Rebirth of the big era of online games

Chapter 411 "Project Ark: Survival Evolved"

In the previous life, there was a well-known game, also called "Ark: Survival Evolved", but it was a survival sandbox game, similar to the online version of "Minecraft" in this life, and it also had a game of stealing property.

What Fang Jie intends to do, strictly speaking, should be called "Ark: Colonial Project", is an important part of the realization of the virtual reality plan, and the purpose is to tell an exciting story with half truth and half falsehood.

This is a huge plan for realizing his own ideals. At present, he only has some preliminary ideas. Since it involves the actual industrial layout, how to do it needs to be carefully considered. This is not something that can be done by patting the head of.

But this year, almost all the important things are busy, now Fang Jie has time to think about the details.

First of all, it is certain that the game must be played, and with the advancement of science and technology, it will be upgraded to a virtual reality game, or even a real virtual world.

The difference between virtual reality and virtual reality is that one is a virtual world that simulates reality, which is still fake, and the other is that virtual reality technology is used to operate the real world. Although the method is virtual, the impact is real.

The concept of "Metaverse" may be more appropriate to describe the reality of virtual reality, but it is not entirely the concept of Metaverse. Fang Jie always feels that the concept of Metaverse that digitizes human beings is not very reliable.

Now that the overall goal has been determined, the game corresponding to this plan must at least have a game background close to the real world, and it must be an open sandbox world where players can play in the game world just like in the real world. Various social activities.

It can be further inferred that the mechanism of this game should be the concept of the game community, and it is close to games like "The Sims".

This game community is not the kind of "Boiling Academy". "Boiling Academy" may only be regarded as a small part of the entire game community, or the school part. In addition, there are other sections such as production, life, leisure, etc. to form such a community. open world.

As for "The Sims", although life has been simulated, it is still carried out within the framework of the game after all, which obviously does not conform to the concept of an open sandbox world.

According to Fang Jie's idea, the supporting game should be a free world without "game official" and "game rules". The rules and all materials in it should be formulated and produced by the players themselves. The game itself only provides a game community background and space.

But if there are no regulations, the background of the game cannot be directly set as a modern society, because all the products of human civilization, such as buildings and props, should not appear out of thin air, but should be created by the players themselves.

After inferring this point, Fang Jie suddenly realized that it seems that the first version of the game "Ark Project" can only be "Ark: Survival Evolved".

Of course, although the name is the same as the game in the previous life, the game mechanism is only similar, and it is not plagiarism at all.

The "Ark: Survival Evolved" in the previous life started from the age of dinosaurs, and even later in the age of technology and magic, dinosaurs still existed and became the pets of mankind, which is very unreasonable.

What I want to do is a game that can simulate reality, so all elements that are divorced from reality should not exist in the game.

Therefore, this "Ark: Survival Evolved" planned by this world should be a primitive earth in the Stone Age.

It’s not impossible to have dinosaurs, but it’s not necessary to be a battle pet. When a player encounters a dinosaur, it’s a battle to the death. In the end, humans may extinct the dinosaur species, or they may be kept in captivity in zoos like lions and tigers. , anyway, it is absolutely impossible to be a mount and a battle pet, and it is absolutely not allowed.

In short, the core concept of the game is one: openness and freedom.

No matter what the final fate of dinosaurs or other species is, it depends on how the player chooses, and what the earth will eventually develop depends entirely on human nature.

Therefore, the resources, species and their numbers that existed on the primitive earth will not be refreshed like in other games, but should be the same as reality, not only limited, but also in line with historical facts.

Of course, players will also die in this world. Although they can be resurrected after death, there must be greater rewards and punishments to allow players to cherish every chance of survival and try their best to survive.

It is conceivable that when the human beings in the game evolve to modern plaintext, they will definitely encounter problems caused by resource depletion and population explosion, so they will naturally evolve to the interstellar era, and have to consider virtual reality technology and Mars colonization plans.

And at that time, once the story is told, the virtual world in the game should not be much different from the real world. Players also have to work and live in it, housing prices are equally expensive, commercial real estate is also very valuable, and even the virtual world in the game Currency can be directly linked to real currency.

