Diversified ecology and industry innovation, Douyu is on the path of reform.

In recent years, with the rapid development of esports, large and small esports events combined with game live streaming have become an important part of the digital entertainment field. According to the "2024 China Esports Industry Report", the scale of the Chinese esports market has exceeded 27.5 billion yuan, and the user scale has approached 400 million people.

In this context, game live streaming platforms are not only the communication windows of esports events, but also an important bridge connecting players, anchors and game manufacturers. However, with the intensification of market competition, the competition among platforms is also becoming increasingly fierce. How to gain the recognition of users in the unpredictable market environment has become an urgent problem for major live streaming platforms to solve.

As a leading game live streaming platform in China, Douyu has always occupied an important position in the industry with its rich anchor lineup, event resources and content ecosystem. However, in the face of the current highly competitive market environment, the leading platforms are also looking for ways to break the deadlock.

At the end of 2024, Douyu once again stood in the spotlight of the industry with a series of self-produced esports events.

These events not only cover popular games and niche games, but also introduce a cross-platform cooperation model, becoming the highlight of Douyu at the end of the year. In the current highly competitive esports live streaming market, how does Douyu consolidate its industry position through self-produced events? What resources and capabilities are shown behind it?

The answers to these questions may be found in Douyu's end-of-year event layout and strategy.

01

Self-produced Event Matrix: In-depth Layout of Diverse Ecology

The just-ended King of Glory True Bull Cup jointly created by Douyu and Huya is undoubtedly the focus of the end-of-year events. Nine teams competed for a total prize pool of 150,000 yuan through the round-robin group stage and knockout stage.

During the event, related topics triggered more than 3.17 million reads on social media. Through this event, Douyu not only consolidated its influence in the King of Glory field, but also provided exposure opportunities for mid-level anchors, allowing the audience to see more high-quality content.

In fact, as one of the most popular esports projects in China, the King of Glory event itself has extremely high commercial value. Different from the top league KPL, although the True Bull Cup is not a professional event in the traditional sense, Douyu skillfully combines the platform resources with the popular game, achieving a win-win situation for the platform, anchors and the audience.

From the perspective of the entire event period, the level of the competition is not bad, and the program effect is full, and fans of all parties can witness the wonderful moments of their idols. This model not only enhances Douyu's influence in the King of Glory field, but also provides a reference for other platforms.

In addition to popular games such as "King of Glory", Douyu has also expanded the ecology of long-tail games through the "Brawl Stars" Cup. The event combines low-entry participation with entertainment and competitiveness, attracting a large number of non-core players. This strategy not only enriches Douyu's content ecology, but also injects new vitality into long-tail games.

Long-tail games often have a large number of deep user groups. By laying out events, Douyu incorporates these games into the content ecology, which is beneficial to further expand the user scale of the live streaming platform. For game manufacturers, these games with both competitive intensity and entertainment need the support of external content. Douyu provides a window and a professional event content system for this, which can be said to achieve a win-win situation.

For newly launched games, events are also an important content type to attract players. "Delta Force: Xtreme", an annual FPS masterpiece produced by Tencent, is a game suitable for esports, and the Tigerfish Bounty Cup has thus emerged.

The "Delta Force: Xtreme" Tigerfish Bounty Cup is an innovative event jointly launched by Douyu and Huya, which also combines the competitiveness and entertainment of "Delta Force: Xtreme", allowing users to enjoy watching the game. During the event, the resources of Douyu and Huya were deeply integrated, and the interaction between cross-platform anchors was frequent, and the popularity of the event continued to rise. It is worth mentioning that the cross-platform event organization and presentation method have allowed many users who used to only watch live broadcasts on a single platform to break the "dimension wall". This not only reflects Douyu's resource integration ability in cross-platform cooperation, but also sets a new cooperation benchmark for the industry.

As a newly launched and growing game, "Delta Force: Xtreme" has a relatively limited market influence compared to products such as "King of Glory" that have been in operation for a long time and are very mature. Through event promotion, the platform allows more players to understand the advantages of this game and discover the anchors and players they are interested in. This concept of "esports events not only limited to top-level confrontation projects" shows Douyu's in-depth understanding of the game market and also provides new promotion ideas for more game developers.

02

Behind the Diverse Ecology: Resource Support and Innovative Play

The rich events and famous scenes, and the diverse content ecology are not simply achievable by the words "self-produced events".

First of all, self-produced events have achieved a wide coverage of diverse game categories, from popular competitive games to long-tail casual and entertainment games, which can meet the needs of the vast majority of game players as much as possible. At the same time, with the accumulated resources of players, esports audiences and anchors, Douyu organically integrates all parties through the event system, narrowing the distance between each other and improving the user experience.

