Walking the bustling corridors of Gamescom, the most eye‑catching booths are usually attached to household names – Capcom, Xbox, Sega, EA, Ubisoft, and the like. This year, however, a substantial portion of Halls 6 and 7 will be dominated by a company many attendees may not recognize: 4Divinity. "It's massive by any measure," says Philip Doust, director of 4Divinity’s UK arm, describing the publisher’s Gamescom footprint.
The company will showcase six titles in the closed‑door B2B zone, five of them featured in the associated trailer showcases, and four titles on the public showfloor across two separate stands, the larger of which covers roughly 800 square metres. The ambition extends beyond sheer size; Doust emphasizes that the booth has been built by one of Gamescom’s premier contractors and that "no expense has been spared." One of the most striking installations is for the 80s‑style pop‑culture RPG *Showa American Story*. The set recreates a Hollywood‑hillscape that, in the game’s alternate timeline, has been renamed Neo Yokohama Hills, a place where Japan governs the United States.
"We built a seven‑metre‑high Golden Gate Bridge adorned with Japanese lanterns, and a fully stocked diner that visitors can walk through while they play," Doust explains. The experience is designed to be immersive and memorable. When pressed about the cost, Doust declines to give a precise figure, calling it "crass" to disclose exact numbers, but he confirms that the investment runs into the millions of dollars. "The scale of our footprint alone shows we are committing resources at that level.
It reflects how seriously we are taking the Western market – something not every Chinese‑owned company does or knows how to do." The reason this relatively obscure publisher can afford such a splash is its corporate lineage. 4Divinity is one of several gaming entities owned by Singapore‑based GCL Global Holdings, a conglomerate that also dabbles in imitation‑diamond jewellery. GCL’s roots lie in a physical‑distribution business called Epicsoft, which has been operating for nearly two decades.
While physical media remains a part of the group’s revenue – and will continue as long as Sony produces discs – Doust acknowledges that the sector is in decline and that the group needs a digital‑centric growth engine. Enter 4Divinity. Launched in 2022 as a co‑publisher to help Western developers bring games to Southeast Asia, the company quickly learned that finding a Western title that resonated in China was a tall order.
Their first breakthrough came with *Atomic Heart*, which performed strongly in the Chinese market, followed by a similar success with *Stalker 2*. However, Doust notes that those titles were outliers rather than a sustainable model. As a Nasdaq‑listed entity, GCL required a growth strategy that could scale globally.
"From a growth perspective, we needed to become a global publisher," Doust says. Consequently, 4Divinity began signing Chinese‑developed games for worldwide release. By the time Doust joined in late 2024, the company already had a handful of titles, including the ambitious *Showa American Story*. Today, the portfolio has expanded to eight games slated for release over the next two years, marking a rapid growth phase.
The emerging catalogue shares common traits: predominantly single‑player experiences, roughly 15–20 hours in length, and positioned at a mid‑tier price point. This focus on the “squeezed middle” of the market mirrors strategies pursued by other indie‑focused publishers such as ProbablyMonsters.
Doust believes this segment captures current player sentiment: "People don’t have the time or desire to invest 200 hours in a live‑service game. An $80 blockbuster is reserved for a few titles, but many gamers are willing to spend $40–$50 on a well‑crafted single‑player adventure." Developing games in this range typically costs between $5 million and $20 million, regardless of whether the studio is in China or the West.
Doust points out that to break even, a title must sell around a million copies – a challenging target given today’s discoverability hurdles. 4Divinity’s approach also diverges in its emphasis on new intellectual property. "Everything you’ll see at Gamescom is brand‑new IP," Doust states.
While Chinese gamers are accustomed to fresh titles, Western audiences often see established franchises dominate. Larger publishers, wary of the high risk associated with AAA development, tend to stick to proven series, leaving a gap that 4Divinity aims to fill. The pivotal moment for the company, according to Doust, was the distribution of *Black Myth: Wukong*. GCL handled the game’s physical PS5 distribution worldwide and acted as publisher in Taiwan, leveraging its Singapore base to bridge the gap for Game Science, a Chinese developer lacking global reach.
The success of *Wukong* highlighted a broader opportunity: since China lifted its console ban in 2016, many Chinese studios have returned home, creating console‑ready games at a fraction of Western development costs. Tax filings suggest *Wukong* cost roughly 300 million yuan (about $44.6 million) to produce, yet it sold 30 million copies, delivering a substantial profit. Doust stresses that lower development costs and price‑sensitive Chinese gamers shape 4Divinity’s strategy. By offering affordable, high‑quality experiences, the publisher hopes to satisfy Western demand for fresh titles without the astronomical budgets that deter many major studios.
"There’s a massive drought of supply for this type of game," he says. His mission is to connect Western appetite for novel, reasonably priced experiences with Chinese developers capable of delivering them. "My thesis, when I started working with Jacky Choo, was ‘what if we can find common themes between East and West?’" Doust explains.
Themes like loyalty, revenge, and defiance are universal, allowing the same marketing assets to be repurposed with different cultural lenses. Even without aggressive marketing, games can cross borders organically – a phenomenon Doust calls the "do‑nothing" business model, where a title primarily marketed in China creates a ripple effect abroad, typically yielding an 80/20 sales split (80 % in China, 20 % elsewhere). *Wukong* followed this pattern, selling about 20 million copies in China and 3–4 million internationally. 4Divinity aspires to shift that ratio toward a 60/40 split, believing that a more balanced distribution would dramatically increase overall unit sales.
Doust muses that if *Wukong* had achieved such a balance, it might have become the best‑selling game of all time relative to its modest development budget. The company is also experimenting with reverse promotion – taking a Western‑developed title, *Guns of Eschaton*, and launching it first in China via Bilibili World, a massive anime and pop‑culture expo in Shanghai.
This early exposure propelled China to become the second‑largest wishlist market for the game, behind the United States, demonstrating that the “Silk Road” approach can work both ways. In summary, 4Divinity’s expansive Gamescom presence mirrors its broader strategy: simultaneous, cross‑market launches that avoid the lag of waiting for a game to become a hit in one region before entering another.
By consolidating multiple titles under one high‑visibility banner, the publisher hopes to make a loud introduction to Western audiences, leveraging the scale of Gamescom as a launchpad for its global ambitions.