《黑神话：悟空》杀疯了。
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在8月20日正式发售这天，这款游戏不断创造奇迹：截至当晚，Steam服务器上最高达到160万名玩家同时在线，远超第二名《反恐精英2》的130万名玩家。外国玩家们到处打听：“那只中国猴子什么来历？”
遍布全球的中外玩家们也给游戏开发团队贡献了大量真金白银的支持。据统计，截至其发布的20日当晚，《黑神话：悟空》在Steam平台上已经售出超过300万份，再加上知名的WeGame，Epic!和PlayStation平台，总销量已经突破450万份，销售额突破15亿人民币。这款游戏的热度甚至高到早在发售前一月预售销量就超过120万份，预售额突破4亿元。
On the video games circuit, an arena dominated by Western legends, one can say the Chinese legends have arrived.
On Tuesday, the day of its official release, 1.6 million global players were playing together online the newly developed game Black Myth: Wukong on the Steam platform. It had more takers than Counter-Strike 2, Dota 2, and Elden Ring, all popular worldwide.
The investment has received good returns as by Tuesday evening over 3 million copies had already been sold on video game digital distribution service Steam. Another 1.5 million copies were sold on WeGame, Epic! and PlayStation services, with the total sales having exceeded 1.5 billion yuan ($210.3 million).
纵观游戏史，这样的高光时刻着实罕见。
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为这一刻，中国玩家已等待多年。
电子游戏是在上个世纪六七十年代随着个人用电脑终端的普及在欧美日本兴起的，发达国家具有先发优势，任天堂等最早的游戏公司即诞生于那个年代并推出了最早的街机与红白机。欧美游戏当然优先采用欧美的神话与现实故事作为蓝本，于是当八九十年代游戏机开始在中国出现时，中国玩家们只能沉浸于欧美的故事里。
《魂斗罗》
红白机上最早的《魂斗罗》是新西兰为背景的故事，《龙王战士》和《圆桌骑士》分别是《魔戒》和《亚瑟王》在游戏世界的复现，好不容易有个近邻日本公司开发的《超级马里奥》，讲的也是意大利水管工在纽约四通八达的地下管道世界里打怪升级。
It was in the 1960s and 1970s that video games first emerged in Europe, the US, and Japan, with the first batch of developers naturally choosing Western legendary and historical stories as the basis of their games. Contra and Super Contra had their tales started in New Zealand, the King of Dragons and the Knights of the Round were based on the novel Lord of Rings and the story of Arthur King, while Super Mario told stories about an Italian pipe worker’s adventures in the underworld of New York.
《龙王战士》
《超级马里奥》
到了二十一世纪初，电脑取代了街机和红白机。能在世界玩家里流行的游戏依然是国外开发的，风靡网吧的《星际争霸》《魔兽争霸》《反恐精英》都是典型，基于《魔兽争霸III》开发的Dota和后来独立进化的Dota2都是典型。这最后两者尤为典型，虽然是基于架空的魔法世界开发的，但其魔法都是欧美神话中的魔法，选用的炼金术士、圣骑士、娜迦海妖等英雄都来自于欧美传说和历史。
Even old favorites such as Red Alert 2 or WarCraft III or SuperMario have a Western cultural background. After them, there is Dota 2 and its predecessor Dota, which, too, are based on a fictional magical world but most of their heroes, such as Alchemist, Paladin Omniknight and Naga Siren can all be traced to ancient European tales. Elden Ring’s characters are mostly Western in style.
All of which made some joke that all legendary heroes have one thing in common, they speak fluent English.
《反恐精英》
难怪在游戏玩家中流传一个段子，无论是来自宇宙空间的外星人还是魔法世界的远古怪兽，英语都说得很溜。当然溜，那是说英语的开发团队基于英文版的文学作品开发的，面向的也是说英语的玩家。
All of which made some joke that all legendary heroes have one thing in common, namely speaking fluent, standard English. Surely they do—their world was invented by English-speaking teams based on English-language literature to serve English-speaking customers.
