Chapter 14: Planning the Next Game

Game Development: Starting by Healing the Players 

Chapter 14: Planning the Next Game

There was no question that Mirror had become a hit.

Of course, it wasn't about to become a cultural phenomenon on the level of a blockbuster AAA title.

But judging from the trajectory it had shown so far, it had every chance of influencing games within its own category.

It might even shape the future direction of this niche genre.

In fact, in Chen Xu's previous life, Mirror had sparked a wave of similar adult games after its release.

During that period, almost every adult game adopted the same formula:

Match-3 gameplay + visual novel (galgame).

Naturally, the quality varied widely.

Some were excellent, while others were nothing more than quick cash grabs.

For a long time, both players and the game industry had generally shared the same impression of 18+ games:

They were low-quality productions.

Aside from their explicit content, there was little worth praising.

Mirror, however, was different.

While match-3 gameplay itself wasn't an original invention of Mirror, the game integrated it with a progression and combat system.

Players fought battles, earned gold, purchased new skills and items...

Beyond that, the game's voice acting, character artwork, unexpectedly touching moments, and thought-provoking story all left players astonished.

It hardly seemed like an adult game at all.

Its user rating also remained remarkably stable at around 9.2 out of 10.

Although the score fluctuated slightly as more players left reviews, it held steady overall.

That stability was proof of just how well the game had been received.

Furthermore, Mirror wasn't a particularly long game.

It featured only a handful of characters, making it entirely possible for someone to rush through it and request a refund before the refund window expired.

Yet very few players actually refunded it.

Of course, that was also helped by its modest price tag of only 10 yuan.

Regardless of the reasons, one thing was certain:

Mirror had become a genuine hit.

Although, because of its adult content, mainstream media outlets and major distribution channels were virtually guaranteed to ignore it...

Within the adult-game community, Mirror was unquestionably the brightest star of the moment.

Among players, many even described it as a revolutionary adult game.

Compared to the countless cheaply made titles flooding the market, Mirror shone like a beacon.

The game's success also opened many adult-game developers' eyes.

So, adult games could be made this way.

This genre was actually capable of achieving such astonishing sales.

To the adult-game industry, Mirror was like a brilliantly lit lighthouse appearing in the darkness of an endless sea.

A good product driving out bad ones.

Mirror had become that superior example.

The tremendous purchasing power of its target audience was reflected directly in its sales.

The numbers continued climbing day after day.

First week: 70,000 copies sold.

Second week: 160,000 cumulative sales.

After two weeks: Third-party estimates placed total sales at 230,000 copies.

For an adult game, those figures were almost unbelievable.

Even many premium indie games would consider those numbers an outstanding success.

Sales like that inevitably caught the attention of independent game developers throughout the industry.

The performance was simply too extraordinary.

Although the sales curve had begun transitioning from rapid growth into a gradual decline, that was merely normal market behavior.

After all, Mirror was still a niche title.

Its audience could only spread through a relatively small player community.

. . .

While the industry marveled at Mirror's performance...

Chen Xu himself was analyzing why the game had achieved such remarkable success.

As a game designer, he would never assume that simply recreating a successful game from his previous life guaranteed another success.

In reality, many games from his former world had only become popular under very specific circumstances.

Take Legend of Mir as an example.

If he recreated that game in this world, Chen Xu believed there would be only one possible outcome:

It would fail completely.

Its graphics offered no competitive advantage.

Its gameplay offered no competitive advantage.

Its world-building and story were practically nonexistent.

It was a game whose success depended far more on the era in which it was released than on the quality of the game itself.

In Chen Xu's view, Mirror's success ultimately came down to differentiation.

As an 18+ game, it offered players the combined experience of a visual novel (galgame) and a match-3 puzzle game.

Viewed purely as a match-3 title or purely as a visual novel, its content wasn't particularly exceptional.

But that wasn't how players experienced it.

It was presented as an adult game.

