Tokyo: Being coveted by my wife, I just want to play games

Dongchuan Che had known for a long time that Shanhe Group wanted to develop stand-alone game business.

But to be honest, he didn't expect that Shanhe Group would go so far as to make an open world game based on the ancient times.

This difficulty

In fact, it is still quite big.

It’s not that the subject of prehistoric times is difficult to write about. There are classic literary works in China such as Investiture of the Gods and Journey to the West, and Shanhe Group also has cooperation with the largest online literature platform in China.

The story and IP are ready, but the open world is a difficult point.

The narrative rhythm of open world games like "Old Man Ring", "My Cousin", and "That Game Series" is not as strong as that of linear games.

Although these games also have some very good story plots, they are not games like "Persona", "Detroit: Become Human" and "The Legend of Paladin" that rely on strong plots to keep players playing.

Games like Persona and Chinese Paladin don’t need to be very good in terms of gameplay, or have a lot of content to explore, or even have very fine graphics. As long as the plot is good enough, players will be motivated to keep playing.

To put it simply, the main difficulty of linear narrative games lies in the plot design; while the difficulty of open world games lies in how to arouse players' desire to explore this open world.

Of course, it is difficult to say which of these two development directions is easier or more difficult. After all, games with excellent plots are very rare. However, open world 3A games require a lot of experience from game producers.

Even a genius like Hidetaka Miyazaki had to make Demon's Souls, Dark Souls 1, Dark Souls 3, Bloodborne, and Sekiro before he made Elden Ring. But even for Elden Ring, there were some problems with "the game guidance was too vague" when the game was first released.

If Hidetaka Miyazaki had not accumulated a large number of fans with his previous works, and those fans were very active in making various walkthroughs, in fact, if a player who rarely played open world games and did not like to look up relevant information online played "Elden Ring", it would still be easy to be confused.

To put it bluntly, although players of "Elden Ring" call Lani their wife every day on the Internet, how many people can complete Lani's storyline without reading the guide?

Many players gave up on Elden Ring because they didn't know what to do after entering the game. This is because Miyazaki had never made an open world game before. He stuffed a huge amount of high-quality content into Elden Ring, but because it was his first open world game, he didn't do a good job in guiding players. Players don't know a lot of content unless they look up guides online.

Game guidance, this is the most difficult part of open world games, and China

China's game market is huge, but it is mainly dominated by online games and mobile games, and there are relatively few players who often play stand-alone games. In the previous life, "Elden Ring" sold 25 million copies worldwide, but the sales in China were only about 5 million copies.

It was so popular that the entire Chinese single-player game circle was ignited, but the sales volume was only 3 million copies, which shows that there are indeed relatively few players in China who play single-player A games. If Shanhe Group wants to make a game with a prehistoric theme, then the main audience must be domestic players in China.

In other words, if Shanhe Group wants to make a 3A game with a prehistoric theme, it must take into account the domestic market conditions in China and the fact that many potential customers in China are not familiar with the gameplay of stand-alone games, which will further increase the test on the ability of game producers.

Too difficult, however.

Thinking of the scene when "Black Myth: Wukong" was released in his previous life, Dongchuan Che glanced at the man in the red shirt sitting opposite him, and then said, "Okay, if you are sure you want to do this theme, I can give you some guidance. However, when the time comes, all the various building model materials, various character and equipment model materials you make must be put into the [Origin Engine] for sharing. Of course, I have also told your boss Bao about this. You can also use the materials that our company has added to the engine in the past two years for free."

If a partner from another country wants to work with him to make a 3A open world game, and that company, like Shanhe Group, has little experience in making stand-alone games, he probably won't get involved in this mess. After all, he has no reason to spend his own manpower and resources to help other companies grow. But a Chinese company wants to make a 3A open world game with Chinese themes.

To be honest, if the dark horse had not been born when he traveled through time in his previous life, he would not have agreed to Shanhe Group's request for cooperation, but now it is different.

Like the vast majority of game practitioners in the world, before Black Monkey was released, Dongchuan Che was actually not optimistic about the sales of Black Monkey.

The theme of the black monkey makes Chinese players very excited, but the influence brought by this theme is mainly limited to China. It is not to say that there are no foreign players interested in Chinese culture, but the main influence is still concentrated in China.

