Otherworldly Architect

In an offline brand store, after buying two ties and paying the bill.

Mingyan saw that it was past nine o'clock, and he planned to go back to the company directly.

But a coincidence happened, as soon as he walked out of the store, a man with a surprised face walked up to him.

"Brother Cheng! Why are you here?" He came up to meet him, looking at Xia Cheng eagerly.

Xia Cheng nodded and said, "Come to buy something. It just so happens that you are here."

Ming Yan glanced at the man in front of him, he had a baby face, and when he smiled, he had an innocent and youthful feeling.

Xia Cheng took a step back and introduced the two of them respectively:

"This is a clear statement. The chief designer of Blue Star Studio is also an old friend of mine."

"This is Zhu Wenshu. He is working as a game architect at Timberwolves and has also cooperated with IPP."

Ming Yan shook hands with Zhu Wenshu, and said with a little surprise, "Coincidentally, we are colleagues."

Zhu Wenshu looked at him, slowly smiled, and said, "Senior, you are the famous 'religious leader'. I have really admired your name for a long time. When the League of Legends was launched, I heard about you in school." It's a deed."

Zhu Wenshu looked very enthusiastic and insisted on inviting the two of them to have a cup of coffee.

Mingyan had no interest at first, but accidentally heard about a game designed by Zhu Wenshu called "Grasp of the Empire", which also got a high score of 9.5 in the evaluation of the League One.

——Designers communicate with each other, maybe there will be unexpected gains.

With this in mind, Mingyan sat down happily.

Xia Cheng sat down next to him, and the three of them found a very secluded corner.

When asked about "Grasp of the Empire", Zhu Wenshu also had a very proud smile on his face.

He looked at Xia Cheng, his eyes were soft and he said: "Speaking of the things back then, I have to thank Brother Cheng for giving me the opportunity. He is my nobleman. "Grasp of the Empire" started because of his recommendation. , I really don't know how to repay..."

Coffee is here.

While talking, Zhu Wenshu skillfully put a piece of sugar into it, stirred it gently, and put it in front of Xia Cheng.

For some reason, Xia Cheng straightened up slightly, and looked sideways at Mingyan.

Xia Cheng said: "No, these are all my job responsibilities, and there is nothing to talk about giving opportunities. Mr. Zhu, don't be so polite..."

Zhu Wen Shu flattened his mouth and said, "Is it because I've been too busy playing games recently? I feel like I've broken up with Brother Cheng! Last time we agreed to go to the Wilderness Survival Club together, but we haven't been able to..."

Xia Cheng straightened his back, sat upright and said, "No, no, let's talk about it later."

Zhu Wenshu didn't seem to be able to hear the polite words, clasped his hands together and said with a smile: "Great, when I finish finishing the new game at hand, I will have the opportunity to go out with Brother Cheng soon!"

Xia Cheng opened his mouth, but he still couldn't find a line to evade.

At this time, I only listened to the clear words on the side, and asked curiously: "Can you introduce a new game? I am also preparing for a new project recently, and I think we can share our experience in this area."

Zhu Wenshu: "..."

Xia Cheng: "..."

Wow, Xia Cheng really loves Mingyan's ability to find key points now.

The weird atmosphere on the coffee table suddenly became inexplicably upright again.

The corner of Zhu Wenshu's mouth twitched, and he said, "Why don't we contact each other by email in the future. Today I want to talk to Brother Cheng..."

Before the words finished, Mingyan lowered his head and took out his business card.

The two exchanged business cards, then Zhu Wenshu was a little confused, looked at Xia Cheng, and then at Mingyan.

After a while, Zhu Wenshu said: "Then... can I have a private chat with Brother Cheng today?"

Ming Yan boldly said: "No problem, I will go back to work overtime."

Xia Cheng almost jumped up from the table, and hurriedly said: "No, no, I'm going to work overtime too."

Mingyan: "?" Huh?Do you want to go back and play games with me?

Xia Cheng hastily added: "Mr. Zhu and I actually don't have anything to talk about. It's all about cooperation at work. I really haven't opened the back door for him. Everything can be settled during the day. Today I just I plan to come out to play with you—"

Mingyan: "???"

"..."

Zhu Wenshu finally saw the clues, and his smile gradually became difficult to maintain, leaving a somewhat ugly expression.

He said sarcastically: "Mr. Ming is really a big airs. No matter how he invites brother Cheng, he can't invite him. You can still play a small temper and threaten him to leave when you are unhappy. It really is the game world. Senior, I have a very high position, in fact, if you don't like me, you can just say so!"

