Unknowingly, Genshin Impact, Honkai: Star Rail, and "Love and..." have gone crazy overseas

Author: Yi Ran

Image source | pexels

Many people view 2024 as a significant turning point for Chinese games going overseas. This statement is not an exaggeration, as 2024 truly deserves this recognition based on both product performance and data.

The emergence of "Black Myth: Wukong" has provided overseas markets and players with a clearer and more comprehensive understanding of domestic AAA games from a contemporary perspective. Although some aspects may not be perfect and public opinion has not received unanimous praise for various reasons, it has still achieved unprecedented breakthroughs. Particularly in terms of performance, by the end of 2024, "Black Myth: Wukong" has reached total sales of 28 million copies across all platforms, with revenue soaring to 9 billion yuan.

With the leadership of "Black Myth: Wukong" and many other products, China's overseas revenue from games in 2024 has achieved a remarkable breakthrough.

According to the recently released "2024 China Game Going Overseas Research Report," in 2024, the actual sales revenue of independently developed Chinese games in overseas markets is expected to be 18.557 billion USD (approximately 136 billion yuan), a year-on-year increase of 13.39%. This marks a significant rebound after two consecutive years of decline in 2022 and 2023, with the scale of games going overseas exceeding 100 billion yuan for five consecutive years.

In light of this growth, "Black Myth: Wukong" has played a significant role, but it is also undeniable that many domestic games have quietly made profits overseas in 2024. However, compared to the past, their strategies have shown significant differences.

Indeed, in the era of stock competition, if game products want to expand overseas, they must continuously make changes.

"Embrace" the Spring Festival, Fire God "Explodes the Scene"

Taking user acquisition as an example, in the past two years, many products have still heavily relied on paid user acquisition, but there has been an increasing emphasis on user acquisition efficiency.

The most prominent manifestation of this is aligned with the core pursuit of major manufacturers to reduce costs and increase efficiency, which is to creatively utilize limited resources to generate greater returns. This attitude is also reflected in the changes in overseas game user acquisition strategies.

According to the "2024 Global Mobile Marketing Planning Analysis White Paper" jointly released by AppGrowing and Airbridge, throughout 2024, overseas mobile games are showing a trend of stable growth in the first half of the year and turbulent fluctuations in the second half. There is a clear concentration of advertising efforts on "important nodes," with manufacturers increasingly focusing on user acquisition during marketing periods such as summer, Christmas, and New Year

Image source: AppGrowing

Entering 2025, this performance continues, especially since this year's New Year's Day and Lunar New Year are close together. Some manufacturers have chosen to increase their efforts in January to maintain the momentum of Christmas + New Year, as well as to resonate with the "Chinese Spring Festival."

Recently, Sensor Tower released the "January 2025 Revenue and Download Rankings of Chinese Mobile Games in Overseas Markets." Looking at the entire revenue list Top 30, many products continued last year's strong performance during the New Year, and some familiar faces achieved impressive results.

For example, "Whiteout Survival" under DianDian Interactive once again topped the overseas mobile game revenue list. Particularly in late January, "Whiteout Survival" launched the "Year of the Snake" Spring Festival event in overseas markets, driving its January revenue close to $140 million, with a month-on-month growth of up to 10%.

With the successful inclusion of "Spring Festival - A Social Practice for Chinese People to Celebrate Traditional New Year" in the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity on December 4, 2024, the 2025 Year of the Snake Spring Festival naturally becomes the first "intangible cultural heritage version" Spring Festival for the Chinese people, making "Chinese New Year" a cultural treasure shared by all humanity. "Whiteout Survival" has also benefited to some extent from the Lunar New Year while practicing "Spring Festival going global, the world embracing the Spring Festival." Currently, "Whiteout Survival" has accumulated global revenue of $1.9 billion and is expected to successfully break the $2 billion mark in February.

In second place on the revenue list is miHoYo's "Genshin Impact," which welcomed the "God of Fire." The appearance of a new god each year brings a significant increase in revenue for "Genshin Impact," and this year is no exception.

