Chapter 133: Jiang Zhangchuang’s Declaration Of War!
After a night of fermentation, #UnrealHonorOfKings# has surged to the top of the Weibo hot search list, completely overshadowing #EDGSpringSplitChampionship#.
A top professional league player, who just won the FMVP in the League of Legends Pro League, turned around and dominated another MOBA mobile game, creating a wonderful chemical reaction.
The reason for such exaggerated popularity is mainly due to the hierarchy that exists in games.
League of Legends players’ favorite pastime is to taunt “sticker games” a couple of times in their free time.
They say that Honor of Kings’ current popularity is entirely due to leeching off League of Legends, and the game itself has no quality.
Isn’t Timi Studio Group just a money-grubbing studio by Tencent?
A skin can even increase attack power by ten points, what a fair competitive mobile game.
In the beginning, most League of Legends players did play Honor of Kings…
After all, the promotional campaigns featured the Great Demon King Faker as the endorser.
But to say it has no quality at all is actually being a hater.
Because Honor of Kings can truly be considered a masterpiece in the MOBA mobile game genre.
After the Hero Ruins incident and a period of reflection, the remade and renamed Honor of Kings has fixed most of its flaws.
This is also the reason why it has achieved its current status.
If it were truly not good, it would not have been able to reclaim the MOBA mobile game market.
After all, at that time, besides Honor of Kings, there was also a competitive game from the same company, Heroes of Newerth.
It must be said that big companies cultivate talent, and only those who last until the end are the true kings.
But by rising with the help of League of Legends players, it naturally received backlash from them…
Especially when Riot Games subsequently sued Honor of Kings.
As a result, all the skills were temporarily modified.
From this, it can be seen that Timi was actually prepared.
As soon as you sue me, I’ll immediately change the skills…
When developing the game, they directly created another set of skills, designed for immediate use.
This led League of Legends players to realize they had been playing a counterfeit League of Legends mobile game all along.
Starting from this year, an extremely exaggerated hierarchy emerged; seeing someone playing Honor of Kings would prompt comments about it being a “sticker game”…
Yet, this “sticker game” was completely unaffected, occupying the top spot on the mobile game charts every month with incredibly high revenue.
The number of players also kept increasing, including not only elementary school students but also many female university students.
It has also become a must-play during the Lunar New Year every year.
It’s very convenient to pull out your mobile phone and start a game by the fireplace.
This resulted in both sides having core players, and whenever they intersected online, it would lead to constant arguments like the current situation.
The onlookers thoroughly enjoyed the show.
Especially the QQ Speed players, who transformed into impartial commentators… they quickly tried to mediate whenever the two sides started arguing.
The reason is quite simple: both sides might get too tired from arguing and not want to type, thus losing the fun.
Upon seeing the impartial comments, both sides would start getting angry again.
Honor of Kings players felt League of Legends was being arrogant…
League of Legends players felt Honor of Kings was being arrogant…
The popularity never ceased, and the bickering continued until nine in the morning.
For genuine strangers, Unreal is truly an exaggerated figure.
Unreal has single-handedly stirred up the nerves of two major gaming communities; he’s mastered traffic.
【 So the conclusion is, playing Honor of Kings can really train League of Legends? （Dog head）】
At the hotel floor where the EDG team was staying at nine in the morning.
Li Fan opened his door, still groggy, and bumped into Clearlove, who was also just coming out.
Upon seeing him, Clearlove broke into a smile: “Yo, isn’t this our KPL’s new jungle king? You must have had a tough time ranking up last night. I didn’t even know you transferred to EDG’s Honor of Kings division.”
Li Fan yawned: “Brother Kai, stop being sarcastic. I just played a couple of casual games, my rank is just ‘King,’ I’m nowhere near professional level.”
“You hit hot search number one by casually playing a few games? Your ‘casual’ is really expensive,” Abu’s voice came from the side. He held his phone with a somewhat helpless expression, “Look, people from the League are already asking me. But you weren’t even streaming, and just duo queueing with a streamer generated this much hype, it’s unavoidable.”
After all, Pineapple is just a Huya streamer, not a professional League of Legends player, so the official channels can’t control her.