这种英语优势大到甚至连中国玩家都习惯了，《反恐精英》曾经推出过版本较高的中文版，但听惯了英文游戏音的中国玩家都很难适应全欧美画面里的中文游戏音，干脆坚守着版本较低的英文版。
不要小看语言优势。谁的游戏走向世界，谁就能把自己的想法灌输给玩家。九十年代打遍世界、今天依然有不少怀旧玩家的《红色警戒2》是以架空的冷战为背景的游戏。这款游戏就对苏联进行了不遗余力的抹黑，其中一个细节是占领了美国纽约的苏军士兵会自动对着和平居民开枪，而攻入乌拉尔山的美军士兵却开着宣传车与当地苏联居民和平共处。游戏里夹带的美国意识形态私货，再明显不过。
Ideological prejudices easily get hidden in the language. In Red Alert 2, a game based on the Cold War history that was popular in the 1990s and early 2000s and still appealing to large numbers of players worldwide, Soviet troops that occupied New York City would fire at unarmed civilians while US troops that invaded the Ural mountains won’t do the same.
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不能说当时没有优秀的中文游戏，但那些游戏基本都是中国人自己玩，很少能火到国外去进行反向文化输出。这一情况直到《王者荣耀》横空出世才算有所改变，这款游戏采用的人物绝大部分取材于中国古代历史和神话传说，以其高度的游戏适配性和随时随地可玩的特点从中国玩家走向世界，从2023年试水巴西开始，到今年7月国际服已经覆盖全球160多个国家和地区，累计用户注册量超过5000万，扎扎实实打了一把输出。
China had its games but most were played domestically only. It was not until Honor of Kings, which picked the absolute majority of its heroes from Chinese legends and history, was welcomed by players worldwide that the situation started to change. By July, its international server claimed to have over 50 million registered users accumulated, covering more than 160 countries and regions worldwide.
但《王者荣耀》游戏属性过强，选用的英雄更多是碎片化分布于中国历史各个朝代，有花木兰也有诸葛亮，还有来自日本的不知火舞和宫本武藏，鲁班大师更是与夏侯惇同台竞技，缺少一个很明确的中国历史故事脉络，这也导致其受到一些学者诟病。
相比之下，《黑神话：悟空》是第一次由中国团队基于中国神话推出的中国游戏风靡世界，其文化输出的完备性是以往任何游戏都不具备的。前期测试的几个boss，包括赤尻马猴、百足虫、虎先锋、晦月魔君等等也都能在《西游记》中找到原型。再加上这款游戏用的是不逊色于目前全球主流的引擎和画面，能吸引到全球玩家。
玩《黑神话：悟空》的老外想了解为什么主角是一只猴而boss是一只虎的话，就得去好好读《西游记》，别无选择。
Compared with Honor of Kings, Black Myth: Wukong is the first Chinese game developed by a Chinese team based on a Chinese legend that has gained world influences, which makes it a more suitable culture exporter. Its engine, modeling, and quality of image are all among the world's mainstream ones, making it appealing to global players.
在《西游记》这个蓝本中，孙悟空这一形象作为主角更是为传播本身助了不少力。不夸张地说，孙悟空或者猴王形象是海外认知度最高的中国神话形象之一，而且已经在多场游戏中出现。
就在几年前，Dota与Dota2都将齐天大圣添加进了自己的英雄榜单，为这一中国神话英雄设计了比较符合原著的专属技能与形象。随着中国文化影响力增强，在那两款游戏里只是众多英雄之一的齐天大圣在新的游戏里成了绝对主角，整个游戏都围绕其成长经历展开。
Compared with Honor of Kings, in which most heroes are drawn from Chinese history or legend, Black Myth: Wukong has gone a step further by telling the story of a traditional Chinese legend in the form of a video game, the popularity of which will open the eyes of global audiences to the rich storehouse of Chinese legends.
The success of the game also owes a lot to the selection of Wukong – the monkey king hero from the classic Chinese novel Journey to the West – as the game’s hero, which has long been so well known in the West that even Dota and Dota 2 had both listed Monkey King among their heroes. The appeal of traditional culture and the application of modern video techniques are working wonders.
当然，《黑神话：悟空》打出开门红，离不开开发团队六年磨一剑的努力。中国历史源远流长，可作为游戏素材的神话故事浩如烟海，值得更多的游戏开发者去挖掘。
今天在多个游戏社群里流传一首诗，或许在游戏开发者与玩家的共同努力下，会成为越来越多中国玩家游戏里的现实：
你曾在大马士革骑过马
在欧洲当过海盗
在美国西部小镇开枪决斗
也在西亚当过刺客。
现在
你终于可以回到家乡
做自己的英雄了。
You mounted in Damascus, blade in hand
took a pirate trip in the Atlantic
won a duel in the Wild West
and did assassination in West Asia.
Now it’s time to come back
And be a hero in your own land.
记者：张周项
编辑：左卓
实习生：高尊荣
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