**|Tech Planet
text|Lin Jing
In the past, after playing the script in the afternoon, I could make an appointment with my friends in the evening, but now I can start in 8 hours, and I have to eat two takeout meals at the script killing store, and the simple story is reviewed over and over again", said Zhang Chi, a script killing enthusiast.
Zhang Chi has been in contact with script killing since 2018 and has played more than 700 books one after another. In the past 4 hours of script killing, even on weekdays, he can get off work to play a game, and the craziest time is "playing one book a day".
But this year, Zhang Chi's frequency of playing script killing began to decrease. He bluntly said that now it is often the city limited version (the script is limited to a few stores in a city), and the exclusive version (the script is only given to one store), which is more expensive and longer. In particular, the script relies on some mechanisms or lack of clues to delay time, or constantly adds settings to achieve a reversal effect, which is simply spending money to buy guilt.
The script hit the unfamiliar offline social market of 4 20 people, and has been developing in China for more than 7 years. At its peak, from 2019 to April 2021, the number of domestic script killing stores soared from 2,400 to 450,000. ** It is not uncommon for more than a dozen script killing shops to be densely spread out in a building.
Compared with the million-dollar investment in escape rooms, this used to be a low-cost, high-yield track. A screenwriter can earn millions of dollars in a short period of time by relying on popular scripts, and the store can open for business with a minimum investment of 100,000 yuan, and the distribution side is even more "lying down to make money".
As one of the ways for young people to relax, socialize and entertain, why did script killing begin to "fall out of favor"?Is it cold now?
Script killing has also had highlight moments, especially during the epidemic, which is one of the few entertainment activities for young people. A script killing store owner told Tech Planet that on the night of New Year's Eve in 2022, many young people who did not go home poured into the store, and the customer flow tripled that night, reaching more than 200 people, and according to the minimum customer unit price of 150 yuan, you can earn 30,000 yuan a night.
However, after the epidemic was relaxed, many stores did not usher in the expected surge in customer flow. Gao Yue is the manager of a script killing brand, and this year he closed three script killing stores and lost more than 3 million yuan. "The flow is cut in half, and then cut in half, which is not as good as before. Gao Yue said that his store is more than 1,200 square meters, with a total of 14 rooms, and a maximum of 600 cars a month in the peak season ("one car" is a group of players), and the turnover of a single store is up to about 400,000 yuan. By 2023, the number of monthly sessions will drop from 300 to 200.
On major platforms, it is not uncommon for scripts to be transferred and closed, and scripts are sold at low prices.
Multiple factors have led to a decrease in customer flow, Gao Yue said, the essence of script killing is a service industry, stores provide scripts and venues, and the user's experience is usually closely related to the same car players, DM (script killing host), and script quality.
In the past few years of script killing, the initial education of users has been completed, and some script killing enthusiasts have been screened out. In addition, due to the low threshold of the industry, many new users in the mixed stores have a poor initial experience, which affects their subsequent repurchases.
What's more, with the opening of the epidemic, young people have more entertainment methods, which can produce substitution for script killing.
Like Gao Yue, some script killing shopkeepers are in a dilemma. Regular users in the store are becoming more and more demanding about script killing, and they want to play a large mechanic book, a logical reasoning book, or a particularly rich emotional immersion book for a longer period of time.
Therefore, if stores want to continue to maintain profitability and strive to retain old users, they will purchase a larger proportion of **city limited capital. A set of boxed books** is usually around 500 yuan, while a set of city-limited books** is about 2,000 yuan. This can also create a vicious cycle, making it harder for new players to come back in.
But even so, Gao Yue's store is barely maintaining at present. Because the city limit means that more labor costs, prop costs, and personnel use efficiency and single-store floor efficiency will be reduced. For an 8-hour script, DM can only receive two or even one script kill a day, and the table turnover rate in the room will be greatly reduced.
There are also some stores that still insist on boxed books. At the beginning of this year, Liu Qing joined a script killing brand, which is located near the university town, and only provides boxed books with low customer unit prices to meet the needs of the target student group.
But in less than half a year, it lost 400,000. In Liu Qing's view, boxed script killing does not have uniqueness, which means that user loyalty is also low, and they can go to other stores with lower ** at any time.
After opening a script killing store, there is no day of good sleep", Liu Qing said, the script killing business usually in the afternoon to the evening, on average every 10 days will receive bad reviews from users, staying up late DM not only did not make much money, but also had to apologize to users.
In addition, the rent cost of the 300-square-meter store is too high, and the decoration has also invested more than 100,000 yuan. However, compared with maintaining low-profit operations in the future, Liu Qing chose to close the store and rethink the entrepreneurial track. He initiated a "0 yuan transfer" on social platforms, hoping to recover part of the rental deposit and reduce losses.
The change also occurs upstream of the script kill. The script exhibition is the main channel for script distributors and script killing stores to communicate, buy and sell scripts. Publishers bring new scripts to the show to promote, while stores can participate in closed beta and selection. In order to purchase high-quality scripts, stores need to crowd dozens of people at the exhibition throughout the year.
