Walking the bustling corridors of Gamescom, the massive, eye‑catching booths are usually anchored by household names – Capcom, Xbox, Sega, EA, Ubisoft and the like. This year, however, a sizable portion of Halls 6 and 7 is dominated by a company most visitors will not recognize: 4Divinity.
"It's enormous by any standard," explains Philip Doust, director of 4Divinity's UK arm, when describing the publisher's Gamescom footprint. The company is presenting six titles in the closed‑door B2B zone, five of which will appear in dedicated trailer showcases, and four will be displayed on the public floor across two separate stands.
The larger of those stands covers roughly 800 square metres. Doust stresses that the ambition extends beyond sheer size to the overall spectacle.
"We hired one of the top booth builders at Gamescom and spared no expense on the construction," he says. One of the most striking examples is the area devoted to the 1980s‑style pop‑culture RPG *Showa American Story*. The set recreates the Hollywood Hills, re‑imagined as the "Neo Yokohama Hills" in an alternate timeline where Japan governs the United States.
"We built a seven‑metre‑tall Golden Gate Bridge adorned with Japanese lanterns, and a fully stocked diner that visitors can walk into to try the game," Doust adds, emphasizing the immersive, experiential approach. When pressed about the cost, Doust declines to give an exact figure, calling it "crass" to disclose specifics, but confirms that the investment runs into the millions. "The scale of our footprint alone shows the level of commitment. It reflects how seriously we are taking the Western market – something not every Chinese‑based publisher is willing or able to do." The reason this relatively obscure firm can afford such a lavish presence lies in its corporate backing.
4Divinity is part of Singapore‑based GCL Global Holdings, a diversified group that also owns an imitation‑diamond jewellery business. GCL originally grew out of Epicsoft, a physical‑distribution company that has been operating for nearly two decades. While physical media remain a revenue stream, Doust acknowledges that the market is shrinking, especially after recent announcements from Sony regarding disc production.
"We will continue to produce discs as long as Sony supports it, but we recognize the decline and are shifting toward digital," he says. 4Divinity itself was founded in 2022 as a co‑publisher helping Western developers bring games to Southeast Asia. Doust notes that finding a Western title that resonates strongly in China is challenging.
The publisher succeeded with *Atomic Heart*, which performed exceptionally well in the Chinese market, and later with *Stalker 2*. However, those successes were outliers rather than a sustainable growth model. "For a Nasdaq‑listed company like GCL, we needed a globally scalable publishing strategy," Doust explains.
Consequently, 4Divinity began signing Chinese‑developed games for worldwide release. By the time Doust joined in late 2024, the portfolio already included a handful of indie titles and the ambitious *Showa American Story*.
Today the lineup has expanded to eight games slated for release over the next two years. All of them share common characteristics: they are primarily single‑player experiences, run 15–20 hours, and sit in the mid‑tier price range. This focus on the "squeezed middle" of the market mirrors strategies employed by other mid‑size publishers such as the US‑based ProbablyMonsters.
"Players today don't have the time or desire to invest 200 hours in a live‑service game," Doust says. "An $80 AAA title is reserved for a few blockbuster franchises, but there is strong appetite for $40‑$50 single‑player experiences." Developing games in this AA segment typically costs between $5 million and $20 million. Whether produced in China or the West, those budgets require selling roughly a million copies just to break even, a target that is increasingly hard to hit due to discoverability challenges. Doust points out that many publishers shy away from this space because of the financial risk, yet the demand from players remains.
Another differentiator for 4Divinity is its commitment to new intellectual property. Every title showcased at Gamescom is a brand‑new IP, both for Chinese and Western audiences. Larger studios are reluctant to gamble on untested IPs, especially given the rising development costs that have pushed AAA into a franchise‑centric model. "Unless you already have an established franchise, it's difficult to get backing for a brand‑new IP," Doust observes, adding that a few emerging Chinese studios are beginning to break that mold.
The catalyst for 4Divinity's global pivot, according to Doust, was the success of *Black Myth: Wukong*. GCL handled the game's physical PS5 distribution worldwide and acted as publisher in Taiwan. Because Game Science, the Chinese developer, lacked the infrastructure to manage global logistics, 4Divinity stepped in from its Singapore base.
The title's triumph highlighted a broader opportunity: since China lifted its console ban in 2016, many Chinese developers have set up console and PC studios and are eager to reach international markets. *Black Myth: Wukong* reportedly cost around 300 million yuan (approximately $44.6 million) to develop and sold 30 million copies, delivering a substantial profit margin. Doust notes that production costs in China are considerably lower than in the West, and Chinese gamers are highly price‑sensitive. This economic environment shapes 4Divinity's strategy: leverage cost‑effective Chinese development talent to create affordable, high‑quality games that can be marketed globally.
Doust's overarching mission is to bridge Western demand for fresh, reasonably priced experiences with Chinese developers' ability to deliver them efficiently. "When I started working with Jacky Choo, GCL's chairman, I asked: what if we could find common storytelling themes that resonate both east and west?" he recalls. Themes like loyalty, revenge, and defiance are universal, allowing the same marketing assets to be repurposed with subtle cultural tweaks for different regions. The company also experiments with a "do‑nothing" approach, where a game is primarily marketed in China and then experiences a ripple effect abroad, typically resulting in an 80/20 sales split (80 % in China, 20 % elsewhere).
*Wukong* followed this pattern, selling 20 million copies in China and roughly three to four million internationally. Doust hopes to shift that balance toward a 60/40 split, which would dramatically increase global unit sales and potentially make a title one of the best‑selling games of all time relative to its modest development budget.
While most of 4Divinity's portfolio originates in China, the company is also testing the reverse flow. Its sole non‑Chinese title, *Guns Of Eschaton*, was developed by Eschatology Entertainment, a new studio based in Cyprus founded by a former Wargaming employee. The marketing campaign kicked off at Bilibili World, a massive anime and pop‑culture expo in Shanghai—an unconventional move for a Western game.
The early exposure generated enough buzz that China became the second‑largest wishlist market for the game after the United States. The massive Gamescom presence is essentially a Western showcase of this bidirectional strategy.
By unveiling its titles in Cologne shortly after a ChinaJoy debut in Shanghai, 4Divinity aims to avoid the traditional lag where games first dominate the Chinese market before attempting a Western push. Doust explains, "We want to launch in both markets simultaneously, rather than playing catch‑up after a Chinese hit has already peaked." Beyond promoting individual games, Gamescom serves as the publisher's grand entrance into the Western gaming community. "We could run separate campaigns for each title, and we do to some extent, but Gamescom lets us consolidate all that effort into one high‑impact event," Doust says.
"Since we haven't done much in the West yet, this is our chance to make some noise. If we're presenting a portfolio, why not go big?"