7554
On December 16, 2011, a game developed 100% by Vietnamese hands officially launched amidst the anticipation and expectations of the local gaming community, that is 7554. From its very first demo, this game garnered the trust and pride of Vietnamese gaming fans.
Set against the backdrop of the First Indochina War with all voice acting done by Vietnamese, players take on the roles of Viet Minh soldiers alongside their comrades fighting against the French colonial army. Never before had a game developed by Vietnamese received such intense attraction as 7554, to the point that renowned gaming news sites worldwide had to cover and report on it.
Counter-Strike
Counter-Strike (CS) is an iconic and long-standing first-person shooter game. The game is essentially a mod of Half Life created by Lê Minh and Jess Cliffe.
In CS, players join one of two teams: the terrorist team and the counter-terrorist team, both with the common goal of eliminating the opponent… CS truly created a sensation in Vietnam upon its release, so much so that gaming cafes sprang up solely to meet the demand for playing this game with friends. The first concept of Esports in Vietnam also began from here.
Released on June 19, 1999, the game underwent numerous updates with a rapidly increasing player base. From there, a massive Esports ecosystem was created, with CS as its core. The prizes for competitions gradually increased.
Flappy Bird
Flappy Bird did not achieve success right from the start. The game was launched in May 2013 and the number of downloads in the first week was hardly in the thousands. There was a period when it continuously dropped in the rankings, only to suddenly become a “hit” shortly afterward.
By mid-January 2014, six months after its launch, Flappy Bird had climbed to the number one position on the iTunes charts. At first glance, Flappy Bird looked no better than a game on Java from 10 years ago. Its graphics, gameplay, and objectives are all very simple. However, it is this simplicity that contributed to the game’s success.
In simple terms, we can compare Flappy Bird to a mentally torturous experience that is painful and frustrating, even driving one to madness, yet it is also incredibly addictive and captivating.
To this day, the exact reasons for the game’s phenomenon remain unexplained. It was mentioned in a video by PewDiePie, a very popular gaming account on YouTube, but that was after the game had already gained more popularity for about a week. It could also be due to complaints about the game’s difficulty on Twitter.
During its existence, Flappy Bird also received many mixed opinions regarding its difficulty and the alleged copying of sounds, images, and gameplay from a well-known game before it. As the game was growing stronger, developer Nguyễn Hà Đông suddenly terminated Flappy Bird, removing the game from the App Store and Google Play.
The above examples are evidence of the gaming capabilities of the Vietnamese, simple yet rich in identity while being equally attractive and trendy!