"You guys are spending money on the oo game platform?" Bannon asked, slightly taken aback by the answer. "Doesn't the platform have thousands of free games? Why do you want to play those paid ones instead of the free ones?"
"Come on, I'm not like you old fogeys who only had Atari's trash games in their childhood. Our childhood was spent playing FC, GBA, and PS!" one of them said dismissively.
Bannon was angered by this but could do nothing about it. After all, he had to admit that Atari's games were indeed outdated. No one was interested in those pixelated games anymore, except for those who were still immersed in childhood memories.
However, this only sparked Bannon's curiosity further, so he continued to ask, "But if you're not interested in these games, why are you glued to your phones all day?"
"Damn it, if it weren't for this damned little bird, who would want to play this industrial garbage instead of their handheld consoles!" the person said, looking quite frustrated.
"Damned little bird?" Bannon's curiosity was piqued. He walked over and leaned in to look at the phone screen. He saw a pixelated creature resembling a bird flying from left to right on the screen.
In the background, trees also flew by, some tall and some short. What was peculiar was that some trees grew from the sky downwards, leaving only a small gap in the middle for the bird to pass through.
This little rascal's bird seemed to be controlled by pressing the '#' key on the phone. A tap made the bird fly up a bit, while not tapping caused it to fall automatically.
The faster you tapped, the higher the bird flew, and vice versa.
This little rascal's controlled bird seemed to be trying its best to avoid colliding with these trees. However, as Bannon's head got closer, the bird inevitably crashed into a tree.
The entire screen instantly turned black, followed by the number "046" appearing on the screen. Then, a line of text emerged: "Use a revive coin?"
"Fuck!" the little rascal cursed, hesitated for a moment, and then chose no. He then glared at Bannon and said, "It's all your fault! You suddenly popped your head out and scared me to death. Otherwise, I might have broken through the revival line and set a new record, maybe even climbed a few ranks among my Weibo friends!"
"Isn't this just a flying game? So you guys are playing our old games!" Bannon chuckled after understanding the game.
"What is a flying game?" the little rascal asked, looking surprised and curious.
"This flying game is one of the games on your despised Atari!" Bannon said with a sigh. "It's basically the same gameplay. You control a plane to go up and down constantly, avoiding collisions with various obstacles!"
"Moreover, the flying game we played was much more complex. It not only had these up-and-down obstacles but also various flying objects that could pop out at any moment. The game content was much richer than yours!" Bannon said proudly, as if he thought the games he played back then were even more advanced than the current ones.
"I can't be bothered with you!" the little rascal rolled his eyes and started a new game. Bannon stopped talking and continued to watch from the side. He watched a whole game from start to finish, thus thoroughly understanding the game's content.
This game was truly incredibly simple, even simpler than the flying games from decades ago. From beginning to end, there was only one type of obstacle: trees from the sky and the ground.
Even with such a simple game, the little rascal played with great difficulty, only scoring 36 points in the second round. Bannon observed that the score was actually the number of trees passed. The more trees you passed, the more points you got. It was ridiculously simple.
"It's really strange. You guys just bragged that Atari games were outdated, but then you play this even simpler game and seem so happy?" Bannon asked, even more confused.
"Hey, you talk too much. What does it matter if it's simple or not? Can you even get a high score?" the little rascal said impatiently. His words struck a chord with Bannon, igniting his desire to show off. Seeing the other's disdainful expression, Bannon smugly said, "You're right. Your score of 46 is really too low. Back in my day, I could easily get thousands of points. I'm a master!"
"Oh really?" A mocking yet expectant smile appeared on the little rascal's lips. He then handed the phone to Bannon and said, "Alright, since you say so, you'll have to prove it with your skills. If you can break through 68 points, I'll admit you're better than me, because that's my highest record!"
"Only a mere 62 points! You underestimate me too much! Even on my first try, I could easily score over a hundred points!" Bannon grinned and readily took the phone. He quickly restarted a game and pressed the '#' key a few times to make the bird fly higher. Suddenly, a large tree flew out and knocked the bird away.
"0 points" The large numbers made Bannon's face flush. At the same time, the little rascal in front of him wore a smug smile.
