The Sad Truth Behind Netflix’s Rebel Moon Game

[Music] Speaking of fanervice, Netflix has shown the trailer for the new exciting co-op action RPG set in the world of Zach Schneider's Rebel Moon developed by Super Evil Mega Corp of Vain Glory fame. It looks to be What is this? What is this? An action RPG? What? This is mobile. Okay, Netflix stories died for this [ __ ] The pitch line, which is everywhere on their well done marketing materials, is an online co-op action adventure game set in the Rebel Moon universe. It feels like somebody who doesn't know anything about mobile marketing wrote that line because as a mobile game player, you're like, "What does that mean online? Like, why did you use that word with me?" Although the trailer looked really nice. nice have a closed beta open. But yeah, I think the bigger topic is not the game itself, which visually looks really

nice. They also have a really fun Turtles game and they do Vangalore. So all their games kind of have this same look and feel to it. They have the same engine. They So that's the real the evil engine, Ev. So they have a great name, by the way. Super evil megaore. Probably the coolest company name ever. There's a bigger topic around them, right? not a bigger topic per se because like we did talk about venture capital before that and the interesting part about super mega corp like I went actually and looked at how much money they've raised and what's the history of the company they've raised actually more than 70 million till date through six different funding rounds and their history was like there there was the launch of that moa vang glory the first moa to the west a lot of hype it was featured on Apple remember the scarf guy that was their CTO he was on stage with Apple like Apple loved them. Ton of downloads, you know, failed to get traction. No surprise. It was super hardcore theme. They didn't have virtual joystic. It was three versus three. But most importantly, it was a mobile done for

the western audience. They should have asked Crest, he would have tell right away that this is like it doesn't matter what you do, this is a failed endeavor. Nevertheless, the saddest part is as an investment or even from the founders's perspective because it's not that you try something super risky like this, get a lot of high traction, but you fail. and you just try again. You get more funding and you start a new company. But they failed with Vain Glory, but they didn't go out of business. They kind of kept on raising more money. And now they're stuck in what I would like to say a twilight zone of startups. They're not growing. They're not dying. They're existing. And they're not going to be acquired because the valuation is so incredibly high. If you raise 70 million, your valuation is probably like closer to what 34 $500 million. And now they've kind of gone from this independent studio with a lot of momentum entering new category having their own engine making you know having this team from Riot and so forth to uh work for High

Studio making games for Apple Arcade and Netflix. And that's not a sad state to be at. There's nothing wrong in making games for Apple Arcade or Netflix especially these kind of good-looking games. But it's definitely not the outcome that likely the founders and the VCs, I think A16Z included, were expecting from this company from purely the VC perspective, not from the perspective of how good the team is and the quality of their game because I think those are all there. It's just what can happen if you end up in a Twilight Zone. I think Phil would say Twilight Zone, which you stole, which I love. Yeah, this is the Twilight Zone happening. It's like the hibernation of the infected in Last of Us 2, you know, underneath. So good episode if you haven't seen Last of Us 2 season 2. Oh, anyway, go. Two main points here. One, this was an amazing team that can build amazing product from the get-go. They've always been like one of those premier teams, right? So, I'll give them that. Right. Two, to be clear, these were the

original OG mobile developers, right? This was the proof that it could never work because they actually built quite a good game with Vang Glory and it [ __ ] bombed. Absolutely bombed. There was just no market for it, right? So, these guys took the risk that made sense at the time and they were the kind of the proof that it was never going to work and the fact that people made MOBAs after Vang Glory before the West never made sense. So, these guys were the OG. So, I don't really blame them for taking a shot at it. Um, third thing I would kind of surprised that this thing is still being green lit, right? This seems against the strategy. Rebel move, you know, like most likely this thing is very almost done, right? Must be pretty far along. And I guess it supports one of their IPs, which is solely failed. So, I don't know exactly why there's clear, but this is the closed beta trailer that we were witnessing on the screen a little bit. This is the announcement. Yeah. So, they were far away. And they announced it with Zack Snider was at some event I think this