Mingyan was stunned for a moment, then said with a blank face: "What happened? I don't mean anything, you can just talk first."

He got up, picked up his coat, and walked out the door.

Seeing this, Xia Cheng immediately stood up and chased after him with big strides.

From the beginning to the end, Xia Cheng never touched that cup of coffee.

Mingyan went outside first, only to find that Xia Cheng was still following him.

Xia Cheng's back was about to break out in cold sweat, and he said in a loud voice: "I really don't know that Zhu Wenshu very well, only work contacts! I have never helped him with anything, you have to believe me!"

Ming Yan smiled and said: "I know, you have a good eye for games. You also signed "Minecraft" back then."

Xia Cheng: "..."

He carefully looked at Mingyan's expression, and finally confirmed that Mingyan was not annoyed at all.

Oh my god.

Xia Cheng didn't know whether he should be happy or disappointed.

Soon, Xia Cheng called his driver and sent Mingyan back to Blue Star Studio first.

Well, the driver is still Comrade Li.

It has been more than three years, and he has long been used to Mingyan getting in the car from time to time.

And he has already seen through the two people in the back seat!There will be no longer the confusion of "drive faster or slower" in the past!

He now knows that Chief Designer Ming's heart is definitely: "Hurry up to the company, I really want to work."

Young Master Xia's heart is definitely: "Drive more slowly, and chat outside for a while."

At this moment, Lao Li's heart is: Look at this status gap!I'm sorry for you, young master. Anyway, even if you ask, you must understand the boss, so let's drive quickly and get over it.

Mingyan quickly forgot about this little episode that happened in the mall.

But what I didn't expect was that some people were worried about it.

In June, the "Star Show Contest" held by the IPP platform went on as scheduled and reached the finals smoothly.

The five judges have been confirmed and came to the online venue to make the final score.

Mingyan looked at the list of contestants in the background, and greeted the rest of the judges by the way.

Unexpectedly, she ran into Zhu Wenshu.

Zhu Wenshu was also the first to greet Mingyan, saying, "Hi, senior."

Mingyan was a little surprised, and said, "It's such a coincidence, you're also coming to be a judge?"

He saw the work card on Zhu Wenshu's chest.

Zhu Wenshu said with a smile: "Yesterday, I saw the list of judges for the Star Show Competition on the official website, so I knew that you would come, senior. No wonder Brother Cheng had dinner with you yesterday. I can't participate in the competition planned by Brother Cheng." She is much worse than her predecessors, so I temporarily recommend myself..."

Halfway through his speech, a staff member behind him said, "Who is the fifth judge? We need to arrange your position."

Zhu Wenshu said: "I'll go there first, see you, senior."

In fact, Mingyan was a bit surprised.

In all fairness, although Zhu Wenshu has a high-quality game with good traffic under his name, his qualifications in the industry should not be enough to be a judge.

He graduated two years later than Mingyan, and he currently only has this "Grasp of the Empire".

His own personality among the players is almost "a genius designer who exploded in one game", which is similar to when Mingyan was a fledgling.

If you sit on the judging panel, will you be able to convince the audience?

Soon, Mingyan guessed the reason behind this while chatting with another judge in the background.

To be honest, the remaining judges didn't like Zhu Wenshu very much, they just maintained a superficial harmony.

One of the younger judges was particularly frank.

He said to Mingyan: "After all, it is an event organized by IPP in person. There are already a lot of masters in the first session. It is foreseeable that it will bring a lot of traffic in the future, so it is very rare to be able to show up in the first session. I wish Wen Shu bought traffic and came in through the back door, so you don't have to talk to him."

Clearly stated: "..."

Since he sat on the judging panel through a special relationship, it was only natural that he was secretly excluded.

The work of the judges is actually quite easy, as long as they try out, comment on and score the top eight works on stage in turn.

During this period, several judges were reluctant to accept Zhu Wenshu's words.

On the one hand, it was indeed his act of going through the back door that caused public outrage;

On the other hand, it is also because his words are more embarrassing.

Several contestants showed their works on stage successively, and several judges focused on criticism and encouragement, pointing out the advantages and disadvantages of the works and opportunities for improvement.

But Zhu Wenshu pointed out Jiangshan and directly put forward a "revision suggestion", saying: "You can directly cut off the third profession. There is nothing outstanding in the design, and it can be incorporated into the second profession. In addition Your combat system can completely change the combo mechanism..."

