China's Illegal Private Servers Achieved a Total Revenue of Approx. US$ 7.86 Mln in 4 Years
By Date: 12-29-2011 Views:
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Recently, South Korean media paid great attention to a news private server running news in China.
It is reported that on Nov. 21 local time in China, a studio running illegal private servers in China's Sichuang Province was closed down by the government. The studio is claimed to have reaped net profits of RMB 5 million (approx. US$ 792,500) in the last four and half years. 21 people of this studio were sentenced 3 years of imprisonment for severely hindering the running of official servers of The World of Legend.
Mr. Qin is said to be the owner of these private servers. They can earn around RMB 20,000 through running private servers for 2D MMORPG The World of Legend each month. In 2008 Mr. Qin established Icebound Studio together with 20 other people and started to reap colossal profits through running private servers.
According to Mr. Qin, there are two departments responsible for running private servers for The World of Legend. One department is responsible for item selling, the so-called "capper" who receives 1%~4% of the total price for each item sold. And the other department is responsible for advertising and promotions. In the last four and half years, their total sales revenue amounted to RMB 50 million (approx. US$ 7.925 million). After deducting server cost, marketing and promotion expenses, their net profits stood at RMB 5 million (approx. US$ 792,500).
As we know, Ragnarok Online which started commercial service in China since 2003 created a record of 1 million peak concurrent users in 2004. Following that, private servers became rampant in China. Although Chinese Ragnarok Online is shutting down servers at the end of this month, it is learnt that currently at least 10 private servers are still running.
Blade & Soul which entered its second round of closed beta testing not long ago in South Korea has also landed in China through private servers. Its character creation, quests and game content are exactly the same as the Korean version.
In 2003 MU Online achieved a total revenue of 65 billion won (US$ 56.13 billion) in China and South Korea. It is said that more than 20,000 MU Online players are using private servers, and between 2003 and 2005, due to private servers, Chinese online gamer enterprises suffered 40% sales loss, which is indeed a big number.
