Building a Gaming Empire From Scratch

Chapter 470: 453: Huge Loss

“To become a boss, one must pay a heavy price.”

“[Sky Player Gathering], what does it mean? Everyone flying old airplanes together? Is it an update for Night City or Paradise?”

“Two new game betas?! Wow! As prolific as a sow!”

Not only were the netizens shocked by Lincoln’s live-stream announcement, but Randall and Fred were also quite surprised.

Within two minutes, both of them sent Lincoln a text message.

“Boss, did you make another game by yourself? It can’t be Battlefield, right? We just started working on it this week!”

“?”

The first message was from Fred, politely expressing his confusion.

The second question mark was from Randall, simply expressing his puzzlement.

Lincoln straightforwardly established a group chat with them.

“Don’t worry, neither of the two beta games will include Battlefield.”

“That’s good to know.” Fred breathed a sigh of relief, “But boss, when did you secretly make another game? What’s the theme?”

Lincoln sidestepped the question and went back to his previous statement: “However, the beta of Battlefield will indeed come very quickly.”

“We’ve only been working on it for a week!”

“How fast is ‘very fast’? The game framework is just being set up!”

“It will take at least one or two weeks to complete, even at the fastest!”

“We can’t sell a half-finished product, can we?”

Both of them tried to persuade Lincoln to abandon this idea — the hindsight of NetDragon’s “Blaze 3” was still fresh in their minds!

But this time, Lincoln really planned on selling a half-finished product.

However, instead of continuing the conversation, he asked, “Did you encounter any difficult development tasks this week?”

Randall and Fred thought for a moment.

Map design?

Not pressuring at all since the rich materials and development tools were accumulated from the previous two games.

Combat system?

Even less so.

Compared to the time-stop feature in “Assassins’ Alliance” and the anticipation of “Speed Chase” which required unique trajectories and combat rhythm, the combat system in “Battlefield” was extremely simple.

All they needed was the “pew pew” sound.

It was just about adding a mechanism to regain health after leaving combat, supplementing with medical bags and saving teammates, which were not difficult to implement.

As for vehicle combat, the development has been quite smooth due to the data and experience accumulated from the previous two games.

So, music?

According to Lincoln’s emphasis from the beginning, the production of “Battlefield” focused on two points: [heroic] and [cruel].

Not only was the combat rhythm crucial, but also the background music was of great importance.

But again, Cloud Dream’s accumulation was just too plenty.

They always valued the composition of its various teams, including the music team. They never slackened in recruiting talent or building copyright reserves.

Ever since the game style and music theme of “Battlefield” were confirmed, the music team has been incredibly high-yield, even being the fastest department in the entire game development team.

There was no difficulty in this part.

So counting it up, it seemed that the only obstacle was firearms.

Yet even the trouble with firearms wasn’t about difficulty, but rather time-consuming.

Making firearms alone wasn’t challenging, as Cloud Dream had many in reserve.

Just a few days ago, players found an Easter egg hidden in Night City – the [Firearms Museum].

From ancient times to modern days, all types of firearms were displayed there, showing the entire history of firearms development.

The weapons needed for “Battlefield” were merely copying and pasting age-appropriate firearms from the museum and slightly modifying their appearances.

But such rudimentary copying and pasting was far from enough.

The reason is that “Battlefield” is fundamentally different from “Assassins’ Alliance” and “Speed Chase”, and its core lies in “player confrontation”.

If the former’s fun is more about “plot experience”, “exploration adventure”, and “open world”.

Then “Battlefield” is purely about “confrontation” and “competitiveness”, with victory being the key driving force.

The requirement for “fairness” is much higher than the previous two, and the competition must be as fair as possible for both sides.

And firearms are the critical factor in balancing.

This determines that the power of firearms in reality cannot be directly replicated.

Otherwise, it is almost inevitable that individual firearms will become the only choice, while a large number of other firearms will be permanently abandoned by players due to the gap in strength.

To achieve as much fairness as possible, Cloud Dream needs to conduct detailed tests and adjustments on the numerical performance of firearms, even sacrificing a certain degree of authenticity for this purpose.

