The Article
"There is a game called 'Pick Me Up'.
Two years ago, Moebius Co., Ltd. launched a mobile game called 'Pick Me Up', with the subtitle 'Hyper Roguelike Summon RPG'.
Today, in celebration of the 2nd anniversary and reaching 100 million downloads of Pick Me Up, I have the honor of writing a special feature article. Please look forward to it.
Although Pick Me Up is already a popular game boasting 100 million users worldwide, I would like to introduce the game once again for those who may not be familiar with it.
When Pick Me Up first appeared in the app store, many people expressed doubts.
Isn't this just another common, mass-produced mobile game?
However, Pick Me Up gradually gained popularity through word of mouth, and now it has become a national mobile game enjoyed not only in Korea but also around the world.
What could be the reason that Pick Me Up became a top mobile game competing worldwide? Let's examine its appealing points.
First, the Moebius Summon.
This is a key system that was completed after about 5 years of development. The essence of the system lies in creating infinite heroes by randomly combining thousands of patterns.
In other words, whether you summon hundreds, thousands, or even tens of thousands of times, the chance of getting duplicate heroes is almost zero. It doesn't make sense logically, but Pick Me Up broke this common sense and emerged.
However, the revolutionary system was not just a minor change.
Second, Quantum AI.
A few years ago, the showdown between the world's top Go player and artificial intelligence attracted attention. The showdown of the century ultimately ended in the victory of artificial intelligence.
As a journalist, I once imagined witnessing such a historic scene. Before long, wasn't it in a movie that we saw highly advanced artificial intelligence?
Ironically, such an artificial intelligence revolution began at a game company.
The secret to nurturing tens of millions of Pick Me Up enthusiasts lies here. Moebius, the developer, applied highly advanced artificial intelligence that was thought to be decades away to a mere mobile game.
The heroes of Pick Me Up feel emotions and think. When each hero is placed on the stage, they react differently. The heroes make demands, assert themselves, sometimes refuse orders, and sometimes obey them.
When it comes to the core of the game, which is combat, even more astonishing results are shown. Without the master issuing individual commands, the heroes autonomously adopt the tactics they consider efficient and use different tactics and formations for each battle.
Moreover, even if they undergo the same training, their growth values are different, and even if they are the same level and rank, the process and results of the battles are different.
Therefore, the common hero grading table and predetermined training methods found in other games do not exist. It's because Pick Me Up's thousands, or even billions, of heroes each resemble an individual human.
This is the main reason why Pick Me Up is called the "Devil's Game".
It's too realistic. Although the heroes in the game are just products of data, they are so lifelike.
Moebius still does not disclose detailed algorithms.
Recently, a giant Chinese company attempted to acquire the developer with hundreds of billions of capital, but it failed. Attempts to invade the company for the algorithm or hacking were frequent, but they never succeeded even once.
Third, Roguelike.
Ah, there's nothing to do.
The content is lacking.
The above two sentences are sighs representing the feelings of hardcore users that can be found in any game. It is also evidence that the development speed of most games cannot keep up with the consumption speed of content. One of Moebius' staff members said in an interview,
"If you're a hardcore user who spends tens of millions of won, who plays games all day? Try it once."
When this interview first appeared, many users scoffed. However, until now, two years after its release, there hasn't been a single user who has cleared the main dungeon of Pick Me Up.
Even in the current situation where users who spend tens of billions or even trillions of won and users who invest more than 18 hours a day in Pick Me Up pour in.
Pick Me Up has adopted the hardcore rule.
When it was first released, users showed somewhat bewildered reactions. This was because hardcore meant that heroes would disappear when they died.
A hero who has spent tens of millions of won and hundreds of hours disappears with just one battle? In the early days of Pick Me Up, this was pointed out as the game's biggest flaw, and it caused the complaints of many users.
Of course, Moebius has not revised this rule at all. Instead, as time passed, more and more people began to see it as an appealing point.
One enthusiast argues,
The heroes of Pick Me Up are precision-programmed dolls that are almost indistinguishable from humans.
Then, isn't it natural for them to disappear as they are summoned?
Also, Pick Me Up's stages change randomly, and no one can predict what mission will come up.
Since the battles are adjusted by artificial intelligence, there is almost no opportunity for the master to intervene once the mission starts.
In addition, there are dozens, even hundreds, of unpredictable variables. Sometimes a party sent out haphazardly clears a super difficult dungeon, and sometimes a 6-star elite party is annihilated in a lower-level dungeon.
Nothing in Pick Me Up is predetermined.