When he was talking, the contestants on the stage were gradually unable to maintain their smiles.

According to Zhu Wenshu, this game will have to undergo drastic and special changes, and it will become completely unrecognizable.

But at that time, did the game count as their own, or as Zhu Wenshu's design?

Perhaps it is a kind of conceit about one's own ability that "geniuses" all have.

As if pouring out his talents, Zhu Wenshu made similar modifications to each of the entries, turning them into what he imagined, and based on this, he scored the entries.

Other judges have the tendency to try to correct Zhu Wenshu, and Mingyan also reminded him: "... I think it depends on the designer's own ideas."

But Zhu Wenshu smiled and said to Mingyan: "Don't you have a design idea, senior? You don't know how to change it is the best choice for it?"

Mingyan said nothing more.

When it comes to game design ideas, there are tens of thousands of them in the world, and I clearly have so many in my heart... But after all, this is someone else's work, someone else's game.

The explicit and tactful reminder aroused Zhu Wenshu's dissatisfaction.

The remaining few judges could see that there seemed to be some discord between the two.

When the next contestant came to the stage, he looked at Mingyan very excitedly, and opened his mouth and shouted: "Hello, Master!... Well, hello, judges and teachers!"

The audience in the audience burst into laughter.

The most famous teacher on the judging panel is obviously the Chief Designer Ming of Blue Star.

At the beginning of the competition, when the judges were introduced, the applause given by the audience to Mingyan was the warmest.

In fact, among the contestants on the stage, there are many people who regard Mingyan as their idol—but none are as sincere as this one, and the admiration is beyond words.

The contestant blushed with excitement, and his teammates pulled him, but did not pull him back.

Ming Yan had no choice but to nod his head as a signal, reminding him: "Hi, let me introduce myself first."

As a result, he stood on the stage and said excitedly: "My name is Yu Bing, and I am a junior this year. I am the teacher's apprentice, and I am also a Mingjiao. After I played "Minecraft" three years ago, I especially worshiped him. The chief designer of Ming Dynasty, so I applied for the game design major! I... I participated in the competition today, just to imagine that I am on par with the leader, and I want to make the best game in the world!"

He is still a very young student, and his nervousness can be seen from his speech.

The audience in the audience applauded spontaneously for him as an encouragement.

Soon, the rest of the team also introduced themselves.

Yu Bing then calmed down and introduced his entries.

This is a stand-alone mobile game with interesting gameplay. The theme is that the protagonist of the game is constantly climbing a high tower and defeating all kinds of monsters.

The characteristic is that the protagonist fights automatically.

The player only needs to click to let the protagonist release the corresponding skills, and occasionally give him points when the protagonist upgrades.

After all, it is a game that was completed in three days, and the content is quite simple.

The degree of completion of this game is already considered very good, and it is temporarily ranked third among the top eight games.

But to be honest, the function of "automatic combat" is very unpopular in the interstellar era.

In the public opinion, "combat" is the most important main content of a game.

So there is still some controversy in this game.

Sure enough, other judges also took the lead in asking this question.

And Yu Bing stumbled and explained: "Our game is not for players to focus on fighting monsters and upgrading. I just want...to let them play games while watching TV. Or when they are waiting in line , neither bored nor so focused that you miss something..."

After listening to him, the judges had a private discussion in a daze.

Ming Yan smiled and asked, "Did you have this idea when you first designed it?"

Yu Bing blushed as soon as she saw him, rubbed her hands nervously on her clothes, wiped off the sweat, and said, "Yes, yes. I imagined Dad lying on the sofa watching TV..."

Small laughter began to appear from the audience again.

Mingyan nodded, and said gently: "In fact, this is a very correct design idea. I call it 'situational requirements analysis'."

As soon as he opened his mouth, there was a sudden silence inside and outside the arena, and the audience's eyes widened unexpectedly.

——Hey, so there is profound knowledge behind this?

Mingyan explained: "Many people know that demand analysis is the only way we must go before designing. Many large companies will research the market in advance to understand the playing time, playing methods and game types of people of all ages... But this is not the case. Not an absolute way. Sometimes, the information mined from big data is cold and absolute. It can only be said to be a mathematical tool, but it cannot bring inspiration to creation.

"Real creation often starts from small things. Yu Bing can keenly dig out the entertainment needs of people around him from a life situation, and use this as a basis to design a game that meets the needs-this is The combination of observation and action can be said to be quite talented."