In a certain metaverse game in the previous life, a central plot with an area of ​​more than 2000 square meters was auctioned for more than 100 million US dollars. A well-known singer in China also spent 10,000+ to buy a virtual real estate in it.

Since none of the characters in the metaverse in the previous life can produce such an effect, Fang Jie believes that his game will definitely be able to develop into the era of the metaverse.

Moreover, the production of this game is actually relatively simple.

Because there are almost no game settings.

The so-called game settings are the natural rules in reality, just copy them directly, and then give a certain trigger probability.

The game only needs to copy the earth in the original environment into it, and then copy various natural rules and technological skill trees, and the game producer has nothing to do with the rest.

At the beginning, there is no need to make a 3D game with massive data, 2D is enough, and the birthplace only needs to delineate the area of ​​1 square kilometer, which is enough for players to toss.

Just imagine if modern people go to the primitive earth and throw them into the old forests of Senshan and old forests without any tools on them, they will definitely be unable to move an inch. They don’t have any means of transportation at the beginning. It is impossible to travel thousands of miles a day, and even the game map will not be provided. What can only be drawn by players themselves.

Not to mention these, at least eating, drinking, and sleeping are all problems, not to mention that if you encounter primitive animals, dinosaurs or something, they will definitely become the opponent's food.

Large aggressive animals like dinosaurs are fine, even if they encounter poisonous snakes and spiders, they must be the result of being instantly killed on the spot.

Therefore, when players enter this world that completely simulates the original earth, the range of activities cannot be too large. If they are unlucky, they may die within a few steps. Even if they master the basic survival skills, they will not go too far in the initial stage. .

Therefore, there is no problem with using 2D graphics for the first version, even word games are fine. Anyway, it can be continuously upgraded in the future. Whether it is the game itself, terminal hardware, network, or server performance, it will also "evolve" with the game. , Evolving to the end, it may be 5G/6G/7G, cloud services, and virtual reality.

Yes, just follow this idea, and the rest is to fill in various details.

But the problem now is that throughout 2005, the work list for Boiling Game was full, and it might be too late to get a version of this game out this year.

Before the middle of the year, Boiling Games has been holding "Magic World" and "Zhu Xian", which is something that must be done in order to run on "World of Warcraft".

This is not counted, there is also "Feng Shen Bang" jointly developed with Kingsoft, and "Jian Wang II" planned for next year

Then there are "Escape from Corpse City", "Toilet Lock", "Reign", "Corpse Tide", "Plants vs. Zombies", "All Love Elimination", "Snake"... and a series of mobile games.

There are also second-generation game development plans such as "Legend 2", "A Chinese Journey to the West III", "Meteor Butterfly Sword II", and "The Legend of Jin Yong II".

In addition, 3D masterpieces such as "The Era of Navigation" have long been established as projects and have been in the production process. Fortunately, "The Legend of Jin Yong II" replaced Shisanmei's "Nine Yin Scriptures" project, otherwise there would be another one Big projects come out.

All in all, Boiling Games, which already has thousands of employees, is currently busy with its feet on the ground. This is due to the design colleges of major universities and provincial design institutes, which have absorbed a large number of art talents to do so much work at the same time.

If you want to increase the size, you have to wait for a new batch of fresh graduates to come in in the second half of the year, or implement the 996 working system.

996 Let's forget about it, don't do to others what you don't want to do to yourself.

Fang Jie doesn't want himself to be the kind of boss he hates, and the 996 work system affects not only everyone's spare time, but will eventually be transmitted to all aspects of society, such as the low marriage rate and low birth rate, which have the potential The reason is that he doesn't want to be a sinner of history.

Moreover, the normal process of boiling games in the past, or everyone's default rhythm, is that during the Chinese New Year every year, when the boss Fang Jie goes home to celebrate the New Year, he writes a few game planning cases in his free time, returns to the company after the year and throws them out, and then everyone Execute step by step.

It's already the middle of the year, and suddenly another game plan is thrown out, and it's a big production with many details to be considered. It will definitely disrupt the entire company's plans and arrangements. Fang Jie himself doesn't like this kind of work. Indiscriminate intrusion.

But never mind.

