What will the "futuristic form" of a party game look like?
The reason why I asked this question is because since the launch of Fall Guys, the originator of party games, in 2020, the track has entered a high level of development. In the past two years, major manufacturers have made frequent layouts. With more and more subdivided categories, richer gameplay, and more and more saturated users, party games will also usher in a bottleneck in development. However, "Yuanmeng Star", which is backed by Tencent Tianmei, does not seem to have this concern. 
On December 15th, "Yuan Dream Star" quickly topped the iOS free list on the first day of its launch, and entered the TOP3 of the best-selling list. Xingbao of all kinds drove trains and stacked music, surrounded the square, and even had to line up to play a shooting game. At the same time, the competition in the qualifying matches is unprecedentedly fierce, and the special gameplay [Forza Motorsport] has exploded in popularity after adding multiple competition maps. As a member of the two tests, the most special thing about the game think tank is that with the help of the Yuanmeng Happy Up phalanx composed of 300+ creators such as "Teacher, My Name is Classmate He" and "Zimin", the "Star World" section of "Yuanmeng Star" has evolved.
With the official announcement of "Yuan Dream Star" on December 2, the first phase of the special investment of 1.4 billion yuan (no cap) has officially begun to be fulfilled from this moment, and the proposition of "future form" of party games seems to have been solved.
Through 2 tests, "Yuanmeng Star" showed the characteristics of "many and complete" game content, but it did not fully show the killer feature. It wasn't until December 2 that "Yuanmeng Star" held an "unofficial" official press conference that we really realized that Tencent TiMi wanted to spend more energy and financial resources on serving users on the party game track, and gave full authority to all participants in the game ecosystem. This is not a bold way of operating, but the idea is clear:
Through PGC's classic content, it will demonstrate to users, and support UGC with great strength, so as to feed back the game and form a healthy ecological cycle. Obviously, UGC is the core point of this whole line of thinking. 
From the first test in October to the second test in November, "Yuan Dream Star" has always adopted the practice of "quality assurance" in the output of qualifying maps, providing reference for UGC topic selection. For example, during the first test, the [Rapids] is a water race throughout the whole process, and you can also leap and take shortcuts in corners, which is full of freshness and exploration space for players; Another example is the [Lotus Leaf Water Floating] during the second test, which added Chinese elements such as carp jumping over the dragon gate and stone lion spraying water to a racing map, which was well received by players; There is also a [Mahjong Speed Dating] points level, which uses the quintessential "mahjong" elements for the collision gameplay, showing a unique design concept.
The featured gameplay is even more refined. For example, with the blessing of TiMi's veteran shooting game R&D team, [Charge Competition] has made the shooting gameplay lightweight and become a popular place for users to practice guns. These ingenuity are actually demonstrating and guiding UGC.
After clarifying what kind of content users like, UGC doesn't have to make too many detours. Therefore, on December 2, "Yuan Dream Star" officially announced the first phase of 1 billion dreams**, which is just right in time. Specifically, "Yuanmeng Star" has a complete set of support plans, and its UGC operation secrets can be roughly classified into two main points: [low threshold tools + high incentives]. The low-threshold tool is a magic weapon to attract users' creation, and it is also an artifact to open users' creative thinking. In the "Dream Space" map editor of "Dream Star", creators can create grand scenes with simple operations, including the [Component Manager] to facilitate the management of scene symbols, the [Algorithm Assistance] for intelligent color grading, and the [Component Mirroring] function to improve creative efficiency. Just like the map [Autumn Mirror of the Lonely Shadow] created by the author "Looking at the Blur of the Green Mountains", although the number of components used is not large, and the color matching is relatively simple, but with the cooperation and tuning of various editor functions, the reflection of autumn colors on the water surface and the continuous peaks in the distance are still shocking. The map of "Green Shirt Smoke and Rain" is in the color scheme of "green + green + black", presenting the purity and warmth of a small village and soothing the user's soul. 
Looking at the green mountains and blurring", the "Autumn Mirror of the Lonely Shadow".
In order to provide a better creative environment, the official has also created a [mod community] full of "fame, fortune" and "love". Its intimate thing is that novice creators can get the function of the Great God Creation Module with one click through the community. This is a win-win relationship, where the gods can get the growth value of the mod community, and the novices can get started quickly, narrowing the distance between creators in a "old and new" way. At the same time, the map editor also supports relay creation, so that no potential content is left unfinished.
The most commendable thing is that "Yuanmeng Star" allows creators to mix and match gameplay methods to achieve "custom production". Creators can create a variety of innovative ways to play by choosing their own type, setting initial health, choosing a team competition mode, melee mode, and taking advantage of the points rules for shooting UGC maps. For example, the new team shooting map [Charge Competitive - King's Canyon] (5v5 shooting push tower) made by "Miss Sun Shangxiang" is made by the shooting editor gameplay template, incorporating the elements of the king's IP, which is both innovative and classic. As of 21:45 on December 15, the map has been played more than 350,000 times.
