Black Myth miracle

Unlike Harbin, which draws tourists through innovative strategies and detailed services, Shanxi's tourism skyrocketed in popularity overnight almost solely due to a video game — Black Myth: Wukong.

Sun Jing, who drove with her parents during the National Day holiday in October to visit the Xiaoxitian scenic area in Xixian county, said it was the popularity of the video game that prompted the trip.

"Although I'm aware of Shanxi's rich cultural heritage and ancient architecture, I still couldn't help but be amazed when I saw them in person," she said.

The game, based on the classic Chinese novel Journey to the West, quickly gained worldwide popularity after its release in August, fueling a tourism boom as travelers sought to view the ancient Chinese architecture depicted in the game. Twenty-seven out of the 36 scenes in the game are inspired by the province's rich cultural heritage.

In August, the province saw a 50 percent increase in visits and an impressive 120 percent rise in hotel bookings compared with the previous month, according to travel portal Tuniu.

Chen Shaoqing, first-level inspector at Shanxi's culture and tourism department, said that by the end of last year, social media topics spurred by the game and related to the province's cultural tourism and ancient architecture had been viewed more than 10 billion times.

To turn the internet traffic into actual tourist visits, the department launched the "Travel Shanxi with Wukong" campaign on Aug 22, introducing three themed tourist routes and an eight-day self-driving tour.

Liu Xiaogang, the person in charge of Xiaoxitian, said the daily visitor numbers remain high compared with previous years. The scenic area had to raise its daily visitor capacity from 3,000 to 10,000, due to the unexpected huge influx of tourists.

By the end of November, the scenic area had received a record 653,100 visits, a year-on-year increase of 394 percent, he said.

Liu said the scenic area is building a digital display platform that uses virtual reality and augmented reality technologies to offer an immersive experience of the Buddha statues. It will also enhance its appeal to visitors by adding recreational facilities, developing vegetarian dishes and staging immersive performances.

Lu Yi, director of the Shanxi Institute for Ancient Architecture, Colored Sculpture and Mural Protection and Research, said the success of Black Myth: Wukong and the attention it has brought to Shanxi's cultural heritage demonstrates the immense potential of the digital culture industry in promoting culture and boosting tourism.

Many classic video games are dubbed "travel simulators". For example, the highly acclaimed Grand Theft Auto V is set in a city modeled after Los Angeles, while Assassin's Creed accurately re-creates Paris. However, no game has ever triggered such a significant surge in tourism enthusiasm in China as Black Myth: Wukong.