It constantly changes and flows.
Some criticize Pick Me Up like this.
Then what is the point of the player's existence?
Are they just spectators? What's the point of replacing it with a game of luck and failure?
Isn't it just a bad game with no strategy or control, where you pick high-star and strong heroes with luck and send them out to win?
To those people, I would like to introduce a master from Korea.
His account name is Loki.
He is a prominent user known as the world's top ranker and Master of master, the only one in Korea.
But being number one isn't everything.
That's right. In terms of ranking, Loki is only 5th in the world.
Looking at the ranking alone, it might seem a bit awkward to call him the world's best master.
But he is mentioned more frequently than the first-ranked players and is the only one among them to have earned the prestigious nickname "Master of Master."
The reason is simple.
It's because he had extremely bad luck.
Pick Me Up's summoning system is divided by star ratings.
Free summons range from 1 star to 3 stars, and paid summons range from 3 stars to 5 stars.
It is commonly mentioned in the community that the condition for becoming a top ranker in Pick Me Up is to have at least five natural 5-star heroes. High-star heroes generally fight much better than low-star heroes.
Loki, a master, is here.
He has done about 4,500 paid summons, but he has not received a single natural 5-star hero.
Compared to the tens of millions of 5-star heroes held by the world's 4th and 6th rankers, his performance is quite pathetic.
He has only one high-level hero, a 4-star.
However, he confidently maintains the position of the top ranker in Korea and 5th in the world. This is evidence that Pick Me Up is not just a game of luck and failure, but one where
skill and strategy can make a difference.
Although the master cannot directly intervene in battles, he can cultivate heroes in other ways. By judging the talents and values of heroes that cannot be converted into stats in the status window, he can designate an efficient cultivation method and create parties optimized for their performance.
Loki proved that while 1-star heroes are generally weaker than higher-ranking heroes, they are not necessarily weak.
The meta of Pick Me Up is said to be divided into before and after Loki posted his strategy guide.
In addition to this, when listing the revolutionary changes that Loki brought to Pick Me Up...
...(Click to see more)
▼[Comments - 3135]:
[Lv.51] Dawwww 11 - Agree: 8742, Disagree: 6644
"Why did this journalist suddenly fall from grace? Does it make sense to praise a single user in a game special article? Did Loki pay the journalist to do this?"
[Lv.17] Hail Loki! - Agree: 513, Disagree: 672
"All hail Loki!"
[Lv.3] Haha Laugh - Agree: 13, Disagree: 5
"I heard there's a RagnaLoki fan among the site's journalists. Could it be him? Why hasn't the boss fired him?"
[Lv.21] Diorama - Agree: 11, Disagree: 13
"Frankly, I'm not sure if Loki deserves all this praise. Isn't he just an ordinary pay-to-win player?"
[Lv.76] I'll be the Wallet King! - Agree 3, Disagree 5
"What's this about RagnaLoki?"
└[Lv.31] Ggukggakguk - Agree: 0, Disagree: 0
"It's a Loki fan site. You need a signature to become a top member."
└[Lv.76] I'll be the Wallet King! - Agree: 4, Disagree: 3
"Ridiculous."
[Lv.7] Siriusjang - Agree: 1132, Disagree: 2564
[Blinded Comment]
• "I want to lick Siriusjang's b**t! Lick lick!"
[Lv.22] Wallet King Kim and Goguem - Agree: 811, Disagree: 532
"Regardless of the fairness of the article, we can't ignore Loki's influence on Pick Me Up. Before Loki's account was revealed, wasn't it just a common pay-to-win game, even if the meta changed afterwards?"
└[Lv.15] From Generation to Generation - Agree 4, Disagree 9
"Here comes the Loki stans again!"
└[Lv.22] Wallet King Kim and Goguem - Agree: 321, Disagree: 157
"Am I wrong? Didn't foreign rankers ignore everyone but Loki last time? Now the only remaining Korean ranker is Loki.
Korean Pick Me Up is Loki, and Loki is Korean Pick Me Up.
To put it bluntly, if Loki had just one 7-star, he could have aimed for the top spot."
[Lv.7] Siriusjang - Agree: 325, Disagree: 1132 [Blinded comment]
"I want to lick Siriusjang's armpits! Lick lick!"
└[Lv.15] Ankle Monitor - Agree: 913, Disagree: 132
"Why doesn't this lunatic get banned from commenting on Pick Me Up-related articles?"
[Lv.1] Isel0479 - Agree: 13, Disagree: 11
"Hail Loki! All roads lead to Loki!'