P'ng Yi Wei

Homegrown Hero Tells You Scary Dreams Are The Ones Worth Chasing

Meet P'ng Yi Wei, an ordinary Malaysian from Bukit Mertajam, whose love for creating games led to planting the seed of an idea in 2009 when he was still a final-year diploma student at The One Academy. He formed the Kurechii team with two of his coursemates, creating their first ever platform-jumping game Reachin' Peachin, which became a hit unexpectedly, garnering over 1000,000 players within a year. Following the success of that, he was itching to create his next game. He decided to pursue making games full-time, leading to the establishment of his very own studio named Kurechii.

His indie game studio has created award-winning games such as Postknight, Tiny Guardians, King's League: Odyssey and more which have amassed 13.7 million players and counting across the globe. To top it off, Kurechii is also the first studio from Malaysia to feature on Apple Arcade - one of the most prestigious gaming platforms, with their game King's League II. They stood proudly amongst a global lineup of 100 companies selected by Apple, including game giants such as Square Enix, Sega and Capcom.

His passion for games started ever since his father bought him a computer as a present during his school days. As a student, he was more intrigued by how his favourite games work than trying to impress others with his academic achievements. Even so, that could not stop him from achieving 10As in the SPM exams.

Needless to say, his parents had high hopes for him to pursue a career as a doctor or lawyer with such exceptional results. However, instead of joyously celebrating his achievement, he had a huge argument with his father when he told his parents about his dream to make games instead. It led to a strained father-son relationship, with very minimal communication between them for the next several years. Even more so when his father left for overseas on a job opportunity to earn more income to support the household and education for his other siblings too.

After convincing them that he would be responsible for his own destiny, and with luck he got selected to be an education fund recipient, he went ahead and graduated with a diploma in Digital Media Design from The One Academy. It wasn't without some struggles, he lived on a tight budget where buying art materials is difficult let alone owning a laptop. Despite having to go through sleepless nights to fulfil all the extra practices he set out for himself and completing his assignments with a borrowed laptop from his college mate, he persevered and remained determined to achieve his dream. It was only during his graduation ceremony that he finally met his father again for the first time since leaving Penang to study in KL.

It was during the time where the entire world was experiencing an evolution in mobile technology. Back then, there were not many Malaysian companies focused on digital games development, which posed more challenges for those who share the same specialization as Yi Wei. So instead of waiting for his dream job to appear, Yi Wei made the daring move to build his own game studio, and the rest was history creating a space for others who share the same zest!

"The proudest moments are seeing our games finally published for everyone to play, bringing out the inner child in them." - Yi Wei

Though he is living his dreams now, it didn't come without experiencing his share of failures and struggles. One of the lowest points in his journey was that his team only managed to obtain 30 downloads for a game launched after the release of King's League, which was a hit that racked up 2 million players in two weeks. Though his passage to success wasn't all smooth sailing, with keeping a strong mindset coupled with unwavering passion and steadfast discipline, he is still doing what he loves today. Passion may be what gets him started on a game, but discipline is what drives him to complete it.

In recent years, the games industry has expanded by leaps and bounds to cater to almost 3 billion gamers worldwide. Today, we are presented with more opportunities thanks to technology advancements and those who dedicate themselves to growing the local creative industry, like Yi Wei. Unlike in the past decades, comprehensive education programmes designed to nurture design specialists for the ICT sector and games industry are now more readily available here locally.

Being passionate about something in life is one of the best assets that money can't buy. Start discovering your passion and get the best out of life!

Just like Yi Wei, if technology, arts and video game development are things that interest you. These programmes are carefully designed by top ranking international design and computer science institutions - The One Academy & DigiPen (Malaysia) for those who are serious about achieving their dreams to be a professional interactive designer, game artist, animator, game writer or game programmer in the world of game-making!

He took a bold step, how about you? Connect with us to find out how we can help you to delve into your passion as a creative professional !