This diversified layout not only attracts different types of user groups, but also further consolidates Douyu's dominant position in the game live streaming field. For example, the Brawl Stars Cup attracts a large number of non-core players with its low-threshold design, enriching the platform's content ecology.

Secondly, self-produced cross-platform events are also rare in the industry, and in this process, there are many difficulties that need to be overcome.

Through cross-platform cooperation, Douyu and Huya have achieved resource sharing and the opening of commercialization paths. Judging from the relevant data during the event, the cooperative events have attracted a large number of anchors to participate, and the interaction rate and audience retention rate of major live streaming rooms have significantly increased.

Through resource integration, the influence of the event has been exponentially enhanced, and the anchors of both sides have also obtained exposure opportunities brought by their own platforms and other platforms, achieving a win-win situation. This model provides a new cooperation idea for the industry and also provides a new example for competition and cooperation among platforms.

Douyu has thus successfully transformed the platform resources into content advantages, further consolidating the platform attribute of "a diversified content ecology with games as the core".

Of course, the "explosion" at the end of 2024 is the result of Douyu's long-term deep cultivation in the game live streaming and esports market.

As early as June last year, the "Thunder and Glory Cup", formerly known as the "Douyu Glory Cup" and "Huya Thunder Cup" dual IPs, attracted the attention of a large number of esports players and live streaming users, and this has also become the largest third-party "King of Glory" event in terms of scale and influence on the entire network. A total of 4 KPL teams signed by Douyu, including Foshan DRG, Shenzhen DYG, Wuhan eStarPro, and Nanjing Hero Jiujing, participated in the competition, and the intensity of the competition was full.

Interestingly, while ensuring a high-level competition, the entertainment factor has not been left behind. Douyu and Huya each sent 4 signed teams to compete directly. Gemini and Cat, as representatives of the platforms, decided the order of appearance, and each had two "magic bags", corresponding to the advantages of designating heroes and priority in choosing sides. The lineups of the first game were directly voted by the audience, making the interactivity and fun of the game directly full.

The success of the Thunder and Glory Cup has also made Douyu more determined to explore innovative content gameplay. In 2025, people will have the opportunity to see more exciting events with richer gameplay and projects.

03

With Games as the Core, Creating More Participatory and High-Quality Content

Since its launch more than 10 years ago, live streaming is no longer the exclusive content of the game industry. Douyu still insists on providing services to users with games as the core and can gain market recognition. This is not only due to high-quality content, but also because the platform has long-term accurate insight into and immediate response to user needs.

For example, today's live streaming users hope to have deeper interaction with anchors, and Douyu has made corresponding gameplay upgrades in the King of Glory True Bull Cup.

First of all, the event invited many well-known anchors to participate, such as Gemini, Tuomi, Beisheng, YTG Xifa, etc. They not only showed professionalism and humor in the commentary, bringing more topics and discussion points to the audience.

Secondly, the True Bull Cup also adopts a unique competition system, such as the team formation mode of "one female player + four male players". This combination not only increases the fun and uncertainty of the competition, but also brings more tactical changes and teamwork highlights. In addition, the event also introduces innovative mechanisms such as "time-limited substitution", making the competition more watchable and uncertain.

In addition to the "program effect", Douyu also prepared rich benefits for the audience during the event, such as limited-time expressions, game skins, Q-coin skin funds, KPL trendy toys, etc. These benefits are distributed through lottery draws, interactive tasks, etc., greatly enhancing the audience's sense of participation and enthusiasm.

Even Douyu has set up a "Champion's Road Prediction" gameplay, allowing the audience to vote for their favorite MVP player or predict the game result during the event. The audience who makes the correct prediction has the opportunity to share a 100,000 yuan event welfare fund.

With so many gameplay, the pressure on the platform is not small, but the resulting immersive and participatory feeling of the event can really allow game and esports enthusiasts to enjoy the fun brought by the competition, and these will also become the cornerstone of Douyu's future sustainable development.

04

Conclusion

In the context of the rapid development of the esports industry, Douyu's diversified layout has brought new opportunities and challenges to the industry. Through the coverage of diverse game categories and cross-platform cooperation, Douyu not only enhances its own competitiveness, but also provides new opportunities and directions for the development of the industry.

The self-produced event matrix at the end of the year is just the beginning of the outbreak of high-quality third-party esports events. Through a series of innovative event designs and resource integrations, Douyu has taken a solid step in the construction of a diverse ecology. However, to build a more mature and diversified event ecology, Douyu still has a long way to go.

In the future, Douyu needs to continue to exert efforts in the depth and breadth of event content, further expand event categories, optimize event experience, and strengthen cooperation with more platforms and game manufacturers. Only in this way can Douyu maintain its leading position in the highly competitive esports live streaming market and truly achieve the strategic goal of "a diversified content ecology with games as the core".