—Of course, the basic intuitive logic must still be followed.

Thinking of this class, Randall and Fred suddenly understood Lincoln’s idea a bit—

“Boss, you mean to let players participate and adjust the weapons according to players’ feedback?”

Isn’t this letting players help with work? Fred thought.

“Damage value, range and rate, terrain points, item effects, even the toughness of a steel wire… ” Lincoln added, “Many content needs a lot of adjustments.”

“A long-term competitive-themed game requires demanding attention to detail.”

“To achieve as much perfection as possible, we have two choices. First, take a whole year to make detailed adjustments and testing. Second, let players participate in advance, making fine adjustments according to massive match data and player feedback while developing. The downside is that it will be more laborious, and the time will be greatly shortened.”

—Isn’t this still making players work? Fred blinked, wisely not saying it out loud.

Lincoln continued with his plan: “This is called [Early Access Version], players first purchase the game’s early access and obtain priority experience rights, they can enter the game first.”

“However, the game is not finished and may encounter some unsatisfactory places, as well as frequent updates and changes. The initial game experience may not be perfect… Considering this factor, there will be some price concessions for the Early Access version.”

“Well, we need a nice way to put it. What do you think of the phrase: [Participate in the development process of the game]?”

Help test the game and have to pay first?

Randall also hesitated, then said with some uncertainty: “Is this… letting players work for a fee?”

“Ah?” Lincoln, who was talking enthusiastically, was suddenly choked by Randall’s sudden complaint, and his following words were stuck in his throat.

After hesitating for a while, he still stubbornly said: “How can you say that! Playing a new game six months in advance! What a great thing! They should thank us!”

“That’s it, let’s hang up for now, and talk tomorrow when you come to work!”

Not giving them more time to ask questions, Lincoln hung up the voice call quickly.

This is clearly to allow players to play the game earlier, not only earlier but also cheaper. How did they make it sound like I’m taking advantage of the players?

Does it make sense?!

Besides, it’s not really selling players a half-finished game!

For the whole week, Lincoln will devote as much time as possible to game production, and Mavis will also join in to provide assistance.

Lincoln also plans to make targeted adjustments to the game production method:

Take out two groups of people, specifically to make two single-player campaigns, and act as tutorial levels.

Then divide four groups of people to create and refine battle maps full time, each group making one map, totaling four battlefields.

Then divide two groups to make firearms and two to make vehicles.

Finally, a core talent group will take care of a centralized coordination to ensure that all work is on the right track, and will not end up with a bunch of puzzles that cannot be put together.

—In fact, with the watchful eyes of veterans like Randall and Fred, and Lincoln frequently watching the progress of the game development, this kind of thing is almost impossible to happen.

According to this plan, when the “Battlefield” Early Access Version is released and players log in, they will see a basically complete game.

There will still be limited content to play—only four fields to choose from and not enough firearm options.

At most, there will be some extremely minor unfairness due to map selection and difficulty regarding the two sides’ attacking and defending.

But this will not seriously affect the players’ battle enjoyment.

Furthermore, as time goes by, the number of firearms and campaign maps will continue to increase, even single-player campaigns and numerical balance will continue to be added and perfected.

In this way, players will have new content to play each week, and Lincoln will even have a bunch of creative gameplay constantly emerging, waiting to be developed for players to enjoy.

By the time the game is perfected and officially released, the “National Warfare” system will be launched simultaneously, thus completing the game.

Moreover, with more match data and player feedback, the game’s official release date will come sooner.

Players can play the game earlier, and the development team can complete the game development more quickly, all while making their lives easier.

The only loser is himself, as the Early Access version will give players extra discounts, Lincoln is bound to earn less money.

Considering the players’ enthusiasm for Cloud Dream’s new game, willing to purchase the Early Access version, the proportion of players is certainly exaggerated, even exceeding 80% or 90% of intended players.

According to Lincoln’s plan, the original price was still fixed at 500 dollars, making the Early Access 150 dollars cheaper, which equated to a huge 30% discount for the game!

It’s a huge loss!