It was precisely the contrast between those two elements that made Mirror successful.

It was much like how players enjoyed doing adult-themed things in ordinary games, while enjoying ordinary gameplay in adult games.

Looking at the sales statistics, Chen Xu knew he had made the right choice.

Whether he had achieved both fame and fortune was debatable—the "fame" was limited, after all, because it was an 18+ game.

Its reputation spread mainly within the game industry.

For the average player, a ten-yuan adult game was unlikely to attract much attention unless they were specifically interested in that niche.

Chen Xu had no intention of continuing to develop games of this type.

For him, Mirror was simply a way to accumulate his initial startup capital.

The truly important part was the profit.

Priced at 10 yuan, and with sales approaching 230,000 copies so far...

After deducting taxes and the platform's revenue share, the game's first-month income came to roughly 1.5 million yuan.

Chen Xu stroked his chin and nodded slightly.

His startup capital was secured.

He had also officially obtained his game designer certification.

At the end of Mirror's first week on sale, he received an official notification and completed his registration with the Ministry of Games in Shanghai.

As for the system's Emotion Points, however, Chen Xu wasn't especially satisfied.

Up to now, he had accumulated enough for only one seven-pull—roughly 700,000 points.

Then again, after thinking it over, he wasn't particularly surprised.

The peak of a player's emotional response probably lasted only a minute or two.

For some people, perhaps only a few dozen seconds.

By Chen Xu's estimation, even the strongest emotional reaction wouldn't last more than five minutes.

Under those circumstances...

Well, it was understandable.

Looking at the statistics in the official game store's backend, Chen Xu leaned back on his sofa and began considering his next move.

According to his plans, his next few projects would still focus on premium single-player games sold at a fixed price.

There were two reasons for this.

First, to build a strong reputation.

Second, to continue strengthening his studio.

As for why he wasn't choosing to make gacha or microtransaction-heavy games, the reason was straightforward.

It wasn't because he was worried about damaging his reputation.

In fact, his previous world had plenty of gacha mobile games that enjoyed both commercial success and positive reputations.

But after careful consideration, Chen Xu decided against it.

The biggest reason was that the timing wasn't right.

Moreover, the gaming landscape in this parallel world differed significantly from the one he remembered.

In his previous life, mobile games dominated the market, and the free-to-play model with in-app purchases was the industry standard.

In this world, however, premium buy-to-play games occupied a much larger share of the market.

There were also significant limitations to gacha mobile games.

Take collectible card games, for example.

In his previous life, the genre had gone through several distinct stages of evolution.

It began with games like I Am MT, Great Master, and Million Arthur, which popularized mobile card games.

Then Dota Legends revolutionized the formula by introducing action-based card combat.

Afterward, The King of Fighters '98 Ultimate Match OL helped rescue SNK from financial trouble, increasing its annual revenue sixfold and fueling the boom in licensed-IP card games.

Around that same period, card games also became increasingly diverse.

Traditional stat-based games like Three Kingdoms, highly polished titles like Onmyoji, and IP-driven games such as Fate/Grand Order were all representative examples.

Chen Xu had carefully researched the current state of card-based mobile games in this world.

At present, the genre had already evolved to a stage somewhere between high-production-value games and IP-focused titles.

A stable industry ecosystem had already taken shape.

For Nebula Games—his future company—entering that market now would be less advantageous than developing an entirely new type of game.

The reasons were the same as before:

No money.

No distribution channels.

Developing the game itself wouldn't be a problem.

The problem was marketing.

Without sufficient promotional resources to make a major splash at launch, his game would simply pave the way for larger publishers.

Card games were fundamentally different from most other genres.

Their gameplay systems and numerical progression mechanics were relatively easy to copy.

If this parallel world's mobile game industry were still in the early stages, before the card-game model had fully matured, that would have been excellent news for Chen Xu.

But now?

There were simply too many uncertainties.