This is like the "God of War" series. How many Chinese players play God of War because of the themes of Greek mythology and Norse mythology?

Generally speaking, Chinese gamers who played God of War after 15 were attracted by its name and action game theme. Players who played God of War on PS1 and PS2 in the early years mainly played it because the first generation of this series became famous in Europe and the United States as soon as it came out, and because of its fame and good reputation, it attracted more players to play it.

One reason.

Foreign players rarely play Chinese games simply because the game theme is Chinese mythology or folk tales. Therefore, if Black Monkey wants to gain market share abroad, its reputation and quality must at least reach first-tier standards, otherwise it can only take over the domestic single-player game market. At that time, the best-selling single-player game in China was "Tales of Immortality".

Yes, before the release of Black Myth: Wukong, the best-selling single-player game in China was "Tales of Immortality". This game was the only domestic single-player game at that time that broke the 4 million sales mark.

Next up is The Painting Scroll of Taiwu, which has sales of nearly 300 million, Chinese Parents, which also has sales of around 300 million, Dyson Sphere Program, and My Time at Portia.

To put it bluntly, before the birth of Black Monkey, there had never been a game in China with sales exceeding five million.

In this case, how many game practitioners will remain optimistic about the prospects of Black Monkey?

How many game practitioners think that China's stand-alone market has great potential?

Capital looks for markets, just like women look for men after entering society.

I won’t say it’s absolute, but most women who have entered society don’t want to find a man who has no present and no future; most capital also doesn’t want to enter a market that has no present and no future, and the same goes for Dongchuan Che.

If he hadn't seen the great success of Black Monkey, he wouldn't have supported Shanhe Group. However, this is only one aspect.

Another reason is the game engine.

Because of works such as "Elden Ring", "FGO", and "World of Warcraft", the [Source Engine] of the renamed and iterated Holy Light Society not only has a large number of European and American style architectural landscapes, character equipment and other models, but also because of the Japanese architectural models of "FGO" that are more like "Persona", and the Asian style models added to "World of Warcraft", the current [Source Engine] is also very powerful. However, there are relatively few models with Chinese elements.

On the one hand, "World of Warcraft" is still its first expansion pack. Although it has added many more Chinese elements to the game than the original, in this version of "World of Warcraft", the Chinese elements are just side dishes, and the company's programmers have not yet carried out large-scale model construction.

On the other hand,

At present, China is not only weak in cultural promotion, but also in talent cultivation.

For example, in terms of art style, although there are definitely some hidden bigwigs in those universities and some scholarly families, these bigwigs can only come to the Holy Light Society as a nominal art director at most, and it is impossible for them to do it themselves, and there are relatively few related practitioners.

This point can actually be understood by looking at the character modeling of domestic ancient style online games and mobile games. The character modeling of almost all ancient style online games and mobile games looks similar, and the models of buildings and various trees, flowers and plants in the game are also similar. Compared with the ancient style online games and mobile games more than ten years ago, the biggest change is the resolution and anti-aliasing. This also brought a big problem to Dongchuan Che - there was no relevant talent.

We can't expect those designers who specialize in European, American or Japanese art styles to suddenly study Chinese art for a few months and then become successful, right?

In a highly professional industry, unless one is a rare talent, most people need to study in this field for a long time to achieve success. Now it is difficult for the internal staff of the company to transform, and on the other hand, there are not enough outstanding talents in China for him to recruit. However.

The various Chinese-style modeling does not necessarily have to be designed manually by programmers and designers. They can learn from "Black Myth: Wukong" and go directly to the field to scan.

But as a foreigner, he couldn't get involved directly. There was a lot of hostility in society right now, and some things were easily exaggerated by netizens. This was the second reason why he decided to support Sunward Group. Or rather, this was the most critical reason - he wanted to exchange material models with Sunward Group.

By then, he will use material models similar to the weakened version of "Black Monkey" to create the Pandaria map of "World of Warcraft". At the same time, after the material models in Japan and South Korea become more abundant, he will also make an [Enhanced Edition·Asian Edition·Grand Theft Auto 5]!

And it’s not just the art quality!

Dongchuan Che's mind is not only filled with games, but also movies, novels and other things!

At that time, he will use the most advanced and exaggerated art pictures, and then integrate a lot of storylines in his head to make a game with a degree of freedom that is comparable to or even exceeds [Grand Theft Auto 5]. At the same time! In terms of the plot, he will also incorporate all kinds of popular urban online novels in China and urban light novels in Japan!

