Chapter 4 Monday, April 4th

Waking up in the morning, Pei Qian smoothed out the work goals for the next few days.

First, he needed to take care of the two game departments, Tenda Games and Shang Yang Games, that kept making money!

As for Shang Yang Games, he would have them fully promote the IOI national server.

And Tenda Games, Pei Qian also had to find something for them to do.

Otherwise, if Hu Xianbin and the others continued to update the versions of GOG with all their might, release new heroes, and increase publicity, the IOI national server might not be able to beat it.

After all, GOG had a much smoother start in the country than IOI, and he had to find a way for IOI to snatch all of GOG's players.

As for what to give Hu Xianbin and the others to do...

Pei Qian thought for a while and decided to summarize his experiences and learn from his mistakes. This time, he had to develop a single-player game that no one cared about!

The success of *A Beautiful Tomorrow* was a heavy blow to Pei Qian, subverting his entire worldview.

Why weren't the audience angry when he was obviously trying to disgust them? It was unscientific!

After much deliberation, Pei Qian understood.

The main problem was the method of expression!

If the audience put themselves in the shoes of the male lead in *A Beautiful Tomorrow*, they would definitely feel very uncomfortable and repressed, and would soon die of poison.

But this was a movie.

Zhu Xiaoce used specific techniques to keep the audience in God's perspective, and no one identified with the male or female lead, allowing them to view the story from a higher level and with a more compassionate mindset.

As a result, the flavor instantly changed.

In Pei Qian's view, this was precisely the biggest failure of *A Beautiful Tomorrow*, going from a bloody loss to a bloody profit was a matter of one thought, a point of no return.

So, Pei Qian thought about it again and again, and the idea that feeding the audience poison would lead to losses was not wrong in itself.

Otherwise, there wouldn't be the saying "kneeling on reality."

The key was how to feed it, which required certain skills.

He had to strengthen the sense of immersion!

As long as everyone identified with the character, and then made the character miserable, it would definitely achieve the desired effect.

Pei Qian felt that he had found the crux of the problem with *A Beautiful Tomorrow* making money, and now he needed a little verification.

But how to verify it...

Feihuang Studio had already been put in suspended animation by Pei Qian, and after being bitten by a snake once, he didn't want to touch movies again in the short term.

In comparison, games were a more immersive art form!

Some of the hardships in movies would not cause too much resentment from the audience, but in games, if players suffered with the protagonist, it would be another matter.

Of course, some people might point out that suffering games like *Repent and Be Saved* did not cause the game to be resented, but instead made players feel very happy.

This was a complete misunderstanding.

Suffering games like *Repent and Be Saved*, although they made players suffer, what players liked was not the feeling of suffering, but the feeling of becoming stronger after suffering. In the final analysis, it was to gain the sense of accomplishment of overcoming difficulties.

In other words, players of this type of game were not masochists at all. On the contrary, they were all sadists.

Almost all games in this world had to give players enough positive feedback in order for players to have fun.

And Pei Qian had decided that this time, the game would not give players any positive feedback, but only convey thorough negative energy!

Wasn't the saying "kneeling on reality"?

This time, he would make a game that was extremely realistic, and he would definitely make sure he had no friends!

This time, President Pei decided to personally take action. He would write the story outline for the game himself to prevent Hu Xianbin from distorting his intentions. He had to make sure the players were taken care of properly!

Of course, Pei Qian also thought that doing so would not necessarily lead to losses. The failure of the game *Game Producer* was a profound lesson.

At that time, Pei Qian also thought that the narration of *Game Producer* was scolding the players, but the players were not angry at all. Instead, the narration became a big plus.

Coupled with Qiao Laoshi's over-interpretation, things became completely out of control.

Pei Qian had already thought about the countermeasures for these things. He would never repeat the same mistakes, and it was impossible to fall into the same pit twice!

In short, Pei Qian learned from the experiences and lessons of the two failures of *A Beautiful Tomorrow* and *Game Producer*, and decided to put all his efforts into this one battle!

...

In the reception room of Tenda Games.

Hu Xianbin was a little nervous.

Pei Qian had called Hu Xianbin to the reception room alone to talk to him about the design ideas for the new game.

This time, Pei Qian did not call anyone else, especially old employees like Li Yada and Bao Xu.

Because these people had participated in the development of *Game Producer* and had a deep understanding of the success of *Game Producer*, Pei Qian was afraid that their participation would also lead this new project astray.

Therefore, Pei Qian decided to isolate these old employees.

He would have the old employees who had participated in the development of *Game Producer* go and maintain GOG, and transfer Hu Xianbin and a group of new employees with no experience in single-player game development to be responsible for the development of the new game.

In order to ensure that this project could fully reach his expected level, Pei Qian was going to explain everything to Hu Xianbin in detail this time to prevent him from having any wild guesses.

Pei Qian took a sip of tea and slowly explained his thoughts.

"The name of this game is *Struggle*. It's a realistic interactive movie game. All the characters must be high-definition modeled and motion-captured, and the quality level must be comparable to AAA games."

"Of course, since the game is relatively short, it won't cost too much money. Let's prepare about 40 million first. We'll add more if it's not enough."

"The development time is tentatively set at five months, and we'll strive to launch it around September 1st."

Hu Xianbin was confused.

What the hell?

An interactive movie game, and a realistic one at that?

What a magical combination!

The so-called interactive movie game can be seen as a text adventure game with exquisite graphics. After the story begins, players can choose different routes and play different endings, but all players need to do is make choices among certain options, without actually operating.

