Why Did NC, Once Thriving, Suddenly Fall Out of Favor? [Buaeri's Game Dictionary]

[Asia Economy Reporter Buaeri] NCSoft, which had been writing a history of success led by the 'Lineage brothers,' is sweating day after day. As various harsh criticisms poured in regarding NCSoft's new release, the company tried to soothe the 'gamers' hearts' through two rounds of updates for 'Blade & Soul 2 (B&S2),' which was released on the 26th of last month.

According to the game industry on the 4th, NCSoft faced a public backlash immediately after the release of the new title 'B&S2.' Although B&S2 was an ambitious work personally led by CEO Kim Taek-jin, the market response was cold. As the reaction to B&S2 went differently than expected, NCSoft's stock price also plummeted. NCSoft's market capitalization evaporated by more than 4 trillion won, dropping from the 18 trillion won range to the 13 trillion won range as of last week. NCSoft once again faced criticism for its excessive monetization structure.

Public sentiment toward NCSoft had been showing serious signs since early this year. The rollback incident of the 'Munyang' item update in Lineage M was significant. In January, NCSoft implemented an update that reduced the cost to obtain the item from tens of millions of won to a few million won. During this process, users who spent a lot on 'Munyang,' called 'hard payers,' raised fairness issues, and NCSoft eventually canceled the update. However, afterward, users launched a boycott, claiming that NCSoft prioritized a small number of heavy spenders over the majority of users. Truck protests were also held.

At that time, the 'gamers' hearts' of users exhausted by excessive monetization worsened significantly. NCSoft stated during its first-quarter earnings announcement that "there is no impact from the boycott," but the backlash from accumulated dissatisfaction continued. Critical comments always flooded articles related to NCSoft. In fact, the number of Lineage users also decreased. According to Mobile Index, a big data analysis solution by IGAWorks, the weekly active users of Lineage M (August 23-29) were 138,281, nearly 100,000 fewer than the same period last year (227,139). Lineage 2M users were 48,639, about half of last year's same period (91,021). Lineage 2M, which used to rank at the top of Google Play, was ranked 5th as of the 4th.

Moreover, even the new release 'B&S2' had a similar monetization structure, differing only in intellectual property (IP), leaving users cold. However, this time NCSoft was also taken aback. While NCSoft had remained calm during past truck protests, it announced two rounds of service improvement plans in a short period, lowering its stance by saying it would "listen to users' opinions." Due to system restructuring and other factors, B&S2 has risen to 4th place in Google Play sales and appears to be stabilizing.

Professor Wi Jeong-hyun of Chung-Ang University, president of the Korea Game Society, said, "NCSoft fell into the addiction of probability-based items and kept releasing similar games, mistakenly believing that the 3N (NCSoft, Nexon, Netmarble) structure was solid," adding, "If a mid-sized game company releases a big hit, the entire market could be shaken."

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This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.