"This game is designed so poorly. How can there be an obstacle less than a second after starting? You should at least give people a few seconds to adapt to the flying rhythm and button-pressing speed!" Bannon argued. "Give me a few more rounds, and I'll get used to it!"
"Sure, I'll give you 10 chances. That should be enough for you to get used to it!" the little rascal said generously.
"No need, three rounds at most will be enough! Actually, I already got used to it in that last round!" Bannon said and restarted the game for the second time. Then, with a bang, he crashed into a tree.
Still 0 points.
"How can this bird ascend so fast? I only pressed the button once, and it flew half the screen!" Bannon exclaimed angrily. The game's design was too perverse. The bird's flying speed and sensitivity were too high. He only pressed it once, and it flew almost halfway up the screen, leaving Bannon no time to react before crashing.
It felt like trying to shave with a small knife, only to find that the knife was too sharp, cutting not only the beard but also the skin, scraping off a small portion of flesh from his chin. It was incredibly smooth.
"If you can't do it, just admit it. Why make so many excuses?" the little rascal glanced at Bannon contemptuously. Bannon felt deeply insulted and began to focus all his attention on the phone.
Fortunately, after getting used to the bird's flying speed and operating sensitivity, Bannon made progress in his third attempt. He successfully passed the first and second trees but crashed into the third tree.
Unfortunately, the gap for the third tree appeared in a too-tricky position. The previous gap was at the top of the screen, while the third gap was at one-third of the way down the screen.
Bannon recalled afterward that unless he completely stopped pressing the buttons after passing the second gap, letting the bird fall to the very bottom, and then pressing the takeoff button at the right moment, he could barely pass this gap.
But that moment would likely be only a fraction of a second, and Bannon couldn't grasp it!
Fine, no more excuses, let's try harder in the fourth round!
Soon, the 10 rounds were all over. To be precise, he didn't even pass Bannon's 62-point record; he didn't even reach 20 points, with his highest score being only 18 points. It was incredibly embarrassing.
"This game is too perverse. It's purely a means of torture, so torturous!" Bannon couldn't help but curse.
"Exactly, it's a damn thing!" the little rascal, for once, agreed with Bannon.
"But why are you playing such a perverse thing so enthusiastically?" Bannon asked, puzzled.
"If you don't want to play, let me play. I can't resist!" the little rascal snatched the phone from Bannon's hand and continued to chase the poor little bird.
Having lost his phone, Bannon suddenly felt a sense of loss. At the same time, a strong desire surged within him to try again, at least to surpass 62 points and suppress this damned young man's arrogance.
This desire made Bannon restless. He even lost interest in talking to these little rascals. He waved them away, then took out his own phone. It was the latest model Bell phone, which naturally had the oo mobile game platform installed.
Bannon quickly opened the oo mobile game platform, only to find that he couldn't enter directly and needed to create an account and password. However, it prompted that he could log in directly using his Weibo account.
Bannon had his own Weibo account, so he did so without hesitation, as registering was quite troublesome. However, when registering, he suddenly realized he hadn't asked what the game was called. Just as he was troubled by this, he noticed that when the software opened, the hottest game displayed was one called "Bastard Bird."
Good heavens, so the game's name was as "bastardly" as it sounded.
Bannon quickly chose to download, and the phone began to download and install automatically over the network. If there was no Wi-Fi nearby or the phone didn't have 2G data enabled, you could also download and install by connecting directly to a computer.
The game itself was not large, only about 1MB. It downloaded very quickly. Bannon clicked to enter the game.
Perhaps it was because he was playing on his own phone, but Bannon's progress was very smooth this time. He managed to pass over 40 obstacles in one go. However, just as he was about to pass the 43rd obstacle and reclaim his kingly prowess, his hand slipped, and he unfortunately crashed into a tree.
Bannon let out a pained cry. As he prepared to start again, he noticed a prompt pop up on the phone screen: "Use a revive coin to revive immediately?"
"I can revive?" Bannon was delighted and immediately clicked agree. However, the bird did not revive. Instead, a new prompt appeared on the phone screen: "You have 0 revive coins. Would you like to spend one oo coin to purchase a revive coin?"
"Yes!" Bannon clicked again without hesitation.
"Your oo coin balance is zero. Please top up your oo coins. Thank you!"