Boiling Game has its own open-source engine platform, which is not only open to the world, but also free of charge. As various game products of Boiling Game are gradually spreading overseas, many game companies and studios have joined this free platform. Ecosphere.

The normal state of the game production ecosystem is that most producers are unable to find good projects, or the current game projects are not very promising, or are still in the state of learning and reference.

Of course, fundamentally, it is also because of the lack of funds and manpower that the game development process is very difficult.

Since boiling games are too busy, and many people on the platform are idle, then go to the platform to call people.

They may not yet have the strength to make a single game, but if they are assigned outsourcing tasks, their abilities in the production of a single item or system are not a problem, and the efficiency is quite high. After all, they are working for themselves to earn money , efficiency means more rewards.

So Fang Jie directly released the outsourcing task of the game on the platform, calling on game producers from all over the world to participate in this project.

Although there are still many details that have not been filled in the planning of this game, the general framework and route are already in place, and some work can be done first.

Like a game map.

This work is simple and simple, after all, it only needs to simulate the real geography, but it is also difficult to say, completely simulating a primitive ecological earth, the map is massive.

It also involves natural encyclopedia databases such as geography, species, climate, and resources. Even if Fang Jie has a photographic memory, it is impossible to do everything in detail.

For example, these ecological environments in the Mediterranean region, he has no idea, and relevant information is not easy to find.

But if you ask overseas game makers to brainstorm, it is actually very simple. There may be locals there, and they will find more detailed information locally. If you find a geography professor in that country, it may be more effective.

It would be too troublesome for Fang Jie to do these tasks by himself. He only needs to control the overall situation and pay for someone to do the work.

The game map is divided into N blocks, one map per square kilometer. The Boiling game engine itself provides various tools and materials for drawing maps. You only need to find detailed information and use the game engine to draw a computer map.

This outsourcing job is quite simple, so the price is cheap, priced by piece, 1 USD per picture, but almost all game producers are crazy about it, and they start to grab money.

Because if you do the math, you know that the total surface area of ​​the earth is 510067866 square kilometers. After deducting the 3.6 ​​million square kilometers of ocean area that does not need to be mapped, there are also close to 1.5 million square kilometers. This is the game outsourcing fee of 1.5 million US dollars!
1.5 billion!
This is just the production fee for the game map.

This is a big production!
Many people on the platform are stupid... No, they think Fang Jie is stupid, spending so much money just to make a map for a game!

Especially those domestic game makers couldn't understand why Fang Jie did this.

You must know that a game can be developed in China for 1 by 200.

Even if you have money, you can't be such a prodigal, right?

Are you, the richest man in China, sending money to foreigners in disguise?
You must know that on the platform, there are many more foreign producers than domestic ones, and we don’t understand the geographical conditions of foreign countries. The money can only be watched by foreigners. Is this not giving money?
Yep, I was accidentally posted online again.

It's no wonder that since the end of 04, Fang Jie's reputation has been mixed, and he has become the capital of evil in the hearts of the public. He thinks about how to make money every day, and how to use games to entrap more Internet-addicted teenagers. There is no one at all. The richest man in China should be responsible.

Well, anyway, there is nothing wrong with wanting to accuse him of crimes. Now, whenever Fang Jie does anything, there will be criticisms.

There are also die-hard fans who firmly believe that the "leader is awesome", and think that what the leader does is actually not easy-spend 1.5 million US dollars to mobilize game makers all over the world to draw their own maps, just to make a game, Do you think it is possible?
Of course not!
But is the leader a fool?
Absolutely not!
So if you think about it carefully, this is actually in the name of making games to help the country strategically collect detailed geographic data around the world!
Emmmmmmm…

Seems to make sense!
But Fang Jie really didn't think that much at first, he was really just playing games, but now he realizes that he seems to have done a great thing that benefits the country and the people?
Not to mention these inexplicable remarks, just say that the $1.5 million game map production fee is actually worth it.

Leaving aside the long-term benefits, let’s just say that he didn’t need to promote it himself, and it directly detonated the global Internet and game circles, that is, the games are still only in concept, and even on the game map, they have already been out of the circle. Everyone knows it.

