This month, we’re spotlighting our new investment in Shanghai-based game studio Cyancook, which recently released a viral debut trailer for its first title, and we also highlight the growing dominance of China in AAA gaming. As always, please reach out to our team with any follow-up questions.
🌉 About: Cyancook is developing its debut title, Of Peaks & Tides, an ambitious survival sandbox reimagining the genre with infinite possibilities. Blending Minecraft-inspired creativity with intuitive physics and UGC-friendly systems, the game offers a dynamic, immersive world that evolves with player interaction. At its heart lies a fantasy co-op ARPG adventure, where players explore, rebuild civilization, and progress through items and gear in a living, ever-changing world.
👑 Team: Cyancook was founded by Ted Cao, a former Tencent Games producer. Having known Ted for many years, TIRTA leveraged this relationship to secure an early position in the Studio ahead of the game’s release and potentially larger funding round.
🙈 Status: Three weeks ago, Cyancook dropped its first game trailer, going viral on Chinese video site Bilibili with 1.5M+ views, building strong momentum as the game enters late-stage production. You can check out an IGN article with gameplay video here.
At Gamescom a few weeks ago, we at TIRTA noticed an increased Chinese developer presence at the convention - both from large publishers, and – more surprisingly– indie developers (including our very own Cyancook).
This isn’t exactly surprising; Since the launch of Black Myth Wukong in 2024 and Chinese domestic policy towards the gaming industry easting, the Chinese gaming market has been on a roll. But few would have imagined its magnitude - and we believe that it’s here to stay.
To wit: Five out of the 6 new games that cracked $500M in annualized revenue globally in the past year, were made by Chinese developers (the sole exception was Swedish developer Arrowheads’s Helldiver 2). Many of these titles have are popular not just in China, but also found significant audiences in the west as well.
Source: Company Filings
China has also become a major consumer market for HD (premium PC and console) games, unimaginable just five years ago. The success of 2024’s Black Myth Wukong unleashed latent demand from Chinese gamers no longer satisfied by just mobile games, but also hungry for premium HD content. Though it varies depending on the month, Simplified Chinese is now the #1 or #2 default language on Steam, the world’s largest PC distribution platform. Popular PC games now generate 20-30%+ of their global sales from China, making the region impossible to ignore.
What’s more, the cost of development in China remains 30-50% cheaper than in the West, even with recent inflation as local players scramble to fill in the premium gaming gap.
TIRTA’S TAKE:
We encourage our portfolio companies to embrace China as both an expansion location (if they can attract and keep local talent), and as an important market that requires a distinct go-to-market strategy. This often involves working with local publishers and platforms, as well as building an on-the-ground community / marketing team.
Despite the structural challenges of investing in China, it’s a region that gaming investors should not ignore. There are near-term supply/demand dynamics that makes the market attractive, but more importantly, we see China as a leader in gaming content innovation.
The breadth (and depth) of the local market coupled with lower cost of development means a greater pace of experimentation and ultimately, innovation.
Chinese developer Paper Games successfully brought the niche Otome genre to mainstream in the 2024 game “Love and Deepspace” (revenue of $650M as of June 2025, ~50% outside of China)