In addition, we've seen a significant improvement in the graphical performance of MetaDream Star's UGC with Unreal Engine and new special effects. For example, Adventure Under the Sea 10] The waterfall effect displayed on the map, and the effect of the sun shining on the earth in the [At the End of the Dream] map, all of which benefit from the many details that can be achieved by the "Star World" editor, and the open [Particle Effect Editor] can also make interesting special effects such as fireworks and **. Looking at the functions of all the tools on the whole, "Yuan Dream Star" is almost feeding the food to the creator's mouth. 
Underwater Adventure 10】
At the end of the dream].
Of course, for UGC to achieve healthy development, it not only needs powerful tools to escort creators, but also a sound incentive and support system to keep players' creative enthusiasm sustained. On December 2, "Yuan Dream Star" officially announced the "First Phase of 1 Billion Dream Making Plan", covering all-round support for creators' growth, income, professionalism and other content.
On December 15th, the first season of 43.3 million yuan ecological creator incentive was officially launched, and at the same time, from a total of six dimensions: individual creation competition, theme creation competition, talent scout team creation, map recommendation officer, traffic platform creation, and author convening order, so that more creators can enjoy the dividends of the UGC ecological development of "Yuanmeng Star".
First of all, "Yuan Dream Star" regards every star friend as a potential game producer, and conducts a long-term collection of maps based on seasons. The total prize money of the first season event [Taoyuan Dream] is as high as 1 million yuan, of which the highest prize for a single person is as high as 23,000 yuan, and 5 tickets for tens of millions of offers will be generated. The official also revealed that it will help establish a studio and provide annual support to make creation more professional; In the first season, 1 million cash incentives will be invested in the studio, and the studio's outstanding works will be selected from multiple tracks, with an individual receiving a bonus of up to 150,000 yuan and the studio receiving a bonus of up to 100,000 yuan. This also means that map creation is no longer limited to the game ecosystem, but exists in a large-scale and systematic operation mode, making it possible for outstanding creators and studios to seek in-depth career development within the creator system of "Dream Star".
Secondly, in the first season of "Yuan Dream Star", three themed creation competitions were launched: the king creation contest eldest lady arrived, the Meituan "Star Knight" creation contest, and the Tencent ** ancient style creation contest, and the three events generated a total of 11 tens of millions of offer tickets. Taking the [King Creation Competition] as an example, the official will select 5 dream superstars, 15 star dexterity awards, and 500 rising stars. In addition to sharing 1 million cash as a whole, there is also the opportunity to receive super traffic support such as celebrity recommendations and national platform recommendations.
This kind of creative competition based on in-depth brand cooperation has two major advantages: first, for brand partners, the brand influence can be enhanced through the embedded communication of the game through the theme creation competition; Second, for outstanding creators, they can become the "star" of the brand through the theme creation competition and realize their personal value. As you can imagine, as the theme creation event expands to more brands in the future, the value of creators will also be infinitely magnified.
Third, "Dream Star" invested 10 million yuan in bonuses to encourage players to sign up on the official website, gather players who love map creation to become "scouts", and create their own "dream team" to create map works. In addition, we have also noticed that in order to allow the potential of creators to be discovered by more users, the official has also made every effort to expand and disseminate the game ecosystem. For example, if you publish the relevant content of the Star World Map with the topic of [Yuanmeng Star], you can share tens of millions of cash; Participate in the creation of high-quality content or game broadcasts on the 9 major platforms of Douyin, Kuaishou, Station B, Xiaohongshu, Weibo, Douyu, Huya, QQ, and **, and you can also share tens of millions of cash; Participate in the in-game season-based map long-term solicitation activities and various platform solicitation activities, become an official signing author group, or share tens of millions of cash.
You know, the above 43.3 million is just a season's investment. According to the official statement of "9 seasons a year", such a high-level incentive and support plan can be done almost all year round, which is indeed a challenge for manufacturers, but it is a great benefit for users. Because, the opportunities never stop.
In the party game track, you can often hear the phrase "social is the core of party games". To be precise, social networking is the core of user operations, and UGC is the core of content operations. At the social level, we don't need to worry about Tencent, a social giant; At the UGC level, the idea of "Yuan Dream Star" is also quite stable - attracting a huge number of creators through unprecedented capital investment and diversified incentive and support programs; Select high-quality UGC content through various creative activities and reward creators; High-quality UGC and PGC form dynamic replenishment; Creators refer to high-quality UGC content for recreation, so as to form a new round of healthy updates and iterations. Even, the self-iteration speed of this healthy creative ecology can be so fast that even the official can't keep up with the rhythm.
Now thinking back to the "no official" press conference on December 2, Tencent TiMi's intention is easy to understand: I will set up the stage and give the space for dream-making to the majority of players. The first phase of 1 billion investment looks fierce, but it is actually just a more eye-catching number, what is really worth thinking about is the ** thinking behind it, a thinking that can allow UGC to drive the healthy development of the game ecology, and a thinking that can lead the future of party games.