After clearly speaking, Yu Bing on the stage was blushing almost to the point of smoking, and the sweat on his forehead soaked his bangs.

The joy and excitement were evident on his face, he almost choked up and said: "Thank you, Master! Thank you!"

Mingyan thought for a while and said, "Keep going."

Then, he looked at the score sheet in hand, and first gave a high score to the "game design" item.

At this moment, another voice suddenly appeared beside Mingyan.

"I don't think so."

Zhu Wenshu said.

All eyes on and off the stage immediately came to him.

Yu Bing's expression became a little nervous again, and he said, "Please advise the judges."

Zhu Wenshu said: "No matter what the design idea is, I only see what the result of the game design is - does the game itself provide us with any playability? The 'battle' itself has been controlled by the protagonist, or simply put it The game is done by itself, is there anything we can play as players? No, I can just stare at the game and play by myself. Is this also a game?"

After he finished speaking, Yu Bing's expression turned pale again in an instant.

His teammates were also very nervous, saying: "Actually, players can use their skills, and they can also add points to the protagonist..."

"Without combat, a combat-adventure game without combat is useless." Zhu Wenshu interrupted him, "I have this time to play your game, why not just watch the streamer play a 3A masterpiece, at least from the screen. for you."

The criticism in this sentence is very heavy, and the minds of several nervous contestants went blank, unable to find suitable words to refute under the spotlight.

A judge next to him frowned slightly, and reminded Zhu Wenshu in a low voice: "That's not the way to say that."

Zhu Wenshu didn't look at the people around him, but had his usual confident smile on his face.

He said: "I can affirm that you must add a suitable combat system, otherwise the game is no different from death. It is also very simple to add a combat system. I have a brilliant idea-how about adding Your skills are all replaced with wizard cards, and the corresponding damage will be caused according to the face value of the cards..."

The wizard card is a popular card game in Interstellar, which pays attention to playing cards in order to achieve combos.

No one thought before that chess and card games can also be integrated into the combat system... Using cards to cause damage?

Two judges started discussing with each other.

Another person said: "But if you do this, this adventure game will become a card game. It is still a card game in essence. The adventure content is just a meaningless performance."

Zhu Wenshu raised his chin and said, "The current appearance is just an empty shell, why not join my gameplay and make it more practical."

Another judge looked at Mingyan and said, "What does Chief Designer Ming think?"

The discussion has developed to this point, and it seems that it has faintly turned into a contradiction between Mingyan and Zhu Wenshu.

Even the audience in the audience suddenly fell silent.

Anyone with eyes can see that there is a big difference of opinion among the judges!

The atmosphere became tense, but the ratings unexpectedly increased.

Seeing that something was wrong, the director in the background hurriedly made gestures, ready to control the field at any time.

At this time, Mingyan had already thought about it.

He carefully considered Zhu Wenshu's "revision opinion", and finally said: "I disagree with this statement. If it is really revised in this way, the original creativity and characteristics will disappear."

He has always been right about things and not about people. Of course, his original intention is to make this little game better.

But as soon as these words came out, Zhu Wenshu's face became ugly.

And Yu Bing's expression was full of gratitude.

Zhu Wenshu smiled "hehe", probably wanting to ease the embarrassment, and asked: "The chief designer of Ming really has a lot of ideas. Then how do you think this game should be changed so that it will not bury the creativity and let it How about more fun?"

Mingyan shook his head and said: "It is not lacking in playability. If I have to say it, I can even reduce some players' operations. It is enough to choose to add points and equipment, and some skills can be changed to automatic. release effect."

The judges were amazed, and the audience went "Huh?"

"This is an attempt at a new type of game." Mingyan thought for a while and explained, "I don't think this kind of game can be evaluated from the previous point of view. Its value does not lie in letting people struggle to pass the level, but in the The joy of getting some windfalls in your spare time. Well... maybe it's appropriate to call it an 'idle game'."

Zhu Wenshu smiled and said, "As expected of the chief designer of Ming Dynasty, he 'created' a new game category while talking. It's amazing!"

He gave a thumbs up, but that expression couldn't be regarded as a sincere compliment.

Mingyan shook his head and said to Yu Bing: "If you are interested, we can talk about it in detail after the game."

After speaking, he lit up his scoring sign.

He gave this game a high score of 8.5 points, which is mainly due to the "game design" item.

At this time, Zhu Wenshu beside him also lit up his sign.

——He scored 3.0 points.