Tencent’s official channels (wechat Pay, QQ Wallet) have achieved a median arrival time of only 3 seconds for honor of kings top up with a deeply integrated payment system, with a success rate of 99.8% (Data source: Tencent’s 2023 Payment Annual Report). For instance, after a 100 RWEI wechat Pay top-up by Chinese players, the system conducts face recognition with a 0.001% error rate and real-time risk control authentication with a 99.5% fraud transaction intercept rate. The entire process takes only 2.7 seconds, 98% faster than a standard bank transfer. However, in the case of cross-border recharges of international credit cards, due to 3.5% processing costs and delayed cross-border settlement (72-hour average cycle), the time of arrival ranged from 15 minutes to 48 hours (standard deviation ±8.2 hours).
Local payment gateways significantly reduce transaction chains. Brazilian players have used the Pix instant payment system (launched by the Central Bank of Brazil in 2023) to reload. The time it takes to get there has been reduced from 180 seconds to 8 seconds, and the rate of failure has come down from 5.2% to 0.4%, creating a 37% increase in the quarterly recharge turnover of the nation. Turkish players have reduced the recharge time from 30 seconds on the App Store to 12 seconds utilizing the Turkcell phone credit deduction facility. However, due to the 44% depreciation of the lira throughout the year, the actual number of diamonds received has declined by 19% year-on-year. The Southeast Asian Codashop platform is connected to local e-wallets (e.g., Thailand’s TrueMoney and Vietnam’s Momo), with a median arrival time of 9 seconds, three times quicker than Google Play. But in 2023, when gray and black industries took advantage of loopholes to engage in arbitrage, the platform banned more than 120,000 abnormal orders (Codashop Risk Control log).
Blockchain technology is rewriting the speed limit. Tencent will pilot the Polygon on-chain recharge system in 2024. Players are able to complete honor of kings top up through cryptocurrencies (e.g., USDT). The payment cycle will be shortened from 72 hours of traditional payment to 22 seconds, and the payment fee rate will be minimized from 6% to 1.2%. Thai firm TrueMoney piloted the Lightning Network recharge plan in Bangkok. The actual time of arrival was 1.3 seconds (±0.05 seconds), but due to local digital currency regulation limitations, the user acceptance rate was only 14% (Bangkok University Payment Behavior Survey).
The operator cooperation model optimizes the local experience. Indian users recharged with Reliance Jio phone credit deduction and achieved 5-second arrival with the UPI payment system (with a peak processing capacity of 4,500 TPS), which brought user growth in the Indian market to 67% in 2023. Indonesian telecommunication company Telkomsel launched a “direct recharge and free” campaign. With a recharge of 1 million Indonesian rupiah (approximately 64 US dollars), another 15% worth of diamonds can be given. Since the offer was negated with the 15% service fee, the net rate of return, however, is only -0.7% (estimated by the Indonesian Consumers’ Association).
The cross-regional game of risk and speed. Argentine players had used to exploit a regional price gap (0.009 US dollars per diamond compared to a global average of 0.014 US dollars) to mask a Spanish IP through a VPN, which resulted in a unit price reduction by 35.7%. Nevertheless, Tencent’s geofencing technology (IP positioning error ≤50 meters, device time zone detection accuracy ±2 minutes) in 2023 saw a boost in the recognition rate to as high as 94%. 84,000 rule-breaking accounts were blocked. Russian players have turned to the QIWI wallet due to Visa/MasterCard sanctions. The reload period has increased from 12 seconds before sanctions to 180 seconds, but the usage rate still increased by 29% against the trend in 2023 (Russian Payment Association data).
Peak efficiency is determined by technical parameters and compliance. The wechat Pay SSL 3.0 encryption protocol reduces the percentage of data transmission errors to 0.0001%, while third-party platforms, since they are not PCI-DSS compliant, have a 97% higher likelihood of data leakage. In 2023, the “TopUpGuru” in the Philippines generated simulated payment interfaces, causing a 24-hour delay for 14,000 recharges daily and a 3% rate of fund recovery (according to the Central Bank of the Philippines’ anti-money laundering report).
The ultimate judgment: Compliant direct payment channels (such as wechat Pay and local authorized platforms) provide the optimal solution of the “impossible triangle” concerning speed (3 seconds), security (99.5% fraud intercept rate), and success rate (99.8%). If players chase extreme speed, they have to endure the big suspension rate of their accounts (85%) and loss of money risk (recovery rate < 5%) through the black and gray industry channels. According to Tencent data, LTV (Lifetime Value) of compliant users is 2.1 times that of non-compliant users because they can continuously participate in restricted activities (e.g., the “Phoenix Seeking the Phoenix” skin in 2024, which has to be unlocked by earning a recharge of 888 yuan or more).
