Even if "Battle to the Peak" has indeed walked out of its own road of e-sports variety shows, this road is still only allowed to take one step forward......

Reading Entertainment | yiqiduyu

Text | Garlic jelly corner

If compared with two years ago, today's "Battle to the Peak 3" already has a good market influence. On the first day of broadcasting, the program rushed to the TOP1 of the Maoyan variety show popularity list and the TOP4 market share of the lighthouse variety show, and entered the mass market as a vertical program "Battle to the Peak 3".

E-sports variety shows can get relatively good initial popularity, with the influence of program IP accumulation, star artist influence, and audience market size, and "Battle to the Peak", which has reached its third season, has also begun to balance the weight of the three factors, and this change may also pave the way for IP development.

Although the IP of "Battle to the Peak" seems to be steadily rising, e-sports is no longer as "hot" as in previous years. According to the "Report on China's E-sports Industry from January to June 2024", in the first half of this year, the actual sales revenue of the e-sports industry increased by 4.43% year-on-year, the number of users was about 490 million, a year-on-year increase of only 0.52%, and in terms of revenue composition, the proportion of live broadcast of e-sports games was the highest at 79.45%. That is, the scale of the e-sports market tends to be stable, and the main economic benefits return to the daily live broadcast tipping of users.

E-sports has grown from explosive growth to a period of normalized development, and e-sports variety shows have to re-answer the question of "who is the show for", although "Battle to the Peak 3" has a good start, but whether e-sports variety shows are worth going deep into the track still needs to be considered.

1

Before "Battle to the Peak", there were also some e-sports variety shows on the market, and the story logic was basically the e-sports of stars, using the influence of stars to leverage the market, "Battle to the Peak" is almost the same template, but it added the link of e-sports clubs, which not only enhanced the attraction of the show to e-sports fans, but also strengthened the watchability of the show, so that professional people and rules can create more highlights for the show.

It is obvious that the show knows where the special point of its third season is, and "Battle to the Peak 3" still maintains the main line of stars entering e-sports clubs for training and competition, integrating stars, games, and e-sports players into one, without superfluous innovation.

However, "Battle to the Peak 3" still made some small innovations and adjustments. First of all, the red and black list settings were added, which not only strengthened the driving force of celebrity guests to compete seriously, but also further strengthened the personal growth line, making the story of celebrities taking off the "rookie" label more conspicuous.

Secondly, in terms of the star lineup, compared with the head artists with more popular influence, this season is more inclined to leave the stage to the artists in the rising stage. In other words, "Battle to the Peak 3" seems to want to verify the market value of the IP itself.

The first season of the program found Yang Mi and Zhang Dada to support the highlights in the early stage, and the artists and interactions with high popularity and high topics opened up the market for e-sports variety shows; Yang Ying and Huang Zitao in the second season are basically the same, and further implement what kind of program "Battle to the Peak" is in the hearts of users - star fans have content to watch, and players and users can also enjoy the competition.

This year, the show did not look for stars with strong eye-catching strength in the mass market, but brought in the younger generation of artists who were "cultivated" in the first two seasons, and began to tell the stories that belong to the program's IP.

This transformation can be understood as paving the way for the subsequent development of IP. First of all, the number of artists who still love to play "Glory of Kings" with a high degree of topic is limited, making it impossible for the sustainable development of IP to rely on such artists for a long time; Secondly, only when the market influence of the IP itself is verified, other values extended from variety shows can be better developed, including but not limited to the ability to support artists, the commercial value of content, etc.

As a variety show vertical in the field of e-sports, it is understandable to initially use popular stars to leverage the market, and after accumulating two seasons, the show began to turn to strengthen the value of the IP itself, this transformation allows us to see that "fighting to the top" is not just a short-term content to ride the e-sports express, but a long-term IP that wants to develop seriously, which is worth recognizing.

2

But the results of "Battle to the Peak 3" are still just an example, or the path of this show is not so easy to copy.

E-sports variety shows themselves have a certain threshold for viewing, after all, in addition to the celebrity reality show part, the competition part will also occupy a lot of space, and it is almost impossible for users who do not play related games and are not fans of artists to stick to watching it, which makes e-sports variety shows naturally lack some variety show users.

But "Glory of Kings" is the competitive game with the largest number of users at present, especially 4 years ago, the official data of the game shows that the ratio of men and women in the game is close to 1:1, that is, "Battle to the Peak", with "King" as the main body of the competition, can relatively smoothly reach the main audience group of female users, the main audience of variety shows, and this alone makes "Battle to the Peak" have natural advantages and difficult replication points.

Secondly, "Battle to the Peak" is still a project that eats more than one fish. Because of the introduction of real clubs, through this program IP, it has also strengthened the exposure and popularity cultivation of "King", game events, and e-sports players, and whether it is variety shows, games or platforms, they are all related to Tencent, which makes this show have more production drives. In other words, considering the multi-dimensional factors, perhaps only Tencent has the motivation to make the next e-sports variety show.

And even if Tencent is willing to make the next e-sports variety show, it may not be easy to get the results of "Battle to the Peak".

Who is the e-sports variety show for? The answer to this question is one of the keys to whether this track is worth digging into or not.

As mentioned above, there have been some e-sports variety shows before, but only the IP of "Battle to the Peak" can reach the third season, and we believe that the show has clarified its own audience. Baidu index data, after 7 months, the ratio of men and women who search for "battle to the peak" is 1:2, that is, there are far more female users than men, and it is determined that the program serves users who play games and female users of variety shows who are pan-players, so as to amplify the feelings and interactions of stars in the program, so that the growth of the artist's game ability and the spirit of the team are more conspicuous, which is also the reason why the program can have a good market influence.

Therefore, if there is a lack of the female user base of "Battle to the Peak" and "The King", there will be a question mark on how many people are willing to watch e-sports programs, and it will naturally be a little unrealistic to go to the e-sports track without sufficient market support, and this should be the reason why we have not been able to see other e-sports variety shows after "Battle to the Peak".

Obviously, even if "Battle to the Peak" does go out of its own road of e-sports variety shows, this road is still only allowed to take one step forward. Perhaps games and e-sports still need to wait for the day when they break through the market ceiling before they can really gain a foothold in the market.

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