It’s not like he, as a League of Legends official, can tell those streamers who play Honor of Kings to stop, saying their generated hype is greatly affecting League of Legends.
As for Li Fan… he is currently a key figure in the League’s deification process. Honestly, even if he streamed, there wouldn’t be much they could do in terms of punishment.
They couldn’t possibly disqualify someone with such explosive popularity, right?
However, the fact that he wasn’t streaming also showed that the player wasn’t a troublemaker.
He didn’t use his popularity to test the boundaries.
This is something the officials really appreciate. As for playing Honor of Kings in private, isn’t that just a hobby?
Just like any other hobby…
It’s just that this game is a bit sensitive, but if you treat it like QQ Speed or Crossfire, it’s not a big deal.
As for the KPL league, they were already grinning at the online hype.
Because they discovered that Honor of Kings’ download numbers had increased, and the number of active players had also risen significantly.
The reason is quite simple: a computer isn’t always accessible, but a mobile phone can be carried around at all times.
When one has free time, they might want to play a game or two.
For League of Legends players, Honor of Kings is truly an excellent substitute.
But they were afraid of being ridiculed by their friends as playing a “sticker game” for playing Honor of Kings.
However, since Li Fan plays Honor of Kings, and the Spring Split champion plays it, it seems okay for ordinary people to play it casually for relaxation.
With Li Fan’s endorsement, they finally felt safe to play it openly.
Nevertheless, a faction still believed that Li Fan lacked the “League of Legends soul”…
They already disliked professional players like Li Fan who didn’t train. If you’re a professional player and don’t train properly, how long can you last even after winning a championship?
And then, on the very night they won the championship, he went to play Honor of Kings.
Two disliked things combined make for even more dislike!
But they weren’t foolish; Li Fan’s current popularity in China is too immense. If they were to attack him now, it wouldn’t have the desired effect and would instead lead to them being heavily attacked.
They must lie in wait!
They just need to find an opportunity for a killing blow!
The Mid-Season Invitational is a great opportunity; EDG absolutely cannot defeat SKT to win the Mid-Season Invitational championship.
After all, the lineup that defeated SKT last time had Pawn as the mid-laner and Deft as the AD carry. Even with such a strong duo, they only won after five grueling games. What kind of trash are the current duo carries!
One streamer who only knows how to stream and never trains, and the other who only knows Ashe, incapable of playing any other hero proficiently.
With such a lineup, how far can they go?
Toys, purely toys.
Furthermore, they understood the mentality of League of Legends players. Losses in domestic tournaments are not that significant, but if you lose in an international match, you’re in for severe criticism!
So now, they just need to wait for EDG to embarrass themselves at the Mid-Season Invitational.
Once they lose the match and are eliminated, all the haters on the internet will attack.
It’s better to wait for a favorable situation; as for a disadvantageous one, honestly, they don’t have the masochistic tendency for that.
After everyone had breakfast at the hotel, they boarded the bus to Magic City.
Meanwhile, in the Tencent Interactive Entertainment office, Jin Yibo was holding a cup of coffee while scrolling through the Weibo hot search for #UnrealHonorOfKings#.
The comment section was in chaos with League of Legends and Honor of Kings players arguing. This wasn’t a big deal to him; the more intense the argument, the more it proved the popularity of both games.
And he also saw an opportunity for himself.
Honestly, reaching the position of Deputy General Manager of Tencent Interactive Entertainment’s Cooperation Department is already remarkable, definitely a dragon among men.
But humans always have a desire for more greed.
Jin Yibo was no exception. Why can’t a Deputy General Manager become a General Manager?
Why can’t the Cooperation Department become the President of Tencent Interactive Entertainment?
If not, he could go out and start a subsidiary.
He had already submitted a proposal…
It had indeed garnered considerable support, with him taking the lead to establish Tencent Esports, a department responsible for the overall management of Tencent’s various esports businesses.
But so far, only his LPL league was willing to join.
If this were the case, wouldn’t this Tencent Esports become a joke?
Fortunately, through Li Fan’s performance and the traffic he generated at QQ Speed SSC, he had preliminarily reached an agreement with the QQ Speed project team. In the future, QQ Speed’s events could be brought under Tencent Esports’ jurisdiction.
