There was a time when Onmyoji was the trailblazing gacha game that shook the entire mobile anime gaming scene — everyone and their neighbor was playing it. Now, a player scrolling through revenue data made a startling discovery: Onmyoji's 2023 revenue came in lower than "Tomorrow" (明日). The OP recalled, "Back when it launched, tons of people around me played. Even a couple years ago, I still knew people active in it. Now everyone's quit." A once-ubiquitous mobile game, and not a single soul in sight still playing.
But the comment section wasn't having the "Is this even gossip?" framing. For Onmyoji veterans, plummeting revenue is ancient news. A top-liked comment put it bluntly: "Player attrition is brutal and onboarding new players is a nightmare. Low revenue is well-deserved — the quality doesn't justify the prices, and the devs keep pulling anti-player stunts. Honestly, the current revenue is already a blessing." That comment zeroed in on the root cause: Zen Studio (Onmyoji's dev team) has been speedrunning self-destruction.
Just how bad is it? The most damning evidence is a player-compiled 520 (a Chinese Valentine's-themed spending event) bill. One commenter listed every paid item Onmyoji dropped during the 520 event: Mai Kuraki collab theme ¥30, animated avatar ¥30, Shiranui collab skin ¥68, Taki collab skin ¥68, Peacock Prestige Edition ¥416, new Summoning Room ¥250, new interlude ¥100, Fox Spirit skin ¥110, Black Panther skin ¥110, Usagi animated avatar ¥75… the total? A staggering ¥1347 (roughly $185). Players turned it into a meme: "Babe, just transfer me ¥1314 for 520, I'll cover the remaining ¥33 myself." The exact numbers may not be perfect, but as one commenter noted, "it's pretty close."
Beyond absurd pricing, Zen's rap sheet of controversial moves is practically endless. Multiple comments referenced the "Super Ghost King" event that mass-triggered veteran player departures — one dual-account holder said they used to buy every Prestige Edition on both accounts but stopped cold after that incident. Others pointed to Zen "relentlessly adding jade-sink consumption projects" — from Summoning Rooms to Spirit Books to Spirit Guardian skins, every patch brings new ways to drain premium currency. An old-timer admitted they quit during the original Ghost King grind years ago and "will NEVER go back to that game," though they gave credit where due: "The art team still slaps though."
The revenue ranking data is where things get truly spicy. NetEase's internal January-to-April 2024 figures were leaked into the thread: Naraka: Bladelife at ¥3.24B, Fantasy Westward Journey at ¥2.63B, and Eggy Party at ¥1.9B formed the "Big Three." Identity V (¥990M), Infinite Borders (¥780M), and World Outside (¥690M) made the "Small Three." Meanwhile, Onmyoji sat at just ¥440M — lumped into the "Other Main" tier alongside mid-tier titles. Commenters also noted that Onmyoji's full-year 2023 revenue (~¥1.2B) was already surpassed by Arknights (~¥1.4B). As for the confusion over whether "Tomorrow" in the OP's title meant Arknights (明日方舟) or LifeAfter (明日之后) — the comment section briefly erupted into a heated debate. LifeAfter's Jan-Apr was only ¥190M, but if the comparison was with Arknights, then yes, the former "Gacha Emperor" has officially been dethroned by a junior.
One soul-piercing question capped off the entire thread: "Who exactly is still spending money on Onmyoji?" Once the face of Chinese gacha gaming — the game that launched an entire wave of Japanese-style mobile titles — Onmyoji has been dubbed the "Gacha Emperor" (二次元先帝) by commenters. One summarized the situation with brutal efficiency: "Self-inflicted wounds plus the government crackdown on Japanese aesthetics this year — all karma, all deserved." From national phenomenon to a game slumped in the "Other Main" revenue tier, Onmyoji's trajectory might be the inevitable fate of all aging gacha games. It's just that Zen Studio's creative dedication to shooting themselves in the foot accelerated the timeline quite a bit.
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