Entrepreneurs are becoming increasingly aware of the financial potential of the ACG world, and are trying to break into that community. Photo: Cui Meng/GT

Investing in the 'other' world

Since the success of the comics, the cartoon series, the movie and the smartphone games of One Hundred Thousand Bad Jokes, Dong has been consulted by a number of investors and other people working in the industry wanting to develop related products.

An enterprise without two-dimensional attributes can hardly expect to do well in the market, said Dong.

"The two-dimensional community is very different from traditional people," he said. "For instance, we would tell the investors in the beginning that any product you develop should be youai (literally meaning 'to have love,' provoking some special feeling inside somebody). But it's hard to explain, and there's no authoritative explanation or analysis for it."

The difference in the values, behavior, language and concepts of ACG fans and that of the three-dimensional world, is known as "the wall."

Despite the growing knowledge about the ACG community, Dong said the wall still exists between the two worlds. "The older the generation, the higher the wall is for them."

Dong pointed out that only by producing good quality products that are easily understood can a piece of work break through the wall and become popular on both sides, but this rarely happens.

"It's a paradox between depth and width," said Dong. "Once the works transcend a bigger audience, it usually lacks in profundity. Those [companies] who chase after width might lose their hardcore clients, who don't like popularized products," he added.

"Based on China's practical situation at the moment, the developers will definitely prioritize width, since the number of in-depth users is still relatively small."