Chapter 13: A Celebration

Game Development: Starting by Healing the Players 

Chapter 13: A Celebration

At a hot pot restaurant in MixC Mall, Shanghai.

Chen Xu, Ruan Ningxue, and Yang Xin were gathered around a steaming hot pot.

Beef slices, tripe, honeycomb tripe, rolled beef...

After all, could you even call it hot pot without beef?

"You're incredible, Master Chen! The game development community is going crazy over your game, and players can't stop praising it!"

Now that they had gotten acquainted, Yang Xin excitedly looked at the news on her phone.

"Sister Xin, please don't call me 'Master.' I'm nowhere near that level. Just call me Chen Xu."

Chen Xu waved his hand dismissively.

She was exaggerating.

He knew perfectly well that the "uproar" was mostly confined to the relatively small circle of adult-game developers.

As for the gaming industry as a whole?

At most, Mirror had caused a small ripple within the indie game community—and not even a particularly large one.

Chen Xu had a very clear understanding of where the game stood.

"I kind of regret setting the goal at fifty thousand copies," Ruan Ningxue spoke with a smile.

Hearing that, Chen Xu set down his chopsticks and laughed.

"Well, that's your own fault, Senior. You're the one who came up with that target."

"I used to think I'd be able to recruit you into my company, Chen Xu. Looks like I was dreaming," Yang Xin sighed gloomily.

"Oh, spare my junior. You've made three games, and each one sold worse than the last," Ruan Ningxue mercilessly stabbed her friend in the back.

"My three games may all have failed, but there were reasons! I was only responsible for the story and narrative design. Everything else was outsourced. And according to player feedback, the writing was actually well received!" Yang Xin protested indignantly.

"By the way, Chen Xu, could you take a look and tell me what exactly went wrong with those three games my company made?"

She looked at him expectantly.

"The positioning... and bloated game systems."

After searching for the games on his phone and watching a few videos online, Chen Xu already had a good idea.

"...Huh?"

Yang Xin blinked in confusion.

"To put it simply," Chen Xu explained, "your games try to cram in a little bit of everything. But you're making low-budget indie games, not AAA titles."

"And even AAA games generally include many of their systems only to enrich the experience—they're side dishes, not the main course."

Yang Xin listened with an expression that suggested she'd had an epiphany.

In reality...

She understood a little.

But not completely.

Although she was still confused, she felt awkward asking further questions at the dinner table, so she changed the subject.

"So, Chen Xu, what are you planning to do next?"

"My next step is probably to start my own small game company."

It wasn't exactly a secret, so Chen Xu answered with a smile.

"Start your own company?"

Yang Xin looked surprised.

"Yeah," Chen Xu nodded.

It had already been part of his plans.

Yang Xin sat quietly for a moment before making up her mind.

"Then... Chen Xu, what do you think of me? When the time comes, could I join your company and develop games with you?"

She truly loved making games.

But after three consecutive failed projects, she'd inevitably become discouraged.

Now, though, she'd come to a realization.

Was the fact that she couldn't make successful games herself really the problem?

No.

The real issue was simply that she hadn't found the right path to success.

And finding someone talented to follow...

That was also a path to success.

Before coming to dinner, she'd done a thorough investigation into Mirror.

She had reached one conclusion:

Its success was absolutely not a fluke.

And after hearing Chen Xu's critique of her three games just now, although she had only half understood what he'd said, one thing she was completely certain of was this:

The junior whom Ruan Ningxue kept describing as "someone making his first game" had every bit of the potential to become a top-tier game designer.

Some game designers created one excellent game through a stroke of inspiration, only to fade into obscurity afterward.

Others, however, possessed a clear understanding of exactly what kind of games they wanted to make.

The Chen Xu sitting before her was clearly one of those people.

After three consecutive failed games, Yang Xin had developed a very clear understanding of her own strengths and weaknesses.

Hearing her proposal, Chen Xu fell into thought.

He had briefly looked over the three games Yang Xin had mentioned.

Just as she had said, the stories were genuinely the highlights.

Most of the negative reviews criticized the gameplay and game mechanics.

Most of the positive reviews, on the other hand, praised the writing.

And it wasn't just one game.

All three had received the same pattern of feedback.

It was obvious that the quality of the narrative planning and writing was her contribution.

Looking ahead, Chen Xu knew that he couldn't possibly develop every aspect of future games by himself.

He could certainly handle the main storyline, the overall narrative structure, and the game's core themes.

But writing and organizing an entire script?

Even with the system, it wasn't realistic to do everything alone.

Take a game like Red Dead Redemption 2, for example.

The main story script alone exceeded 2,000 pages.

If all of the game's dialogue and text were included, the screenplay—printed on standard A4 paper—would stack up to roughly 2.4 meters (about 8 feet) tall.

For a game like Mirror, Chen Xu could oversee everything himself.

But if he wanted to create larger games with significantly more story content in the future, there was no way he could handle every detail alone.

"Of course. If you're serious about it, Sister Xin, then once I've finished setting up the company, we can sit down and discuss it," Chen Xu nodded.

"No problem. Then I'll wait to hear from you," Yang Xin smiled.

"Enough talking. If you two don't start eating, I'm going to finish all the beef myself."

Ruan Ningxue interrupted from the side.

"I've got an idea, Ningxue."

Yang Xin grinned.

"Why don't you join us too? With our combined talents, we could definitely accomplish something big."

Taking a sip of her bottle of Want Want milk, Ruan Ningxue merely glanced at Yang Xin without saying a word.

"I wonder how popular Mirror is going to become, though."

Yang Xin speculated aloud.

"Do you think it could sell over a million copies in a month?"

"I'd say there's a chance if you cut that prediction in half."

Chen Xu laughed.

"As for anything higher... that's basically impossible."

He had a fairly realistic understanding of the situation.

After all, Mirror was an 18+ game.

Its audience was simply too restricted.

The three of them continued eating and chatting until around nine o'clock that evening.

After dinner, Chen Xu escorted the two women back to their respective apartment complexes before hailing a taxi and heading home.