China International Capital Corporation: Current World Models in Game Development Remain in Early Stage, Leading Game Publishers Still Possess Strong Content Moats

China Financial News, March 25 — China International Capital Corporation (CICC) reports that the current application of world models in game development is still in its early stages, primarily providing localized empowerment. They are showing significant efficiency improvements in pre-research and 3D asset creation. In the future, these models are more likely to serve as single-scene generation tools rather than comprehensive game engines. CICC believes that the most directly impacted part of the industry chain is the outsourced services with higher standardization, mainly including art asset creation, basic audio recording, and some coding. One direction for profit pool migration is the creative and management segments upstream in the game industry chain. CICC thinks that leading game developers still possess a strong content moat. In the medium to long term, companies that effectively leverage AI for creation, explore AI’s potential, and continuously strengthen their IP and gameplay advantages are expected to maintain a sustainable edge amid current changes. Ecosystem platforms that aggregate creators and tools may seize new production and distribution opportunities by embracing AI and innovative tools, gaining additional growth during this transformation. Due to high barriers built by pipeline data, midstream engine providers are unlikely to be replaced in the short term, but long-term business model restructuring remains to be validated. Small and medium-sized developers and studios face both opportunities from lowered creation barriers and challenges from a surge in homogeneous content.