Chapter 358: E-sports is the poison of games.

"Completely give up Honor of Kings eSports?" Feng Xianjun's eyes widened involuntarily.

Of course, he didn't ask this question on a whim. After all, his experience at the helm of the Glory Professional League had more or less become a knot in his heart.

During the time he worked for Tencent Esports, one of Feng Xianjun's most important pastimes was to imagine how Honor could be changed so that it could continue to thrive.

But he couldn't think of a solution.

Rigid content, pathological player ecology, huge conflicts between fairness and viewing quality of e-sports...

When Feng Xianjun thought about how the glory of the eighth season was so prosperous, but it was shattered by Tenghai, which had not even entered the e-sports field at that time, he really couldn't figure out how to save such glory.

This time, he suddenly felt like asking Pei Yunteng for advice, just to ask, since Rong Yao had already been buried in the grave in a strict sense.

He was even prepared that even Pei Yunteng would not be able to give Rong Yao a solution.

But no matter how mentally prepared he was, he never expected that Pei Yunteng, who is respected as the father of e-sports in the industry, actually thinks that Honor should remove e-sports?
Maybe he heard it wrong?
"Mr. Pei, are you sure that you want to remove e-sports from Honor, and not... the other way around?" Feng Xianjun asked tentatively.

Looking at him like this, Pei Yunteng almost laughed out of anger.

No, you have been working with me for such a long time, but you don’t understand such a simple truth.

"Actually, I'd like to ask you, why did Honor suddenly decide to get involved in e-sports?" Pei Yunteng asked with interest.

"With Honor's gaming quality, there are plenty of better monetization models. Why must e-sports be the only solution?"

In fact, this is the point that Pei Yunteng is most curious about so far.

Why do those people from Honor always think about B e-sports?
"This……"

"Do you know that the reason why Honor has fallen to its current state is because its entire ecosystem has been hijacked by e-sports?" Pei Yunteng looked directly into Feng Xianjun's somewhat confused eyes.

"Ah? Honor was ruined by e-sports?" As soon as this sentence came out, Feng Xianjun's brain was really about to crash.

"What else?" Pei Yunteng said with a smile.

"Think about it, the reason why Honor of Kings has formed such a distorted gaming environment and is so unfriendly to newcomers, apart from the threshold itself, is e-sports a 'great contribution'?"

In order to engage in e-sports, the major guilds must roll up their sleeves, must monopolize high-end gameplay, and must destroy the gaming experience of new players to feed themselves.

Because of e-sports, materials and equipment are driven up to abnormally high prices, and most people are not even qualified to touch the creative and amazing gameplay of the equipment editor.

Because we want to engage in e-sports, we dare not make professions specialized and functional. We strive to make "every profession can play", but in the end, there are still pitiful summoners...

"Look, has e-sports really brought any benefits to Glory?" Pei Yunteng asked.

He really couldn't understand this matter.

What is the meaning of e-sports?
For manufacturers, it is an attempt to break the circle through e-sports, attract attention, and then feed back into the game to increase revenue.

However, Honor's own size and technological advantages are there. As long as it does its job well, it will not have to worry about breaking out of the circle. There is no need to get involved in the muddy water of e-sports.

On the contrary, after the start of e-sports, the environment has completely deteriorated, the experience for newcomers is terrible, and the fans that were attracted by the competitions with great difficulty can basically not be retained, which is not worth the loss.

So, what is the purpose of Honor?
Feng Xianjun couldn't answer Pei Yunteng's question.

His mind was now filled with shock.

It turns out that Honor’s current success is thanks to e-sports?

Shocked for a moment, Feng Xianjun asked tentatively: "So, Mr. Pei means that Honor and e-sports are not compatible, so e-sports has become a poison that accelerates its decline?"

"Half right." Pei Yunteng nodded and shook his head, ignoring Feng Xianjun's dizzy gaze, and slowly spoke:
"The half of it is true that as a 3D MMO RPG game, Honor of Kings is indeed very incompatible with e-sports."

For MMORPGs, equipment, levels, and skill points are the core parts of their systems.