However, the scale of QQ Speed events is relatively small…
He had always kept his eyes on the KPL league of Honor of Kings.
But the KPL league was not under his purview. The difficulty in achieving cooperation could be imagined.
Moreover, the relationships between the two groups, the KPL league and the LPL league, were not very good.
This had truly caused him a lot of worry…
But this time, he seemed to see another opportunity.
Li Fan’s unintentional actions this time were like a key, forcefully tearing open a larger opening: KPL!
The game Honor of Kings, according to internal company estimates, has a phenomenal user base and potential for growth. Reaching over 300 million DAU in the future is not an impossible dream, and the value of its professional league, KPL, is immeasurable.
The public opinion stirred up by Li Fan this time, while seemingly a conflict between League of Legends and Honor of Kings player bases, proves on a deeper level that there is a massive traffic channel between these two top-tier esports projects.
Unreal is like a bridge; his personal influence can easily transmit popularity between the two circles.
Currently, KPL is independently operated by Timi Studio Group and the KPL league team.
If they can truly use this opportunity for acceleration, under these circumstances, seeing such data might make them willing to sit down and talk.
After all, the conflict between hosting esports events and game competition is not that significant.
If LPL and KPL can have more positive interactions under the Tencent Esports framework, such as cross-industry events with star players and joint promotions.
And even exploring some common themed activities in the future, the energy generated would be incomparable to acting alone.
This might seem like a far-fetched fantasy, but where there’s a will, there’s a way. If successful, this Tencent Esports would reach an incredible level.
With this move, his own position could definitely be elevated further.
“If this can truly be achieved…” Jin Yibo’s eyes grew brighter.
He was right about Li Fan; it was because he saw his potential that he specifically acted as an award presenter.
With that thought, he no longer hesitated and picked up the internal phone: “Old Xu…”
…
At three in the afternoon, EDG’s bus finally arrived at the base in Magic City.
After nearly four hours of travel, even though sleeping on the bus was possible, sleeping in the seats left everyone sore and exhausted.
With the Spring Split just ending, Kuaisu Xing wasn’t being overly demanding and announced that there were no training sessions scheduled for the day; everyone was to rest.
The players felt like they had been granted amnesty and, dragging their luggage, prepared to return to their dorms to catch up on sleep.
However, Li Fan did not follow the main group towards the dormitory area. Instead, carrying his peripherals bag, he headed straight for the training room.
“Fan Ge, aren’t you resting?” Mei Kong asked, yawning.
“I slept on the bus, I’m not sleepy now. I haven’t played QQ Speed in a long time, my hands are itching.”
“Holy crap, I used to think you liked streaming, but now I finally realize you’re not just into streaming, you’re an ultimate internet addict, a gaming fanatic. You like playing any game,” Clearlove complained.
“How is that exaggerated? I’m doing this for training, cross-training method, it’s also very beneficial for League of Legends.”
“I’d sooner believe I’m Qin Shi Huang than believe you,” Clearlove waved his hand and headed straight for the players’ dorms.
Li Fan pushed open the training room door and casually placed his peripherals bag at his workstation.
After pressing the power button, he first stretched his somewhat stiff neck and wrists.
The more than four-hour journey had indeed left him feeling uncomfortable all over.
Li Fan’s live stream room was, as usual, black screen, but the bullet comments within the room were scrolling wildly.
【 Where is he? Where is he? Why isn’t he streaming yet? Didn’t someone post photos that EDG is back in Magic City? 】
【 Even a donkey from a production team wouldn’t dare rest like this! Unreal, open the door quickly! 】
【 So the champion player got arrogant, huh? Not even streaming anymore? 】
【 Understandable, after winning the championship, there must be a lot of business activities. 】
【 Business my foot, the haters don’t even dare to curse directly anymore, they can only be sarcastic? 】
【 Are the sour grapes upstairs jumping around? What’s wrong with Brother Fan resting for a bit? 】
【 Exactly, they called him trash when he didn’t win, and now that he’s won, they’re complaining he’s not streaming. You people are truly disgusting. 】
【 If I had known winning the championship meant no more streams to watch, I’d rather he hadn’t won! I don’t play League of Legends anyway. 】
【 Don’t say that. If he hadn’t won, his live stream would have been flooded by haters long ago, and we wouldn’t be chatting here? 】
【 So, is he going to stream or not? Give us a definite answer! The Honor of Kings yesterday already caused a huge uproar, I came specifically for Honor of Kings today. 】
Just then, the live stream room lit up!