Interactive movie games can use game graphics, or they can use real sets and actors to shoot, and neither are cheap.

But as President Pei requested, all characters were to be high-definition modeled, motion-captured, and the quality was to be comparable to AAA games. This would probably cost more money than real sets and actors.

Forty million was enough to make a movie...

Thinking of this, Hu Xianbin felt a lot of pressure while being confused.

It didn't sound reliable at all!

If President Pei hadn't said it himself, Hu Xianbin would have thought that someone was falsely conveying the imperial decree.

Pei Qian continued, "The so-called *Struggle* is to allow players to re-experience the real struggle in the game."

"This game will be divided into two parts, the rich version and the poor version, sold separately."

"*Struggle*: Rich Edition is sold to the poor for 29 yuan, with a discounted price of 19 yuan; *Struggle*: Poor Edition is sold to the rich for 99 yuan, with a discounted price of 79 yuan."

"If players only buy one version, they can enjoy the discounted price; if they buy both versions, they can only buy them at the original price, which is a total of 128 yuan."

Hu Xianbin blinked: "Is there... any deep meaning in this?"

Pei Qian nodded: "Of course there is. Poor people experience the lives of rich people, and poor people don't have money, so the pricing is lower; rich people experience the lives of poor people, and rich people have money, so the pricing is higher; there is no second chance in life, so if you want to experience both, you have to spend more money."

Hu Xianbin was silent, sighing, "President Pei's pricing is so philosophical..."

Pei Qian continued, "Whether it's the poor version or the rich version, it will be divided into several stages, from childhood to adulthood, from school to work, from work to life, from rest to entertainment... We must use these scenes to show all aspects of the lives of the poor or the rich as much as possible."

"In the rich version, players play a rich man who has been carefree since childhood and has easily obtained success in all aspects of life, career, and relationships with the money and resources of his parents."

"But in the end, he dies at the hands of a homeless man."

"In the poor version, players play a poor man who has been frugal since childhood and has been bumpy all the way. He did not make a comeback when he grew up, but continued the cycle of poverty."

Hu Xianbin was confused: "And then?"

Pei Qian: "And then? There is no then. This is the entire content of the game."

Hu Xianbin was even more confused: "As an interactive movie game, shouldn't there be many endings?"

Pei Qian shook his head: "No, no matter what choices you make in this game, there are only these two endings in the end: the rich man is killed by a homeless man, and the poor man continues to be poor."

Pei Qian thought to himself that he would never make the mistake of having multiple endings in *Game Producer* again!

Hu Xianbin was shocked: "If everything is already destined, what are players playing for?"

Pei Qian explained, "The process will be different. Every time a player makes a different choice, it will lead to a different branch, but all the branches will return to the same ending."

"The differences in those branches are not reflected in the ending."

"As for the details of this game, we must fill in all aspects of life under the overall framework."

"For example, when going to school, poor people can only go to ordinary schools with low education quality, while rich people can go to expensive private schools; when going to work, poor people are repeatedly rejected in interviews, while rich people go directly to their father's company; when falling in love, poor people break up with their girlfriends of many years because they can't afford a house, while rich people bring different girls back from nightclubs every day; when getting married, poor people use the strength of their entire family to buy a small, second-hand house, while rich people's families have long prepared luxury houses, and they don't have to do anything. The increase in the value of real estate alone every year is more than what poor people earn from hard work..."

"Understand?"

The corners of Hu Xianbin's mouth twitched slightly: "I... understand too well."

Pei Qian thought for a while and added, "Oh, right, the story background must be set in Europe and America, and we must find some foreigners to do motion capture and dubbing."

Hu Xianbin: "President Pei, this game... is there any deep meaning to it?"

Pei Qian smiled: "You don't have to worry about whether there is any deep meaning to it. Just do your job."

"I'll come up with the story outline for the game, and you and the other members of the production team will be responsible for perfecting the plot. After the entire plot is written, show it to me again to ensure that there are no deviations in understanding."

"Okay, you can go and prepare."

"You can make the art resources first, anyway, you can use your imagination to know what kind of characters you need to make, such as parents, teachers, classmates, bosses, etc."

Pei Qian gave a few simple instructions and turned to leave.

Only Hu Xianbin was left, racking his brains.

Teacher, is this question beyond the syllabus?

I can't guess it at all!

...

This time, in order to make sure that he would lose all his money, Pei Qian was fully prepared.

The pricing was very meaningful.

The poor version can also be called the ultimate suffering version. Playing this game will allow you to suffer all the sins that poor people suffer in reality, the ultimate abuse.

The rich version can also be called the gold-plated version. It starts smoothly and completely follows the Long Aotian template, making people feel great, but in the end, they die at the hands of a poor man.

Considering that the rich version was gold-plated and the truth was not revealed until the end, and it was very enjoyable in the beginning, Pei Qian deliberately set a low price of 19 yuan.

The poor version, on the other hand, was abusive from beginning to end, so he set a high price of 79 yuan.

In order to prevent players from playing both versions together and generating some inexplicable interpretations, Pei Qian deliberately increased the price of buying both versions together.

And if players really wanted to buy it, the best choice would be to buy the rich version for 19 yuan. It wouldn't cost much money, and the risk of Pei Qian making money was very low.

As for the content, it was even more excessive. It was already bad enough to be abused throughout the entire process, but the key was that both endings were terrible. No matter how hard the players tried in the game, they couldn't change these two endings!

Who would play this kind of game?

Absolutely impossible!

This time, Pei Qian was determined to "kneel on reality."

He would use this method to court death, and strive to make all 40 million go down the drain, leaving not a single cent!