Spending a lot of time and energy, or money, to create a powerful account for yourself is one of the core pleasures of this type of game.

But once it becomes e-sports, this part will be removed, and the fun of the game will be greatly weakened.

Or, just like Honor, after developing to a certain level, it can't move forward because of the issue of fairness. Once someone makes a fuss about it, it will explode like a balloon.

The PVP of MMORPG should not be in the form of competition, but in the form of war.

It should be masters challenging each other in the arena, or dozens or hundreds of people passionately fighting each other in various activities. It would be so exciting.

If you insist on turning it into e-sports, then that's just not a good match.

"What about the other half?" Feng Xianjun asked.

"That's top secret. You must keep your mouth shut. Otherwise, something terrible will happen." Pei Yunteng's originally lazy body suddenly straightened up, and his eyes revealed a serious look.

Feng Xianjun was frightened by his appearance. He stood up consciously to close the doors and windows, then sat back and pretended to listen attentively.

"It's not that I'm cautious, but given my current position in the industry, if the following conversation gets out, do you believe it will cause panic in the market tomorrow?" Pei Yunteng kept it a secret.

The more he didn't speak directly, the faster Feng Xianjun's heart beat.

He vaguely felt that what he was about to hear might be the ultimate answer to this industry.

And Pei Yunteng did not disappoint him. What he said next almost caused Feng Xianjun's heart, which had not had any problems for almost a year, to stop suddenly again.

“Esports is not a poison that accelerates the decline of Glory.”

"It is the poison that accelerates the decline of all competitive games."

……

Pei Yunteng will always remember his experience when he first started playing League of Legends.

An extremely abnormal reality is that his real attempt to play League of Legends was not until after S11.

Before that, he was just a cloud player for this phenomenal game, nothing more.

The reason is very simple. I was born late, and I focused on my studies during my student days. The only time I had for gaming was spent on many stand-alone games.

Much of his impression of League of Legends and e-sports came from watching various competitions with his roommates.

It was not until he entered the industry as a game planner by chance that he downloaded League of Legends to play with a learning mindset.

When his college roommate heard that he was actually going to play League of Legends, he was shocked and kept trying to persuade him not to go to that deadly place and instead follow him to play the latest and coolest game, Valorant.

But Pei Yunteng felt that his poor reflexes would be a waste of money if he played FPS games, and he had been playing online games for a long time, so he had some aspirations for this game, so he resolutely entered the pit of League of Legends. After playing dozens of AI games, his roommate said that he could try to matchmake, so he went to try it.

After this attempt, he "lost both his parents" online.

Because he had no awareness of grabbing a position, Pei Yunteng was forced to play the support position, which he was completely unfamiliar with, and chose a Titan to start eating.

Because I am completely unfamiliar with the support mechanism, I don't know how to place wards and I don't understand the lines.

It would have been fine if he had chosen a cat or something, but he chose a Titan.

A not-so-careful hook resulted in a double kill in the bottom lane.

Then he was greeted by the team's jungler Zhao Xin about his parents.

The jungler was probably from Zaun, and the speed, filthiness, and variety of his insults were beyond Pei Yunteng's imagination at the time.

Pei Yunteng had clearly explained on the public screen countless times that this was his first time playing a match and he had never played a support role, and he hoped that his teammates could understand.

After all, it's just a match, there's no need to be so explosive, right?

But the jungler still kept chasing him and cursing at him, and finally his roommate stepped in to help him block the chat channel, allowing Pei Yunteng to continue playing the game.

Then Zhao Xin simply swaggered to the bottom lane and started to snatch the minions from them. When asked why, he said he was just a waste and didn't deserve to eat the minions.

Pei Yunteng didn't know how he lost the game in the end, because he quit the game immediately at that moment. Since then, apart from playing in Genting, he has hardly touched any League of Legends content.

I would rather be a happy cloud player.

At first he thought it was just bad luck that he encountered a stress monster in the first round.

But with the many things he saw and heard later, and the complaints from many colleagues and friends who shared their feelings, Pei Yunteng gradually realized:
This is no accident.

