Game Science bets Chinese mythology can make a global 3A hit; Wukong sells 20M in a month

Game Science was founded in 2014 in Hangzhou by Feng Ji and Yang Qi after their Tencent MMO Asura (《斗战神》) was reshaped by free-to-play monetization. In February 2018 the founders decided to 'pioneer' a premium single-player title; at a dinner where teammates argued for sci-fi shooters and action adventures, everyone went silent when Journey to the West came up — the shared cultural memory became the game's foundation.

The studio spent 6.5 years developing on a team of roughly 100 people. On 2020-08-20 it posted a 13-minute gameplay demo, mainly to recruit staff — Feng Ji expected about 500,000 views; the video drew tens of millions, made the project a national phenomenon, and became its marketing launchpad.

Black Myth: Wukong (黑神话：悟空) launched 2024-08-20 on PC (Steam, WeGame) and PS5. Game Science announced 10M copies sold across platforms by 2024-08-23, with 3M peak concurrent players and 2.29M on Steam (then the second-highest peak in Steam history); Guinness World Records certified 20M copies sold in the first month.

Chinese media (Pengpai (澎湃), Jiemian (界面)) framed it as the start of China's 3A era — a full-priced, buy-to-play single-player game out-exporting the domestic mobile norm, with Goldman Sachs calling it a turning point for Chinese games going global. By mid-2026 reported cumulative sales exceeded 30M copies and the studio had announced its next title, Black Myth: Zhong Kui (黑神话：钟馗).