The Chinese 3A Game ‘Black Myth: Wukong’ Is Released, Topping the Steam Most Played Games
On August 20, the Chinese 3A game ‘Black Myth: Wukong‘ officially launched and was released globally.
Less than an hour after its official release, ‘Black Myth: Wukong’ surpassed ‘CS2’ to top the Steam Most Played Games chart, with over 1 million concurrent players.
The official website shows that the game has four versions: the digital standard edition priced at 268 yuan, the digital deluxe edition at 328 yuan, the physical deluxe edition at 820 yuan, and the physical collector’s edition at 1998 yuan. Currently, all physical editions are sold out. Based on this pricing, at least 3 million copies need to be sold to break even.
According to public information, ‘Black Myth: Wukong’ is a domestically produced AAA game adapted from the classic Chinese novel ‘Journey to the West.’ The game developer is Game Science (Game Science Interactive Technology Co., Ltd.). During its pre-sale, it topped the global sales chart on Steam, the world’s largest game distribution platform, multiple times, dominating in 12 regions including the United States, Singapore, Thailand, Canada, Brazil, and Italy. According to data from the global game rating website Metacritic, as of August 19, 54 media outlets worldwide gave it an average score of 82. Among them, the authoritative rating organization IGN China gave ‘Black Myth: Wukong’ a perfect score, stating that the game is a milestone for the Chinese gaming industry and is genuinely competitive in the global market.
On August 20, the gaming platform Steam showed that, based on revenue, ‘Black Myth: Wukong’ is currently ranked first in the world and has been in the top 100 for 10 weeks. According to data from the ‘Chinese Game Sales Ranking,’ as of July 13, 2024, the pre-sale sales of ‘Black Myth: Wukong’ have exceeded 1.2 million copies, with pre-sale revenue surpassing 400 million yuan.
‘Black Myth: Wukong’ is regarded as a high level of game production in the domestic market, and it has amazed the outside world since the trailer was revealed. According to previous statements by Feng Ji, the founder and game producer of Game Science, the development cost per hour of gameplay for ‘Black Myth: Wukong’ exceeds 20 million yuan. The team estimates the overall gameplay duration to be over 20 hours, with development costs needing at least 300 million to 400 million yuan.
Faced with the extremely high attention and huge topic flow surrounding ‘Black Myth: Wukong,’ many brand companies have also taken action to collaborate with ‘Black Myth: Wukong.’
Yesterday, before the game was even launched, its co-branded merchandise with Luckin Coffee sold out. On August 19, Luckin Coffee launched the co-branded product ‘Black Myth: Wukong Tengyun Americano,’ which supports purchasing designated sets and offers limited gifts including a 3D limited edition poster lenticular card and three co-branded cup sleeves.
The items sold out almost immediately after they were launched, and the topic of ‘Luckin Coffee collaboration with the Black Myth: Wukong’ quickly trended on Weibo. At 9 a.m. that day, Luckin Coffee responded on its official Weibo, stating that there was a brief system malfunction, which has now been resolved. On the afternoon of August 19, Luckin Coffee announced that a restocking plan has been developed, but it will take 15 days to produce the next batch of products.
Luckin Coffee’s Chief Growth Officer (CGO) Yang Fei also expressed on social media: ‘Sold out nationwide in seconds, almost caused a system crash.’ In the comments, Yang Fei even added: ‘More reliable than ten Father’s Days.’
As the first domestically produced AAA title, Nvidia has given it significant support by specifically releasing a new driver for ‘Black Myth: Wukong,’ which supports ray tracing and DLSS 3, allowing for ultra-high graphics and frame rates using frame generation technology. Although this is a routine practice by Nvidia before the launch of most AAA games, it clearly shows their optimism and support for ‘Black Myth: Wukong.’
At the ‘AI Beautiful Life’ 2024 Hisense TV E8 series new product launch event, Hisense TV announced it has become the global official partner of ‘Black Myth: Wukong.’ The event introduced the official customized television – the flagship new Hisense TV E8N series, as well as the official cooperative monitor – Hisense Monitor 27G7K Pro.
Zhitai, as the only retail storage brand under Yangtze Memory Technologies, has announced its designation as the official storage brand partner for ‘Black Myth: Wukong’.
Lenovo announced that it has become the global official partner of ‘Black Myth: Wukong’ and will launch a customized Savior Wukong computer in the future.
The toy figurine cultural and creative company INART announced its collaboration with ‘Black Myth: Wukong’ to participate in the production of the game’s physical collectible edition and jointly develop a 1:6 scale movable figurine titled ‘Face the Destiny’.
Didi Bike officially announced that a special edition of the Cloud Rolling Vehicle, in collaboration with ‘Black Myth: Wukong’, will also be launched along with the game. Starting from August 20, this co-branded vehicle will gradually be made available for use nationwide.
Industry insiders believe that regardless of the final commercial performance of ‘Black Myth: Wukong’, it has already opened the curtain for a new story in the Chinese gaming industry.
