Tencent Holdings’ Honor of Kings and Peacekeeping Elite have long dominated China’s game charts, but the little-known developer’s new title has recently surpassed blockbuster games and become the most downloaded in the country.
The Chinese clone of the popular American video game Werewolf topped the free game rankings on Apple’s App Store on Monday, according to app monitoring company Kimai Data.
Developed by Shenzhen Yuliang Technology and launched on October 28th, the Chinese clone topped the country’s Apple App Store on November 2nd with 116,000 downloads, compared to the 112,000 and 111,000 downloads for Honor of Kings and Peacekeeper Elite, respectively.
Since its launch, the game has been downloaded over 478,000 times in the App Store, Kimai data shows.
This is one of the many Chinese copies that will be rushing into the market as Innerslot’s EMS EMS is one of the biggest gaming sensations this year.
In most countries, including China, intellectual property law primarily protects art, characters, and the story of a game, but not its game dynamics.
As a result, video game clones or redesigned games are available worldwide, but in China – many Western games are unavailable or delayed – this is especially common.
Tencent’s most successful mobile game, Honor of Kings, was initially seen by many as a clone of the world-famous multiplayer online battlefield game League of Legends.
Netizens’ Marquee Shooting Mobile Game Knives Out, meanwhile, was launched with the battlefields of PC-based Battle Royale game player Annon.
Earlier this year, when PC games Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout and Party Animals were the biggest headlines in video games, many companies tried to release mobile clones of both games.
Among us, free to play on mobile and computer, players confront each other by assigning roles as “team members” or “cheats” on a spaceship.
The Chromats must try to differentiate the cheaters when completing multiple tasks, while the cheaters try to destroy or kill the crew before completing all the tasks assigned to them and winning the game.
The game was launched in June 2018, but only in the summer of 2020 caused the virus outbreak during the Govt-19 epidemics. Last month, US Congresswoman Alexandria Ocacio-Cortes attracted 435,000 viewers worldwide on a twist live-stream. Played the game – This is one of the most watched streams ever recorded.
It is also hugely popular among us in South Korea, where many celebrities like Alexa and members of popular groups like Exo, Twiz and Day 6 are known to play it.
According to developer Innerslot, the game has been downloaded more than 100 million times worldwide and had 60 million daily active users by the end of September.
Chinese players were initially hot and slow among us, some have reconsidered that this is another version of the individual party game Werewolf, which is already very popular in the country.
But despite this, the game is not available in Chinese – the current languages are English, Spanish, Portuguese, Korean and Russian – which is now the 10th most downloaded game in the country among us.
According to Kimai, the game has been downloaded about 885,000 times in China over the past three months, and is available on the App Store and online store Steam, which continues to run in the legitimate gray area of the landscape.
“It’s really effective in attracting downloads among us,” said Zheng Jindiao, co-founder of online media company Camerobum. “This is better than many games on a dedicated user acquisition budget. It shows that many are following this trend.”
However, Zheng said the game’s user experience was “not ideal” for Chinese gamers due to language barriers and network issues.
Photo: Shenzhen Yuliang Technology / Desktop
It also has an army of Chinese language transcripts. The most popular among us is the wolf, who has cloned the original map and gameplay mechanics, the only difference being the structure of the game: between us in space; Werewolf among us in a medieval castle.
Another notable clone of us from China is Space Kill, a mobile game developed by Beijing Renshi Information Technology that has been downloaded over 251,000 times on iOS and now ranks 11th in the free entertainment segment of the App Store, according to Kimai.
“For any game like ours, as long as they have a Chinese language preference, there will be downloads no matter how scary the game is,” Zheng said. “But I don’t think big companies copy these types of games because they ‘re hard to monetize in China.”
This article was originally published South China Morning Post.
Beatrice Ashford is a contributor at Nintendo-power.com, covering a wide range of topics including news, politics, business, technology, sport, entertainment, and lifestyle. She focuses on delivering clear, balanced reporting and useful information that helps readers stay informed about current events and emerging developments. Her work highlights stories that matter to everyday audiences, with an emphasis on accuracy, relevance, and accessible journalism that keeps readers connected to the issues shaping the world around them.