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China’s Black Myth: Wukong mania lifts sales of Sony’s PS5 gaming console

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China’s Black Myth: Wukong mania lifts sales of Sony’s PS5 gaming console

The hit action role-playing game – developed by Tencent Holdings-backed studio Game Science and based on the classic Chinese novel Journey to the West – has sold at least 4.5 million copies since its release on Tuesday for the PS5 console and personal computers.
“This is a big win for Sony,” Yan Fang, a third-party gaming hardware merchant in Shanghai, said on Wednesday. “PS5 offers the best option for those who want to try out Wukong, but cannot afford to buy a 40-series Nvidia display card [for their PCs].” He added that his bricks-and-mortar store on Tuesday received more than dozen inquiries about the PS5’s availability.

Sony’s flagship store in Shanghai’s upscale Huangpu district on Tuesday saw its stock of six freshly delivered PS5 consoles quickly snapped up, as a stream of shoppers helped lift total sales that day above normal levels, according to the shop’s staff.

Sony’s flagship store in Shanghai displays posters and other promotional materials for Black Myth: Wukong on August 21, 2024. Photo: Ann Cao

Shoppers who place an order for a PS5 after Wednesday may need to wait for up to a week to get the in-demand console delivered, according to the staff.

On Xianyu, Alibaba Group Holding’s online flea market, the number of searches for PS5 consoles surged 300 per cent this month. The platform –without specifying the day – saw the highest single-day transaction exceeding 700 orders this month, as many sellers put the keywords “Black Myth” or “Wukong” into their product description to boost traffic. Alibaba owns the South China Morning Post.
In the seven days before Black Myth: Wukong’s launch, the transaction volume for PS5 on Sony’s Tmall store rose more than 100 per cent year on year, according to data from Alibaba’s Taobao and Tmall Group. The console also held the No 1 “hot item” position for video gaming equipment on Tmall for four consecutive days during that period.
The high demand for PS5 on the mainland shows the potential for even greater sales of video gaming hardware when the anticipated version of Black Myth: Wukong for Microsoft’s Xbox Series X and Series S consoles gets released.
A young man plays Black Myth: Wukong, as a crowd looks on at a store, during the video game’s launch day in Shanghai on August 20, 2024. Photo: AFP

A student studying for his master’s degree at Hong Kong Baptist University, Li Shuyan said he is considering buying Sony’s PS5 to fully enjoy playing Black Myth: Wukong.

The hit title has given mainland gamers a strong reason to upgrade their gaming hardware.

For gamers on Windows, running Black Myth: Wukong smoothly on digital gaming service Steam is likely to require more investment. Gamers will need a system equipped with at least Intel’s Core i5-8400 or Advanced Micro Devices’ (AMD) Ryzen 5 1600 processor and 16 gigabytes of random access memory, as well as a high-performance graphics card such as Nvidia’s 6GB GeForce GTX 1060 or AMD’s 8GB Radeon RX 580.

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Will China’s first triple-A game ‘Black Myth: Wukong’ reach global heights?

Will China’s first triple-A game ‘Black Myth: Wukong’ reach global heights?

In the first half of this year, about three quarters of video-gaming revenue on the mainland was generated via mobile games played either on a smartphone or tablet, with only 23 per cent from Windows desktops and consoles, according to data from the China Audio-Video and Digital Publishing Association.

The huge popularity of Black Myth: Wukong, however, could change that revenue structure.

That strong demand augurs well for the prospect of consumer spending in China’s video game market this year, which industry research firm Newzoo has projected to reach US$45 billion.

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