(A large part of this paragraph is the author’s personal experience. My first experience with this game really made me sick…)
……

Pulling his mind back from his memories, Pei Yunteng skillfully took out a quick-acting heart-saving pill and gave it to Feng Xianjun to hold in his mouth.

The look in Feng Xianjun's eyes was no longer just one of fear.

I have worked diligently in e-sports for so many years, and you tell me that e-sports is actually poison to the game?

Wouldn't that make me a Breaking Bad guy?
"Don't believe it?" Pei Yunteng smiled, and a rare, barely perceptible hint of helplessness flashed across his brows.

"The main reason is that this viewpoint... is too shocking." Feng Xianjun smiled bitterly.

He finally understood why Pei Yunteng was so cautious.

Given his status, if word gets out, the industry will be in more than just panic.

Maybe within a week, we can create a large number of aerialists around the world.

"Mr. Pei, can you explain it in detail?" Feng Xianjun asked sincerely.

“Think about it, the reason why playing games is called playing games, isn’t it because its essence is to gain happiness by playing the content created by game developers for players?” Pei Yunteng spread his hands.

"But once a game chooses to become an e-sports game, inevitably, the way to get fun from it will change from playing to winning."

"Where there is winning there must be losing. Where some people are happy because of winning, others will be sad because of losing."

“It’s a zero-sum game.”

The e-sportsization means that the living space of pure entertainment players who enjoy games will be squeezed out little by little, especially in games that require teamwork.

Personalized games, such as fighting games or RTS, are fine. You can have fun playing them alone, but the fun is a little less, and you run the risk of being abused when playing in a match.

But if it is a game that requires cooperation, then even if the player himself does not want to improve his skills and just wants to play the game to relax, his teammates and opponents may not allow it.

The various pressures from teammates and the easy conversion of opponents into human workers are all things that make these players very unhappy.

Practicing more certainly gives you a chance to get rid of these, but not everyone has the patience to continue practicing and trying to prove themselves after being scolded.

It would be strange if there were so many new players.

If there are fewer new players, the anger of the old guys who grew up being scolded will be concentrated on the few new players, and then transform them into even more disgusting old players.

What a horrible vicious cycle.

So in Pei Yunteng's previous life, the more popular the e-sports games were, the more disgusting the gaming environment was, and LOL was the heavyweight among the heavyweights.

In addition to environmental issues, the compromises and rigidity of the game itself due to e-sports are also issues that cannot be ignored.

For players, unless an absolutely balanced version is created, the more serious the e-sports trend becomes, the more strength-oriented players will appear, and the more rigid the gameplay will become.

When the interesting playing styles that players are more interested in are destroyed by the version answer, other players who don't want to be abused have no choice but to join in.

Then the environment became rigid.

As for the official, because they need to maintain the balance of the game, most companies will be extremely cautious when creating new mechanisms.

Even if they have ideas, they dare not put them into the game easily, for fear of accidentally creating a monster and further destroying the game environment.

However, games that are not heavily e-sports-oriented don’t seem to have so many problems.

Pei Yunteng still remembers that there was a game called 300 Heroes in his previous life. Although it was indeed controversial, the mechanism design of some of the heroes was really bolder and more interesting than LOL.

But once these things are put into the game or even the ranking, they can accelerate the collapse of the already fragile game environment.

So how dare the designers put it into competitive games?
A gaming environment where everything is for victory is much more rigid and short-lived than those that are oriented towards entertainment and leisure.

After listening to Pei Yunteng's explanation, Feng Xianjun was completely dumbfounded.

LOL has only been in public beta for a little over a year, and Pei Yunteng has been working hard to squeeze the system out of the game environment purification technology, which has maintained the harmony of the game environment very well.

Therefore, the current LOL has not shown any of the signs that Pei Yunteng mentioned.

But Pei Yunteng's explanation was so reasonable and logical that Feng Xianjun couldn't help but doubt his life:
Since there are so many problems with e-sports, why do we need to engage in e-sports?

　Only one update today. I caught a cold again, which was infected by my roommate. Today, three out of four people in the dormitory have fever. It's really frustrating. Luckily I have some leftover medicine from last time.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)