Building a Gaming Empire From Scratch

The next day in the morning, unable to resist Zhou Jingzheng’s repeated invitations, Lincoln visited the factory.

As soon as he arrived at the factory, he saw the factory manager Zhou

Jingzheng leading two rows of workers, standing outside the gate to greet him.

Seeing Lincoln get off the car, the workers standing in two rows immediately started clapping rhythmically.

Seeing this situation, Lincoln stopped in his tracks, almost turning around to run away.

Zhou Jingzheng enthusiastically ran up, pulling him along.

With a stiff upper lip, Lincoln accepted the warm applause from these workers who were much older than him.

Who could blame Zhou Jingzheng for saying to the worker masters in advance,

“The leader is coming to inspect today, so we must behave well!”

Although Lincoln was slightly unaccustomed to this way of greeting, he was still pleased to find that Zhou Jingzheng and ordinary workers all had experienced significant changes.

Although their clothes hadn’t changed, their energy and spirit were noticeably different.

After Lincoln acquired the factory and cleared its debts, he immediately paid the full salary and subsidies for the previous month on the first of the next month.

And that was according to the standards he had raised.

Then, trucks of materials were transported in, production lines were started, and one piece of equipment after another left the assembly line.

Several days later, even more new assembly lines were installed, obviously aiming to increase production capacity.

It’s worth mentioning that human labor was indispensable throughout the entire process.

So-called “unmanned factories” only depend on machines to complete specific production and assembly links, without human intervention.

However, in other aspects, workers are still necessary, the only difference being that traditional factories need fewer workers.

After all, the unmanned factory technology is advanced, but not as absurd as the Warhammer World’s STC standard construction templates, which can’t just pour materials in one end and have consoles spewing out the other end.

The rapid operation of the factory kept everyone busy.

But this busyness also gave everyone a fresh sense of purpose.

Who would rather drag a lifeless factory along if they can earn money to support their families by working hard and showcasing their talents?

In just over half a month, their spirits had undergone tremendous changes, once again standing tall, and living with dignity.

After paying out the salaries and finishing a week’s work, the factory entered a stable operation.

After many years, the workers finally had the time and inclination to come together and have a small drink.

At the drinking table, a master worker said bitterly, “It’s not easy. Finally, after all these years, we’re living like humans again!”

All the workers at the table felt as if they had countless words to say, but didn’t know how to express them.

In the end, they just raised their glasses and silently drank down the alcohol in one gulp.

The next day, they once again threw themselves into their work with all their might, as if returning to 20 years ago and back to their youth.

After completing the “factory inspection”, Lincoln promised everyone that as long as they smoothly reached the production target of 1.8 million consoles this week, everyone would get prize money!

Leaving the factory amidst another round of enthusiastic applause, Lincoln got into the car.

As soon as he entered the car, he let out a sigh of relief and collapsed into the co-driver’s seat.

“Brother Yue, what if I don’t go to the studio and just go home? I feel like my energy for work for the day is completely exhausted.”

Yue Pengju had been following Lincoln all along and witnessed the changes in the factory and the workers firsthand, admiring him all the while.

But then he heard him say this, and couldn’t help but shake his head with a mix of laughter and tears.

The car drove onto the highway and merged into the traffic, heading towards Cloud Dream Studio.

At Cloud Dream Studio, there were still only two “living people” as always, with

Sister Qiao handling the arrangements for campus recruitment over the phone.

They needed more hands at the studio, but due to Lincoln’s high standards and off-season recruitment, the hiring process had been slow.

Lincoln not only evaluated a person’s skills but also paid great attention to whether their ideas and character were in sync.

Many people with extreme views on the internet, antagonizing men, women, regional discrimination, class discrimination, the love for the rich and hate for the poor, overachievers, and slacker kings… too many people with bizarre worldviews and characteristics were eliminated by Mavis right out of the gate.

Lincoln was serious about creating a harmonious working environment, and those with problematic views were poison, which could only ruin the overall atmosphere.

Sister Qiao agreed with Lincoln’s idea, noting that they didn’t have the luxury of being this picky in previous working environments.

Now that they have this luxury, she was happy about it.

After all, as the person in charge of human resources and administration, she hoped for a harmonious and friendly office environment.

So she directed her efforts toward the campus recruitment, intending to bring in a batch of promising interns for training.

The challenge wasn’t too great, as Cloud Dream was in high demand. Once the fall recruitment news was released, within a single day, the inbox was flooded with over 1000 applications.

Many of these students were not even from Xiajing City!

Many outstanding students from the top 10 universities in Daxia sent not only stunning resumes but also eloquent self-recommendation letters, expressing their eagerness to join Cloud Dream while analyzing how their abilities could be applied to the job.

Many of them even stated outright in their application letters that they were willing to give up opportunities to study abroad or continue their studies domestically for this chance!

They didn’t even need Cloud Dream to reimburse their travel expenses. All they wanted was an interview invitation, and they would drop everything to fly in at their own expense.

Quentina had been in human resources for many years and had never seen such enthusiasm.

Even in her time at the top domestic mobile phone company, she had never seen anything this exaggerated!

She excitedly told Lincoln of the situation, but he asked her to calm down: “Although these are indeed top talents, our needs are limited, so be careful not to send out a bunch of invitations casually, as this could interfere with people’s plans.”

“I understand,” Quentina agreed.

He greeted Cheryl before heading to his office, where he logged in to the “Assassins’ Alliance” world.

Inside the virtual world, all the employees excitedly gathered around Lincoln once he appeared.

After a night of contemplation, they had each come up with their own Easter egg ideas and, with Lincoln’s permission, they could add their creations to the game.

Their excitement was understandable – after all, leaving their own Easter eggs in the game would be far more thrilling than having their names listed in the credits!

They each presented their Easter egg ideas to Lincoln.

Most could be directly integrated into the game.

For example, one girl wanted to commemorate her black cat that had been with her since childhood, so she wanted to put a ghost cat that would only appear at midnight into the game.

Lincoln agreed without hesitation.

Another guy had recently become a fan of skiing due to his new leisure time after getting off work early. So he wanted to create a JK skiing instructor and place her in the ski resort.

Interestingly, he set this JK instructor with a unique temperament – she would be gentle when teaching, but if you made the same mistake repeatedly, she would suddenly take out a wooden stick and hit your head!

Lincoln gave him a meaningful look but didn’t say anything, agreeing with him readily.

However, Lincoln felt a little weird seeing the employee’s excited face.

He had an odd feeling that if this continued, he would soon know all about his single coworkers’ sexual quirks…

It was unclear whether this was a good or bad thing…

But then again, this was entirely useless information, right? After all, what was the point of knowing all this anyway?