT. DT is a 2.5D marshal art paying game. DT2 is supposed to be its sequel. It is going to be a 2.5D free-to-play game. The new game will be another 2.5D free-to-play game. It is not clear how the two new games will differ. Most likely DT2 will be a more serious game while the new game will have more light-hearted game playing features.
From the two articles, the new game as well as the DT re-development had both been under development for 10 months already.
All these new developments are pretty exciting. TX2 and XYW are brand new games. All the growing will happen in 2009. In addition, FF2 and DT2 will certainly come out in 2009 also. It is hard to know when the new game (derived from DT) will come out. The most likely time frame is later in 2009. In addition, DT will be re-developed.
NTES will be busying adding new games to its staple in 2009.
Those are exciting news. If it is any other companies, it would have sent tons of press releases to Wall Street analysts. But it is not Netease’s way. It lets its games designer tells a few thousands gamers.
Netease makes great games. It continues to make great games. But NTES's investors have to tolerate its aversion to any marketing.
1 comment:
Don't forget there was a game called XY that preceded XY2. Vefore XY2 became a huge succcess, XY had all sorts of problems but it was closed down, reworked and then launched again as XY2.
There is a similar story as to why TX2 is number 2.
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