The short video app Douyin on Monday launched a mini game in its official game account, marking the Bytedance-owned platform’s entrance into the market of casual in-app games, Chinese media outlet Jiemian reported.
The mini game, dubbed yinyue qiuqiu, or “jumping ball of music” in English, can be accessed through the mini-program tab in the sidebar on a user’s profile page. It is currently the only mini program listed in the tab. Users can also find the link to the game in a video in Douyin’s official game account with the thumbnail (our translation): “Have you ever imagined that you could play games in Douyin?”
In the game, players control a headphone-wearing ball that’s jumping from building to building by tapping the screen according to the rhythm of the song that’s playing. The goal is to help the ball land on the center of each building.
As of early afternoon Tuesday, the game had more than 645,000 likes, 8,300 comments, and 8,400 reposts, figures on the official account show.
A Bytedance spokesperson said the service is still in testing and declined to provide further information to TechNode.
This is not the first time that Bytedance has played with the idea of mini games. The media giant’s content aggregator, Jinri Toutiao, rolled out its mini programs feature last November, attracting a number of mini game developers.
Douyin has also made forays into game-related services before. A link on the profile page of Douyin’s official game account directs users to another page of called “game center,” where a number of popular mobile games are listed. While several of the recommended games are from gaming giant Netease, none is from gaming behemoth and Bytedance rival Tencent.
According to a document for developers of Douyin mini games from Bytedance, the short video platform will offer mini games that choose to launch first on Douyin, and to those with unique features—what the platform refers to as “first launch games”—heftier cuts when dividing ad and in-game purchase revenues.