week, right? My guess, and we talked about this last time, is it's contractual. Yeah. Right. Right. Right. But yeah, this does not bode well for Super Evil Mega Corp, though. Like, this game I didn't even know, honestly, that it was on mobile only. Oh my god. Are you kidding me? Like, this game can't do well on mobile. I'm sorry. I didn't see other platforms on the website. Somebody checked me on that, but it looked like it was mobile only. I thought it was Steam and console, actually, when I saw it, and I'm like, "Okay, well, this could Yeah. All right. Yeah, but mobile. No, not going to happen. Not going to work. It probably doesn't have a monetization. It's probably cosmetic, you know, like it's like, you know, whatever. Chris, it's a Netflix game, so there is no monetization. They already paid for it. They already won. Oh, right. They already won. And it's the previous Netflix leadership that probably overpaid by 20x. Oh, god. Makes no sense. Makes no sense. Anyway, by the way, there the bloodletting in Netflix continues. Like the whole core business team is [ __ ]

gone. Like quietly, right? They just let go everybody. Everybody, right? So, and I want to be clear with all these gaming people that are going to Netflix, buyer beware, dude. These guys don't give a [ __ ] about games, you know? And it's like, you go there, you're doing a deal with the devil, like I've said before. You might get paid, dude, but you got a two three year two three year runway, dude. That's it. So, be aware. Be aware. Be afraid. Oh my god. I'm looking at their website. It does not tell me platform. Yeah, you have to search really hard to figure out it's on mobile. They don't use the mobile symbol anywhere. They actually clarify it in Twitter comments. I'm sure it will come out on Switch as well. So, after Brawl Stars, of course, that should absolutely. I mean, it can't, but it should. All right. So, Val Mobile in China. Interesting news. We finally have a launch date for Valerant Mobile which will be launching in China after 4 years in development. I had heard this was on rocky grounds and I actually had heard

that it was close to cancellation. I thought the plug had been pulled on this but it is stuck it out and it has a shot I think at a market that's pretty frothy in China when it comes to first-person shooters particularly for tactical shooters like this with a built-in audience on PC already. So let's see how this does. You know, right now we're looking at the top performers in China in the FPS category for iOS only. Again, just to control for the distribution of Android in China. And you'll see Crossfire is number one far and away, doing about 20 million a month on those platforms. That, of course, is the ripoff of CS:GO that China has and then developed for mobile. Delta Force is out, by the way. That was the HD title we were looking at earlier this year. It's out in the last 2 months. did it 11 million it looks like so far. Let's check back in on that one. Very curious to see how that one performs in the long run. Arena Breakout, we mentioned that a couple months ago. That's kind of found its own footing. Call of Duties still sticking around. And then there's just kind of this collection of NEIS Battle

Roy which just float around for quite some time. So I think this game has a real shot. I'm not quite sure what it looks like from a product perspective. So let's definitely check back in on this one and see whether or not they executed. And these are revenues for China app stores only. iOS only. I just removed Android alto together. Boom. Yeah, that's a So that's a fraction of the money that they're making. Yeah, I mean correct. Holy [ __ ] Crossfire Gunfight King. Stupid ass name, but must make stupid money, too. Yeah. I wouldn't be surprised if it was hitting 50 plus million a month. Yeah, most likely. What's not on here is Fight for the Golden Spatula, which is TFT in China run by Tencent, which crushes it. It's a top 10 revenue driving game. And just be clear, this is Lightseed Studios, which is doing Valerant Mobile, which is the PUBG studio inside of Tencent. I'm very interested to see what they pull off from a product perspective. Yeah. Yeah. The fight for the Golden Spatula is T-Mi, which is another one of the

studios. But yeah, so just to be clear, sorry everyone, this is only in China. Valerant is not coming to western markets. [Music]