This can save a lot of publicity costs!
Previously, international netizens were still discussing that Musk took [-] million to acquire a stake in a satellite company, and he was moving towards his rocket program.

In the end, within two months, the richest man in Huaguo was even more powerful. He used 1.5 million to make a game, and it was just a map for the game...

What kind of game is a game worth $1.5 million for a map?
Everyone is full of curiosity and looking forward to this game.

This kind of mentality is just like when Cameron filmed "Terminator", "True Lies", "Titanic" and later "Avatar". He dared to spend so much money on things. For the sake of money, he The movie will definitely not be too hip!

Under the shock, excitement, curiosity and onlookers of countless people, Fang Jie accepted interviews from many well-known foreign media.

"Is $1.5 million a lot? As for all the fuss?"

"I'd say $1.5 million is probably a fraction of the cost of the entire game."

"I want to make a real game that explores the issue of human survival. I think there is nothing more important than the survival of human beings. For such an important thing, it is worth spending more money."

"Yes, I am not wrong, I did say 'real game'. That is, this game, it is extremely real, and it may even become the second world of human beings in the future, a virtual but real game The world. Therefore, its map must also be real."

"No, no, that's not contradictory."

"No, it's not just a virtual reality concept either."

"I mean, it should be a kind of virtual reality, which is two different concepts from virtual reality, even the opposite."

"The real world is a material-based world, but it is undeniable that the human society in the real world is actually dominated by the human spirit. The virtual reality I am talking about is a spiritual world, a human being. It is also a real spiritual home, and it can also dominate everything in reality.”

"Let me give you a simple example, a forward-looking technology: telemedicine. Now when doctors perform surgery, they must go to the operating table in reality and perform real operations; while in the real virtual world, doctors do not have to go to the operation site in person, directly With the use of virtual reality technology, this operation can be performed in any corner of the world."

"It is conceivable that in the future, people will no longer have to seek medical treatment everywhere, and the world's top medical experts can help people solve their problems at any time."

"Of course, this is just one example of an application in the real-world virtual world. On its own, this may be just a remote technology, not virtual reality. But what if telecommuting is possible in all walks of life? "

"Then it will not be a separate technology, but will form a virtual world in which most human activities will be carried out."

"For example, let me talk about another forward-looking technology: human unmanned driving. Here is a statement: I am firmly opposed to strong artificial intelligence with autonomous consciousness, so the unmanned driving I mean refers to drivers staying at home and Access to the virtual reality system to provide driving services for passengers. Although it is called unmanned driving, it is still human, but the driver is not actually sitting in the car."

"Then to put it a little bit bigger, if everyone except the necessary travel, all other work is carried out in the real virtual system, can we use this technology to explore outer space and carry out the Mars colonization project?"

"At least, you can access the virtual reality system, remotely drive the Mars excavator, and do engineering work on Mars, which is far safer than going there in person."

"On the earth, we human beings compete with each other for limited land and resources. Countless wars have occurred since ancient times. The destruction of the human earth is becoming more and more serious. In the end, we will surely perish. And if there is such a With the latest technology, we can completely set our sights wider.”

"Human science and technology cannot achieve this in the short term, but there are some things that must be done, and the sooner the better."

"Yes, this game, or so strictly speaking, it is not a game, but another world, a virtual world that can affect the real world, just to promote the development and progress of these technologies!"

"All the income of this game, that is, all the expenditures of the players, will be used to develop related technologies and continuously upgrade this common spiritual home of mankind."

"In other words, although this game will still charge some fees, it is not profitable, and I will not take a penny!"

"Money belongs to everyone, and is shared by players and peace-loving people around the world. If you use your money to realize these technologies and promote human civilization to the era of interstellar colonization, the credit is also yours!"

"As for me, like everyone else, I am just a participant, at most a wealthy participant, so I invested as much money as I could."

"I hope that everyone can also participate in this plan, pay attention to the living conditions of human beings in the future, and find a solution."

"And this plan, I call it "Ark Project"!"

"The first supporting game of this plan is "Ark: Survival Evolved"!"

"Finally, I want to emphasize again: Any expenditure you make in this game world is a contribution to the future development of mankind. I will not take any money. The financial report of the game will be released publicly and updated daily!"

(End of this chapter)