Lulu is the manager of a script killing distribution studio. She told Tech Planet that in the past, "there were too many stores and not enough distribution", the show was a seller's market, and the scripts that the distribution brought to the show were all sold out by sellers. The time from script creation to final listing is usually 3 months to create a script, and then two months to test the script, and hundreds of thousands of dollars can be easily pocketed in half a year, and if the distribution studio has multiple screenwriters, it is millions of income.
This also attracts more people to set up script killing distribution studios. Even, as long as the script killing store and player can write the script, buy a ticket for the exhibition for several thousand yuan, and exhibit the printed script, it can become a distribution.
However, with the increasing supply, the exhibition has long been a buyer's market, and there has even been a phenomenon that the exhibitors are larger than the script and the store is killed.
On the one hand, it has bred the profession of script killing and publicity. According to Lulu, publicity and distribution is to distribute the script information to the stores in her circle of friends, and at the same time recruit enough stores to participate in the bus and private car tests before the script is released.
Lulu said that the age of the practitioners in the script killing publicity and distribution is generally relatively low, and many of them are students. This is not a sales position, they are not responsible for the final sales of the script, they are only responsible for helping you "blow" the book.
Nowadays, the quality of the script can even be ranked second in terms of script killing, and publicity and distribution are becoming more and more important. According to Lulu, the average cost of a publicity staff is about 5,000 yuan, and high-sales scripts usually need to invite more publicity personnel. In addition, many large issuers will also pay for streaming on platforms such as short **.
When the sharp drop in passenger flow affects the distribution side, and the cost of publicity and distribution remains high, they can only reduce the cost from the script creation side. Lulu decided to give up the high-cost full-time author training, and also quit the rented office and began to cooperate with part-time authors.
Another chaotic phenomenon of the exhibition is the birth of "Kouhi Ben". "Kouhi Ben" usually means that the completion of the work is usually less than 30%, and the scene depends on the framework and structure of the script, and the competition to see who "blows" more. This also leads to the fact that the script killing shopkeeper only knows the true level of the script after the script arrives.
Many times, the store owners can't even receive the script on time, and the book usually purchased at the exhibition may not be received until a year later. The essence behind it is to distribute immature scripts to the exhibition to make money.
Script killing distribution is also gradually becoming a wealth game for leading publishers. Many head distribution agencies will carry out first-class sales, and if the store wants to buy a popular script, it needs to buy other scripts at the same time, and a similar club model will be formed, and the store can only buy a popular script by paying a certain annual fee. There are also some publishers who have begun to use their script resources to attract novice players to join.
The script killing industry is facing multiple challenges. On the one hand, it is the problem of "old users quit and new users can't enter". With the city limits this rule changes, from only authorized to one city.
From three or four stores to dozens of stores, the quality of content has also begun to be uneven.
This means that the cost of trial and error increases for script killing. Zhang Chi, a fan of script killing, said that the earliest were cheap boxed copies, and even if they encountered bad copies, they didn't mind very much. But now, the script of 10 hours is a great test of the content story, he has encountered a lot of bad books, and the store arranges multiple NPCs to perform on the spot in order to improve **, and plays the script for a day, as if he is in prison.
A script killing player who quit the pit said on social platforms that the duration and difficulty have increased, and he often drops in the second half of the game, and his enthusiasm for playing has greatly decreased.
On the other hand, there is the loss of talent. In the script killing industry, the general consensus is that the most valuable thing is not actually the script, but the host, who is an important variable to improve the user experience. But as the traffic decreases, so does the DM.
A script kill DM in a second-tier city told Tech Planet that the income is from the "basic salary + commission" model, and it is common to stay up all night, and it will be 100 yuan for a 10-hour script kill. The consumption of the body did not match the income level, and in the end, he chose to leave the industry and "couldn't stay up".
However, the script killing industry still shows a savage growth side. The author of the script killing, Ah Cang, told Tech Planet that due to the low threshold for entering the industry, the industry is full of unscrupulous releases that want to make quick money but lack their own ability and poor character, and the author invests a lot of time and cost to create, but after the release of the book, he got nothing, and finally had to go to court with the distribution, which is not uncommon in the industry.
Ah Cang's first work had problems such as being issued and falsely reporting the number of authorized stores. As an author, in addition to having the ability to write, you also need to screen and publish. To this end, she hired a perennial legal counsel to write and review the contract for her, "Since I still want to work hard in the industry, I can only rely on this method to escort myself." ”
This year's boxed script "Looting All the Roses in London" created by her has achieved a box office result of 27 million yuan, and although the income she has earned from this script cannot be compared to the script killing author in the most popular period, these positive feedbacks make her willing to continue to stay in the industry.
Although, due to the demand for profit, the issuer and the store are more inclined to the city limited book. But boxed books are the key to expanding the entire market to new users, Acang said, as far as she knows, a popular boxed book in 2022 brought 2 million new users to the market.
Like Ah Cang, many practitioners who are still in the script killing industry are thinking about breaking the current problem. After all, only new users come in that are the key to the long-term development of this industry. Project Kunpeng (Note: All names have been changed.) ）