Practitioners accepted an exclusive interview with the Beijing News, exposing many problems facing emerging industries
Immersive chambers have low barriers to entry, with mixed hardware and software
According to public information, the number of stores in China's secret room industry exceeded 10,000 in 2018, an increase of nearly 40% from the more than 7,000 in 2016.
According to the Beijing News reporter's statistics, only Beijing currently has nearly 70 "immersive secret rooms" or "super secret rooms".
This industry, once estimated by the market as a tens of billions of business, is flooding into the market.
But Yu Kun described the current industry, "Yesterday it was selling stinky tofu, and today it raised 10 million to open a secret room, and it is a secret room practitioner." The entry barrier is low, and the quality of the secret room in the market is uneven. The phenomenon of IP is not uncommon.
As a blue ocean in an emerging industry, what are the difficulties and areas that need to be improved?
Immersive secret room and film and television IP win-win?
Secret room brings lasting heat to IP
In 2016, Yuyue Culture purchased the full copyright of the novel "Chang'an Twelve Hours", and plans to operate it all-IP, that is, in addition to film and television, it also takes into account the expansion of other offline entertainment, such as animation, stage drama, and derivative Product, cultural and creative paradise, etc.
In 2018, Yuyue reached a cooperation with TFS to launch the live entertainment super secret room of "Changan Twelve Hours" during the TV series broadcast.
In the view of Li Anning, vice president of Yuyue Culture, the derivative value of immersive chambers lies in "experience" first.
No matter how developed the Internet, e-commerce, and online AR games are, people still need face-to-face social entertainment between people. This is why the theater will not be replaced, and no matter how you call it a takeout, you must invite friends to eat out.
"When we can not only watch TV series, but also act in TV series ourselves, this is the feeling that offline live entertainment can bring."
Man Yi also described immersive live entertainment as "an important tool for realizing IP."
At present, China's film and television industry is still in its initial stage of development, and most of the film's profitability depends on the split account model.
However, in Europe, America and Hollywood, online revenue only accounts for about 30%, and the rest comes from offline.
Man Yi said that China has the ability to produce explosive IP, the next most important thing is how to make IP sticky.
The best example is "The Twelve Hours of Chang'an". Although it has been broadcast for more than a year, most of the players who come to play in the secret room will review TV series or novels later.
This is the continuous heat that offline live entertainment has brought to IP.
"The way to increase stickiness is to have heat both online and offline, which requires the entire IP to have both upstream channels and downstream channels. You can base traffic on online, but when it is converted to offline, there is a high Conversion rate, so that this content can generate greater value."
IP brings marketing channels to secret rooms
What can IP bring to immersive entertainment?
In interviews by reporters from the Beijing News, most secret room operators said that many IPs did not bring more obvious traffic advantages, and for the secret room industry that can create independently, ready-made stories are by no means just needed.
But in Kun's view, the use of genuine IP is very necessary for the current industry.
In the early stages of industry development, most of the secret room consumers wanted to decrypt or experience mystery, instead of spending on IP.
In addition, the scripts of most practitioners at that time were original, and their demands for IP were relatively weak.
However, as more and more people participate in the real-life entertainment track, the use of IP can achieve drainage for the secret room to a certain extent, saving a lot of advertising, marketing, and planning costs.
Real entertainment short board
A.
Many secret rooms don’t know how to do fire fighting
According to Yu Kun, in the past few years, Secret Chamber could not be called an industry.
In addition to having a certain size, the industry must also have professional industry standards.
Man Yi made the same point.
At present, many secret rooms do not even know what to do with fire exits, fire evacuation, and safety doors.
All these require unified guidance from relevant departments.
As one of the editors of the secret room industry standards, Yu Kun is currently actively advancing the formulation of the secret room and immersive entertainment industry specifications, which involve content review and business specifications.
"This industry is too young and it takes time and process."
B.