“Good afternoon everyone. My back is sore from sitting on the bus back to the base… I originally wanted to rest this afternoon, but I thought about it, and since I didn’t stream yesterday, if I don’t stream this afternoon, it’ll be too long, right? So I came straight to the lounge.”
Li Fan said as he skillfully connected his peripherals and adjusted the camera angle.
Almost the instant he started broadcasting, the popularity in the live stream room skyrocketed as if on a rocket…
Easily breaking through three million and heading towards the four million mark.
【 Here he comes! It’s truly a once-in-a-millennium wait! 】
【 Brother Fan is awesome, you dominated so hard in Honor of Kings last night, I never expected you to be so good at this game too. 】
【 Oh no, what are you doing! Why are you playing Honor of Kings? 】
【 Haters, scram! What Li Fan plays is none of your business! 】
【 So what are you playing today? Honor of Kings again? 】
【 Please, please stream Honor of Kings, yesterday I only watched from a third-person perspective, it was really lacking. 】
【 Are you all trying to get Unreal banned? Streaming Honor of Kings… and then issuing a notice for suspension the next day? I can only say there are bad people in this live stream room! 】
Li Fan glanced at the bullet comments and said with a smile, “Today I’m playing QQ Speed. I haven’t played in a while, and my hands are itching. After winning the championship, I have indeed become a bit lax.
“As for Honor of Kings… that’s for private relaxation. Perhaps some people also don’t know that professional League of Legends players cannot stream Honor of Kings, so please don’t be too harsh.”
While speaking, he opened the QQ Speed client and watched the update progress bar move slowly, then continued to chat with the bullet comments.
“Actually, different types of games can train different abilities. Playing QQ Speed can train my reaction speed, which is very helpful for positioning and dodging skills in League of Legends.”
【Here we go again, cross-disciplinary training! 】
【Fan Ge, your mouth! I almost believed you. 】
【So playing Speed can really improve my League level? 】
“Of course,” Li Fan said seriously. “Think about it, the drifts, energy collection, and positioning in Speed are very similar to the positioning and timing of skill releases in League, right? They all require precise judgment and quick reactions…”
After the update was completed, Li Fan logged into the game.
“I play a few matches occasionally when I’m relaxing to keep my hand feel. What map do you guys want to see me race on now? Or I can show off my cars… My garage might not have every single car, but I can probably bring out eighty percent of them.”
Since he had money, Li Fan had not treated himself poorly.
Anyway, aren’t the cars in QQ Speed obtained by recharging and opening things?
“Oh? It’s been so long since I logged in, and there happens to be a May Day event?”
Today was exactly the Supreme Treasure Hunt.
There were four newly released S-class cars: Shadow Tiger, Xuanwu, Nirvana, and Fire Kirin.
As for the prize pool, there were also some T-class race cars and a large number of A-class cars.
Li Fan thought for a moment, then took out his mobile phone and started recharging. “I’ll conservatively recharge a thousand yuan first, to test the waters.”
The audience in the live stream room saw this and started to laugh. He was too young; a thousand yuan would just be thrown away.
【Wanting to draw a car with a thousand yuan? Fan Ge, you’re thinking too much! 】
【Look at the official drop rate, a goddamn 0.001%! You might get it once in ten thousand tries. Each try costs ten yuan, so that’s a car that costs a hundred thousand yuan! You could buy a real car with that amount. 】
【It’s already outrageous without the percentage sign, and with it, it’s just inhumane. 】
【This is clearly designed to guarantee an S-class car. 】
【Fan Ge is still too young and doesn’t know Tianmei’s tactics. Ever since Tianmei took over, all the games are pay-to-win, pay-to-win. 】
Li Fan looked at the bullet comments and smiled: “What if my luck is good? You guys know my luck has always been great. People who smile a lot have good luck.”
