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ive streaming on Bilibili so that their homes, and families, Zun has Focusing on the Niche Market
his fans could watch him play- created a family called Zhao, which Zun attributes his relatively low
Ling video as usual on January has lasted for more than ten genera- popularity to the type of games he
19, 2017, Ade Zun, found words in tions. He records the lives of the fam- plays and the style of his videos.
different colors suddenly appear out ily and uploads them to a video series “Honestly, I do care about the
of nowhere and swoop across the called Life Goes On. numbers (of his channel) … but con-
screen. Up till now, Zun has more than tent is more important,” Zun says.
These messages are called danmu, 53,000 followers with an average of Unlike other game content crea-
which literally means “bullet screen”, 2,000 views for each of his 1,700 vid- tors playing exciting games and mak-
and they are popular on Bilibili, one eos. ing visually satisfying videos for the
of the many Chinese video-streaming He is not that “popular” since sake of attracting the mass audience,
websites with 50 million subscribers. other similar Bilibili game content Zun prefers playing relaxing simu-
Instead of receiving bullet mes- creators usually each has more than lation games that could last for sev-
sages commenting on his contents as 100,000 followers and an average of eral hours. He would also narrate his
usual, Zun received birthday wishes 10,000 views for each video. games in a peaceful way and chat with
from hundreds of his fans this time. his fans about life casually.
“They said they were notified by the “
Weibo’s birthday reminder,” the game
content creator says.
“I was surprised as I had never
mentioned my date of birth before Honestly, I do care about the numbers ...
… I was touched,” the forty--year-old
man recalls the wonderful moment but content is more important.
like it happened yesterday, adding
that he rarely celebrates festivals in
real life after stepping into his 30s.
”
Journey to Content Creation
Zun had never played video games
until he received a game console from
his dad in 1991. Since then, he often
watched videos recorded by other
players to learn more about game
strategies.
“I thought I could do the same,”
Zun reveals how he was inspired
to broadcast himself playing video
games online so that others can get
tips, ideas and solution on gaming.
However, unlike other content cre-
ators, Zun simply recorded his games
and uploaded the videos without edit-
ing as he merely wanted to share his
game experience.
He started to play The Sims 4 in
2014, a life simulation game published
by Electronic Arts, immediately after
it was released for Microsoft Window
users.
In the life simulation game where Ade Zun has made a video series for The Sims 4.
players can create unique characters, (Photo courtesy of The Sims 4)