Some businesses use scary haunted houses as their selling point
In 2019, Yu Kun's company cooperated with iQiyi to obtain the original IP authorization of the hit drama "Ice Breaker" and developed a derivative theme "Ice Breaker".
No matter what your identity is, here you can use the evidence in your hands to find out who is behind the scenes.
But for the secret room that has long focused on themes such as horror, suspense, and action, modern themes of positive energy and "non-terrorism" seem to be less attractive to experienced players.
"But this theme is more in line with my values. I hope the theme of the secret room can be more cultural." Yu Kun has experienced the development of the secret room industry for nearly ten years, foreseeing the prospects of the industry, and encountering detours. He sees more and more Many practitioners make this industry a pure entertainment pastime, attracting players with bottomless vulgar horror and ghosts.
According to Yu Kun, "I think everyone should be able to feel what is good and what is justice while playing."
Man Yi also believes that too many people now misunderstand the immersive secret room as a "haunted house". Terrorism has become a trend. Without ghosts running around the house, players will not be excited. "What makes money and what to do, can secret rooms become a sunrise industry? This will affect the outside world's judgment on this industry." Man Yi insisted on launching "The Wind" and "In the Name of the People". "We want the outside world to know that the secret room also has patriotic education and positive energy."
C.
Millions of film and television licensing fees are prohibitive for merchants
According to the reporter's observation, the current cooperation model between the Secret Room and the film and television company is mainly that the Secret Room pays an authorization fee to the IP party, and the IP party provides planning services and performs sales sharing.
Some film and television companies charge millions of license fees, which makes small-scale real-life trading that has a passenger flow of up to 10,000 people a year and annual revenues that have not exceeded that number.
However, as the volume of the secret room industry has gradually expanded in recent years, the production has become more and more sophisticated. Ten years ago, a store was opened for tens of thousands of dollars, and now it has invested tens of millions. In the past 40 yuan per ticket, there was no secret room. Doing tens of thousands of advertisements, but nowadays, he will heavily promote a theme.
Immersive real-life entertainment and film and television linkage, both the secret room and the IP party are in the process of exploring.
Yuyue has also been cooperating to improve the model of the secret room product.
In the past, Yuyue cooperated with an immersive theater in a theme commercial district in Shenyang. There are theaters, cafes, and hot pot restaurants next to it. It seems to be a bustling area with business opportunities, but its performance has not improved. Many players said, It’s hard to stick to the theme of playing for three hours after shopping.
So Yuyue shortened the theme time to 40 minutes and 20 minutes. "At present, our biggest problem is still constantly running in and cooperating with the secret room. How can we better conform to the logic of the immersion secret room, meet the audience, and at the same time It conforms to the business logic of IP." Li Anning said.
Future development of live entertainment
Or become an important carrier of film and television IP experience
"Offline live entertainment will definitely become a part of the film and television industry in the future, rather than an independent unit." In Man Yi's view, an excellent film and television company cannot rely solely on creating movies, and will be forgotten by the public in the past few months. Offline live entertainment is one of the proven and very successful ways that can truly make IP form a closed loop and have long-term stickiness.
"Nowadays, there are more immersive secret rooms. It's like a movie theater in Beijing had only a few giant screens ten years ago, but now it has become a standard for theaters. In the future, we will not rule out large listed companies or cultural tourism groups from making changes with us. In-depth joint venture cooperation."
Yu Kun believes that the future cooperation between film and television IP and the immersive room will move towards better mutual benefit and win-win in the process of mutual testing and mutual running-in.
Film and television IP does not rule out the establishment of a new immersive secret room theme with the release of movies every year, so that more and more young people will participate in live entertainment.
And immersive secret rooms can not only become a derivative extension of film and television IP, but also have the possibility of grafting with more entertainment and cultural content, "such as online games, VR, sports, drama. Immersive is more like everyone’s dream space, the future It may also become the carrier of all experiential culture."
Written by/Beijing News reporter Zhang He