In his initial conception, after entering this game, the player will start to grow up directly from the student days, and then according to the player's progress in the game and the emotional level with different male and female protagonists, the entire story line will continue to jump!

For example, if the player chooses to go gambling on stones at the beginning and triggers some related important NPC plots, then the player will be involved in part of the plot of the novel "Golden Eyes" and get to know various characters in the plot;

For example, if the player starts the game as the son of a Korean chaebol, then according to the player's choices during the game, he will also be involved in plots similar to "Rampaging Korean Entertainment" and "Peninsula Prosecutor";

For example, if the player chooses a Japanese high school student and meets some special characters during special time periods in certain games, the plot will be cut into "My Sister Can't Be This Cute" and "Kaguya-sama: Love is War". Even because the game will incorporate games such as football and basketball, the player may trigger plots such as "Slam Dunk" and "Detective Conan"!

In short, all urban stories in China, Japan and South Korea without superpowers may be selected into this game! And these story lines are not fixed. It does not mean that if you choose one of the story lines, you can only go one way to the end. Players can make new choices as the plot progresses, and even jump back and forth between multiple story lines.

This kind of setting can easily lead to conflicts between characters and events. Therefore, Dongchuan Che's current idea is to give players two options at the beginning of the game. One is a thorough [Fun Game], in which the logic will be reduced a bit, so that players can experience all the stories as much as possible without any regrets, and they can also start a harem.

The other is a more realistic mode, in which the concept of time appears in the game. If you miss a character's key plot at a certain key time point, then this plot will be skipped directly. And if there is a conflict between the plots of some heroines, then if you choose one of them at this stage, the other may become a passerby heroine in the game.

All in all, Dongchuan Che wants to make a game with awesome graphics, lots of gameplay content, and so many plots that players can’t finish playing it all!

Of course, this kind of game is extremely technically difficult to make, and the workload is also quite terrifying. Not to mention too much, there are so many stories that have to be integrated as much as possible. Even if Dongchuan Che finds a lot of editors, it is still a very time-consuming job, and a lot of the plots need to be written by himself.

Although it was just copying from memory, it was definitely a huge workload, and Dong Chuan Che didn't have the time or energy for it at the moment. However, as the saying goes, you have to eat one bite at a time. Dong Chuan Che wanted to make the game of his dreams, and he would definitely need to use various Chinese building models, flower and grass models, and other materials. To obtain these materials, cooperating with Shanhe Group was a very good channel.

Dong Chuan Che had a thousand and eighty thoughts in his mind, but the man in the red shirt sitting opposite him didn't know about these thoughts. But as an uncle who was selected by Shanhe Group to study at Shengguang Society, he also understood that Dong Chuan Che, a business tycoon, was willing to help them, and it must be for the sake of profit. However.

The problem is not big.

Business is based on the exchange of interests, and the exchange of interests is often not a physical barter of goods.

After hearing Dongchuan Che's words, "When the time comes, all the building model materials, character and equipment model materials you make should be put into the [Origin Engine] for sharing. Of course, I have also told your boss Bao about this. You can also use the materials our company has added to the engine in the past two years for free." He did not hesitate and nodded in agreement.

The communication time with the people from Shanhe Group did not take too long. They met at around four o'clock in the afternoon. When it was dinner time, Dong Chuan Che called several sociable middle-level managers of the company and arranged a farewell party for them.

The red-shirted man and his men were not important officials of the Shanhe Group. They were potential stocks at most. Dong Chuan Che would not personally see them off. But even if they were just some middle-level officials, the red-shirted man and his men still showed surprise and a little fear when they left the office. After all, Dong Chuan Che, who was worth tens of billions of dollars, was a real business tycoon. They felt very honored that such a big shot personally arranged a farewell party for them.

After seeing off the man in the red shirt and the others, Dong Chuan Che, who had been busy all day, came to the floor-to-ceiling window, put one hand in his pocket, looked at the gorgeous sunset on the distant coastline, drank a sip of wolfberry tea, and thoughts surged in his mind.

"The seeds have been planted, but given the speed at which normal companies make games, it will probably take some time for them to blossom."

"The focus of our next work will be entirely on the host side."