He clicked on the first draw, and light flashed on the screen.
Golden Legend!
“Congratulations on obtaining the S-class race car, Yellow Fire Kirin!” 】
The entire live stream room began to furiously spam question marks.
【????????? 】
【Holy crap? One draw hit? 】
【What kind of shitty luck is this??? 】
【I spent twenty thousand and didn’t get it, and you got it on your first draw with a thousand yuan? 】
【Report! This is definitely a paid actor! 】
【Now I understand why people who smile a lot have good luck, because people with bad luck can’t smile at all! 】
Li Fan was also stunned. He said it, but he didn’t expect to get it on the first draw. However, his luck had also been proven when he played Shu Tu Zhi Bin before.
Smiling, he told everyone: “It seems my luck is pretty good today.”
【More than good, this luck is heaven-defying! 】
【Fan Ge, go buy a lottery ticket. A one-in-ten-thousand chance and you got it in one draw? 】
【Is this the world of a European Emperor? 】
“It seems today is suitable for drawing. Let’s see how much I can get with this thousand yuan.”
Saying that, he clicked to draw nine more times consecutively… nothing significant came out.
Shockingly, within the second ten-draw selection, something appeared again!
“Congratulations on obtaining the S-class race car, Yellow Shadow Tiger!” 】
【????????? 】
【Am I blind? Two S-class cars for two hundred yuan? 】
【Is this probability real? Did Tianmei secretly adjust the rates for Fan Ge’s account? 】
【With two S-class cars in twenty draws, I suggest Fan Ge shouldn’t go out anymore. It’s too dangerous. 】
Li Fan looked at the two new S-class cars in his garage and nodded with satisfaction. “It seems today is indeed my lucky day. Let’s finish drawing this thousand yuan and see what I can get!”
The subsequent drawing process indeed verified the law of conservation of luck.
After spending the remaining eight hundred yuan, he just got a pile of junk with nothing.
【As expected, the luck ran out. 】
【This is normal. Those last two draws were too outrageous. 】
【But getting two S-class cars for a thousand yuan is already a huge profit. Seeing this makes me itch to try. 】
【If you go, you’ll be ripped off. Tianmei must be watching the stream and deliberately increased the probability to trick people into recharging. 】
With that, he recharged another thousand yuan.
This time, he chose a ten-draw. As the drawing animation progressed, the hearts of the live stream audience also became anxious.
“Congratulations on obtaining the S-class race car, Yellow Nirvana!” 】
【Holy crap! Another one! 】
【What kind of divine luck is this? 】
【Three S-class cars? 】
【I’m so jealous, I’m so jealous, I’m so jealous! 】
【It’s over. I don’t want to watch the stream anymore, I really don’t want to watch it, it’s kind of disgusting. 】
In the end, Li Fan spent two thousand yuan and obtained four S-class cars… it was like a sci-fi story.
Zhao Ming watched the question marks continuously scrolling in Li Fan’s live stream.
Hmph, hmph… Of course, you guys don’t have that probability. They specifically adjusted it for Li Fan.
Giving away cars is not okay, but when it comes to lucky draws, especially live stream lucky draws, the probability can be extremely high.
He believed that any player who saw this slicing would be unable to resist recharging to draw.
Making money from one person isn’t much; the real target is these players!
“Come, let me give you guys a taste of this new car’s performance.”
Li Fan directly selected the Fire Kirin. Compared to the Jade Kirin, there was some gap in stats, but the Fire Kirin was still top-tier among S-class cars.
On this Mount Qiu Ming track, he easily broke the original record.
“The hand feel is great. However, everyone should act within their means; there’s no need to spend too much money on a game…”
Just as Li Fan was about to start the next round, a special effect gift suddenly appeared in the live stream room.
Jiang Zhangchuang sent a Treasure Map!
【Li Fan, do you dare to play race to seven with me! 】
After losing to Li Fan in the SSC Spring Split Finals, Jiang Zhangchuang had been obsessively researching running methods for various maps, especially Rainbow Windmill Island. To him, being defeated by a League of Legends player was a great humiliation, and he had to reclaim his honor!
