Less than a year after testing the waters, ByteDance shut down multiple interactive drama businesses

Due to business adjustments, several exploration IAP interactive drama mini-programs will be shut down on June 17. With the closure of the interactive drama business, does it mean that interactive dramas are no longer popular?

Tech Planet has exclusively learned that due to business adjustments, several exploration IAP interactive drama mini-program businesses developed by ByteDance's commercialization department, Massive Engine, will be shut down on June 17, namely Bubble Heart Selection, Claw Heart Selection, and Jelly Heart Selection.

These interactive drama businesses are embedded in the Douyin APP in the form of mini-programs. Among them, Jelly Heart Selection and Claw Heart Selection are developed by Beijing Bitmanbu Interactive Entertainment Network Information Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Bitmanbu), and Bubble Heart Selection is developed by Beijing ByteDance Network Technology Co., Ltd. According to the query of Qichacha, both companies are 100% controlled by Douyin Co., Ltd.

At present, all three platforms have issued announcements to shut down operations.

Caption: Screenshot of business closure notice.

In the current hot short drama track, there are many subdivisions, and interactive drama is one of them. Interactive drama is a form of entertainment that combines short drama with game interactive technology. It not only retains the compact and exciting characteristics of short drama, but also brings more participation and immersion to the audience through game interactive technology.

Last year, an interactive drama called "It's Over! I'm Surrounded by Beauties" suddenly became popular, which led to the rise of the new cross-border trend of "game + short drama" overnight. According to the "Top 10 Domestic Tour Sales in 2023" released by the third-party data statistics team Guoyou Sales Bar, the interactive drama received sales of up to 80 million yuan last year. Faced with this new cake, multiple platforms such as Yuewen, Kuaishou, ByteDance, and China Online have made moves to lay out.

However, it is quite surprising that ByteDance has shut down its interactive drama business. Is interactive drama no longer popular?

1. ByteDance’s new attempt in the short drama track

ByteDance's short drama business is divided into two lines, one is the Douyin short drama on the main Douyin platform, and the other is the commercialization department's huge engine, both of which are important pieces in ByteDance's short drama business layout. Among them, the huge engine is an important starting point for ByteDance to explore new short drama businesses, and interactive drama is one of them.

In 2020, Tech Planet exclusively disclosed that Bytedance launched and internally tested its first interactive novel APP "Qianli Interactive". This product was also developed by an affiliated company of Bitwalk. However, the interactive novels at that time were far less popular than the current interactive drama content, and eventually "Qianli Interactive" was shut down.

Although this business failed to break out in the interactive content track, it also accumulated experience for ByteDance in developing interactive content projects. Taking advantage of the popularity of short dramas, interactive dramas have entered the fast lane since last year, and ByteDance has also keenly noticed this new track. Tech Planet learned that ByteDance began exploring the interactive drama business in the second half of last year.

Three interactive drama platforms, Bubble Heart Selection, Claw Heart Selection, and Jelly Heart Selection, were launched on the Douyin APP in the form of mini-programs at the beginning of this year.

Caption: ByteDance’s three interactive short drama platforms.

Taking Paopao Xinxuan as an example, you can see on the homepage that in addition to some interactive dramas, in order to enhance the content richness of the platform, Paopao Xinxuan has also launched short dramas of multiple types such as urban passion, son-in-law counterattack, sweet pet romance, etc. These contents require membership or use of platform virtual currency points to unlock.

Paopao Xinxuan launched the first interactive drama about a sadistic love triangle, "The Choice of the Ex's Love". Different from traditional short dramas, this short drama adopts interactive gameplay. In each episode, there will be different interactive options for users to choose from. The user's choice will affect the direction of the plot. It can be said that every interaction will lead to a new ending of the story. This interactive drama requires payment to unlock the plot, and the monthly membership price is 199 yuan.

Caption: Screenshot of Bubble Heart Selection.

ByteDance is not only a platform company, but also produces interactive dramas. In December last year, ByteDance obtained a license for the production of radio and television programs through its subsidiary Beijing Bitmanbu Interactive Entertainment Network Information Co., Ltd., and then began to experiment with the production of interactive dramas.

In December last year, ByteDance completed production of its first self-produced interactive drama "Back to 1990: Beautiful Women Like Clouds", completed the software copyright registration, and put it on the above three interactive drama platforms.

This means that ByteDance has formed a full-link layout from interactive drama production to platform promotion and distribution, and its interactive drama business has gradually surfaced.

