Lately, whenever I open Weibo, my Moments, or gaming groups, there’s one phrase I can’t escape: “Niu Lai.”
This “cow” has become a massive hit, yet there’s really no logical explanation for it: Director Xin Yumeng and his mother, Sun Lifang, spent five years using two home computers to create an 86-minute 3D animated film. Released with zero marketing, it grossed a cumulative 7,169 yuan in its first nine days,with 236 viewers. Its lowest single-day gross was 188 yuan, and at one point, fewer than five screenings were scheduled nationwide. By all accounts, this film should have quietly disappeared from theaters, losing tens of thousands of yuan in production costs, and then been forgotten by the world.
As a result, a single complaint from a netizen sent it straight to the trending list.The crude modeling, stiff animations, and the hauntingly bizarre scene of the calf repeatedly crying out “Mom” were so shockingly bad that they piqued even more people’s curiosity. Everyone was saying: “I don’t bother watching just average trash, but something this bad—I’ve got to check it out just to see how bad it really is.”
Then, box office receipts began to skyrocket. On August 15, the single-day total was 717,000; on August 16, it was 6,087,000, bringing the cumulative total to over 26 million. Maoyan’s forecast for the total box office briefly reached 135 million.
At the same time, this wave of enthusiasm gradually spread to more people: since movie theaters didn’t have official posters, people simply drew bull heads themselves; stock investors treated their movie tickets as good-luck charms for a “bull market,” and once inside the theater, they arranged them on their seats to form a rising K-line chart.
On the A-share market, stocks with the character "牛" in their names—such as Jinniu Chemical, Bull Group, and Tongniu Information—have also been surging.
A movie’s box office curve has thus become, all at once, a form of social currency, a wishing well, and a barometer of the stock market. This bull has laid bare the full spectrum of life on the internet in 2026.
The "Frontline Party" was the first to rush into the theater, checking in to the screening room on WeChat Moments with the caption, "Witnessing the 'Abstract Eucharist' with my own eyes."
Meme enthusiasts are quick on the draw—they add meme images to their collection and flood group chats with them for eight hundred rounds, showing off how trendy they are.
The media wasn’t about to be outdone, either. Based on every move made by the director and his son, they launched into a “reading comprehension” analysis, engaging in serious discussions and interpretations about whether *The Ox Comes* is meant to be a badge of honor for the “autistic son” or a spiritual autobiography of the family.
Those who take practical action reap the greatest rewards.
Overnight, major e-commerce platforms rushed to launch all kinds of “Niu Lai” merchandise: 3D-printed standees, acrylic keychains, T-shirts,phone cases, and throw pillows—the full range of products, forming what appears to be a fully-fledged IP merchandise market—even though this “IP” had earned less than 10,000 yuan in cumulative box office revenue as of last week.On Douyin, “Niu Lai” plush keychains are priced between 8.6 and 26.8 yuan each; many stores have already sold over 10,000 units, and pre-orders at some shops are backed up as far as half a month in advance.
Game developers certainly can’t afford to miss out on this valuable opportunity.
Currently, a slew of "Niu Lai Like" games have popped up on major platforms—mostly casual games with the lowest entry barriers—but developers are coming up with all sorts of creative ways to "ride the trend."
Some have resorted to a blatant name-riding tactic: they simply added the words “Niu Lai” to the title, swapped out the icon for a passport photo of Niu Lai, and called it a day. But once you open the game, you realize the content has absolutely nothing to do with “cows”—though its level of abstraction does stay true to the spirit of the original film.
Some games feature a "skin swap"—on top of classic puzzle-matching, obstacle-course, and parkour gameplay, the art style is replaced with the main characters from the movie—the Tripping Cow, the Cup-Holding Leopard, and the Hard-Flying Lark are all in their respective spots, and the sound effects include a line like "Mom!" is slipped into the sound effects, and the loading screen is replaced with the four characters “Cow Brings Good Luck.” Although the gameplay follows the same old formula, it certainly delivers some great entertainment value.
Of course, there are also games that incorporate the film’s central theme and innovate on core gameplay mechanics—such as *Cow Trip*, which centers on tripping over obstacles, and *Cow Trip* Stock Market Simulator. While these games may not be particularly polished, they at least offer players a fresh experience.
Furthermore, as of now, quite a few products have seen solid user growth, demonstrating that while “riding the wave of popularity” may be a crude tactic, it is effective.
原创文章，作者：游茶妹儿，禁止转载：https://youxichaguan.com/en/archives/219596