Throughout January, "Genshin Impact" saw its overseas revenue double, securing the runner-up position on the revenue list while also claiming the champion of the domestic mobile game's overseas revenue growth list. The launch of the new version 5.3 "Burning Requiem" and the introduction of the new character "God of Fire" Mavika drove the revenue growth of "Genshin Impact," with its overseas revenue reaching the highest level in nearly two years. Previously, Sensor Tower reported that "Genshin Impact" saw a global revenue increase of 106% in January.

The remaining three games in the Top 5 are "PUBG: MOBILE," "Call of Duty Mobile," and "Honkai: Star Rail."

"Hunter" takes action, love and "power up"

Mu Tong Technology's "Mobile Legends: Bang Bang," Haibi's Roguelike action shooting mobile game "Archero 2," Paper Games' "Love and Deep Space," and Kuro Game's "Ming Chao" all performed well in January.

For example, "Mobile Legends: Bang Bang" launched a crossover collaboration with the famous Japanese manga "Hunter x Hunter" on January 4, introducing related events and hero skins, further expanding the product into the Japanese manga circle and making the game more diverse and interesting. The collaboration with "Hunter x Hunter" drove a 76% increase in January revenue for "Mobile Legends: Bang Bang," ranking it 7th on the revenue chart.

"Archero 2" ranked 8th on the revenue chart. The game launched in multiple overseas markets including the United States, Europe, and Japan in January, achieving good rankings. Overall, the game's overseas revenue grew by 64% in January, placing it 8th on the revenue chart. In terms of downloads, "Archero 2" saw a surge of 345% in January downloads, ranking 7th on the download chart.

Paper Games' "Love and Deep Space," which launched its 3.0 version "Wonders Meet You · Anniversary Celebration" and limited-time wish event "Surging to the End of Last Night" at the end of December, became the core driving force behind its January revenue performance. In January, "Love and Deep Space" saw a 36% increase in overseas revenue, ranking 7th on the growth chart and 11th on the revenue chart.

Kuro Game's "Ming Chao" also had an impressive performance in January, with the launch of the new 2.0 version "To Silence with Joy" and new resonators "Ke Lai Ta" and "Luo Ke Ke" receiving widespread recognition from players both domestically and internationally. The new version showed significant optimization in exploration experiences, and new content like the new voice corps had more innovative expressions based on previous foundations. The design allowing players to choose attributes for weekly bosses further implemented the concept of reducing player burden and costs. These adjustments led to a 275% month-on-month increase in overseas revenue for "Ming Chao" in January, achieving the best performance in nearly six months, jumping to 4th place on the revenue chart and 2nd place on the growth chart.

On January 11, Lingxi Interactive Entertainment's "Three Kingdoms Strategy Edition" set a new daily revenue record with the launch of a new PK season and new generals, resulting in a 250% surge in overseas revenue for January, earning it 6th place on the growth chart.

Additionally, GameBeans' "Dragon Soul Traveler" and Joy Net Games' "Legend of Heroes: Little Heroes" both achieved excellent performance in the Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan markets, ranking 16th and 19th on the growth chart, respectively In terms of download rankings, the top 10 are "PUBG: MOBILE," "Mobile Legends: Bang Bang," "Whiteout Survival," "Subway Princess Runner," "UNO!," "Tic Tac Toe 2 Player: XO Game," "Archero 2," "Soccer Superstar," "Kingdom Age," and "Dark War Survival."

From the performance of various products in 2024, it is not difficult to see that the overseas competitiveness of Chinese games is steadily increasing. Looking at major overseas markets such as the United States, Japan, and South Korea, as well as the top 100 revenue products in markets like Europe and the Middle East, Chinese publishers and products are consistently in a state of steady growth, with revenue fluctuations remaining within a reasonable range. This indicates that domestic overseas game companies have accumulated rich research and development and operational experience in relevant regions, allowing them to have considerable insights into product localization and operations, as well as a more complex and thorough understanding of local markets, enabling them to steadily launch products that meet the demands of target markets.

However, compared to previous years, domestic companies now face greater challenges as they set sail. Manufacturers need to be more sensitive and make strategic adjustments to cope with a series of negative impacts brought about by intensified market competition, unpredictable policies, and regional economic turbulence. It is believed that incidents like TikTok being banned and miHoYo being fined $20 million by the U.S. FTC for the "gacha mechanism" in "Genshin Impact" will not be rare in the future. While moving quickly, they must also pay attention to whether the ground beneath their feet is stable.