3. A tough nut to crack

ByteDance has shut down its interactive drama businesses including Bubble Heart Selection, Claw Heart Selection, and Jelly Heart Selection. It is not difficult to see that interactive drama is still a tough nut to crack.

An insider revealed to Tech Planet that the interactive drama business matrix created by ByteDance is more like a test. Although there are some twists and turns at present, facing the temptation of this market, there is still a possibility of a comeback in the future.

From the current perspective, ByteDance has not promoted this business vigorously. Tech Planet found that the number of topic plays of ByteDance's self-produced interactive drama "Back to 1990: Beauty Like Clouds" in the Douyin APP was only 79,000, far lower than the playback volume of other interactive dramas in Douyin that exceeded one million, ten million, or even hundreds of millions.

On the other hand, for ByteDance, the cost of exploring new businesses is not low. Compared with traditional dramas, interactive dramas require more content materials and complex technical architecture, so their costs will increase significantly. From scene construction, actor performances to post-production and other links, more resources need to be invested, and the production cost is high.

The high production costs also mean that interactive dramas cannot be produced as efficiently as short dramas, so there are not many interactive dramas available on the market. For example, there are only a handful of interactive dramas on ByteDance's platform.

Moreover, the 199 yuan/month price of the Byte interactive drama platform is relatively not low. For example, the official version of other games such as "It's Over! I'm Surrounded by Beauties" is priced at 42 yuan. During the discount season, the price can be as low as 35 yuan. It only costs a few dozen yuan to experience it. If you spend the same 199 yuan, users can experience at least 4-5 interactive dramas.

From a macro perspective, although interactive dramas are becoming increasingly popular, there are still very few hit interactive dramas that have become popular. Except for "It's Over! I'm Surrounded by Beauties!", most interactive dramas have not yet become popular with market influence.

According to the "2023 Short Drama Industry Special Report" released by West Securities, the film and television industry has been trying interactive dramas around 2019 and 2020, with different plots and stories based on the audience's answers, including "Black Mirror: Pandanaskey", "The Antique Bureau: The Origin of the Buddha's Head", "The Great Detective: The Prime Suspect", "Love Apartment 5", etc., but overall there are no blockbusters and the volume is relatively small. At present, the existing interactive dramas have problems such as insufficient plot coherence, weak interactivity, and insufficient immersion.

3. Top players continue to test the waters

Although ByteDance’s interactive drama business is currently encountering setbacks, there are many leading players in the content industry who are testing the waters to explore interactive dramas. Internet platforms such as China Literature, Kuaishou, and China Literature have all taken action.

At the end of last year, Hou Xiaonan, CEO and President of China Literature, announced China Literature's "Short Drama Galaxy Incubation Plan", which included three major initiatives to explore interactive short dramas. Less than a month later, the interactive short drama "The Bourne Legacy" jointly produced by China Literature, Huying Technology, Shanghai Film Yuan and Shanghai Film Production was officially launched on the Steam platform.

During the winter vacation last year, Kuaishou also tried out interactive short drama gameplay, providing users with a variety of AIGC gameplay, such as "Drama Wants to Fall in Love", which allows users to become the protagonist of a short drama with one click through AI tools, attracting 200,000 users to participate in the interaction.

ReelShort, a short drama platform operated by CMS, an overseas subsidiary of China Online, has become popular overseas. This month, it opened a new interactive game section in its APP and launched an interactive short drama called "Pregnant by My EX's Dad".

In addition, according to Baijing Chuhai, the developer of ReelShort also operates the interactive novel platform Chapters. According to Diandian Data, Chapters' revenue from both platforms in the past year was 49 million US dollars, while ReelShort's revenue in the same period was 67 million US dollars. In terms of revenue scale, the former is not much inferior. If the cost is taken into account, the profit of interactive novels is more lucrative. The interactive short drama launched this time also let the outside world see the new ideas of Chinese Online for the commercialization of short dramas.

Many industry insiders are also optimistic about interactive dramas. A short drama producer told Tech Planet that the commercialization of To C content represented by mini-program short dramas has basically been successful, and short dramas with a recharge turnover of tens of millions have appeared. For example, "Oh! The Queen Comes to Work" had a user recharge of over 12 million in 24 hours, and "Wushuang" had a spending of over 100 million in 8 days after its launch.

With the rapid development of innovative content forms such as interactive short dramas, new stories may emerge in this sub-segment.