You call this entrepreneurship?

Chapter 50 Follow me to America

Hong Fei and Chen Guangxia watched Mr. Qin's impassioned encouragement, their blood boiled with excitement, and they also had some expectations for the future.

Qin Shaoyan took out a lot of legal documents and asked them to sign one by one, thus completing the onboarding process.

Then he started to introduce the current situation of the company to two people, and by the way, he mentioned the progress of the campus network.

Hong Fei didn't feel anything yet, but Chen Guangxia became more and more excited.

This multinational company is not just engaged in game development, it actually has an Internet project hidden away.

There is really much to be done.

One hundred thousand users a month, what is this?

This is a gold mine that has not yet been mined, a future Internet giant, the future Sina! NetEase! Sohu!
Chen Guangxia was a little excited for a while. After all, he only made a lot of money by playing games.

If you can sneak into the campus network, become a senior executive, and then wait for the IPO to go public, wouldn't that mean you have freedom of wealth?

But you can't be too eager at this time, otherwise Mr. Qin will look down on you.

Don't rush now, wait a moment, they will all sneak into the company anyway.

The same goes for waiting for the right opportunity before applying for transfer.

Chen Guangxia suppressed his petty thoughts and spoke enthusiastically to Qin Shaoyan, carefully complimenting him.

Hong Fei's thoughts were much simpler, and he directly started asking about the progress of the stand-alone game project.

Qin Shaoyan was so excited that he turned on the computer and showed them the demo version he and Zhang Pingyi made.

After a few minutes of demonstration, Hong Fei did not express any comments, but just said, "The degree of completion is very high."

The gameplay of this game is novel in theme, the rules are rigorous in logic, the operation is simple and easy to use, and there are no bugs in the program.

There is nothing wrong with the production itself.

But, you can’t tell whether this project has the potential to become popular just from a demo version.

Let alone a bare demo version, even if the finished version is here, Hong Fei wouldn't dare to say that this game will work.

Take out a game, play it casually and everyone will be shocked.

Then he swore that this game would be extremely popular, and then frantically rushed to release it exclusively. That was all nonsense.

The game industry has a special characteristic. It is an industry with great randomness.

In the words of Nintendo head Hiroshi Yamauchi, "it's a little better than drawing a lottery."

This randomness has been particularly obvious for a long time, especially in the era of 2D games, when the graphics have not yet advanced to the era of 3D graphics quality.

Whether a game can be popular or not is completely a matter of probability.

Not only the development programmers don’t know, the planners don’t know, the artists don’t know, the bosses don’t know, and the publishers don’t know either.

This industry has completely inherited the characteristics of the toy industry, with no rules to follow, no logic and no signs.

No matter how complex the game design is, how exciting the plot design is, or how exquisite the graphics are, it is common for the game to fail when it is launched online.

If players don't buy it, they just don't buy it. It's useless whatever you say.

Developers cannot replace players' preferences with their own preferences. The R&D team uses the brains of a few people to challenge the brains of hundreds or thousands of players.

This is an asymmetric war.

Hong Fei looked at Qin Shaoyan, "Mr. Qin, what do you need me to do? Are you sure about the art style?"

"I have already decided on the art style. Please draw it for me, Teacher Hong, and then we will discuss it." Qin Shaoyan opened a document, "I sorted out the specific art requirements and quantities. Teacher Hong will take a look first."

Then Qin Shaoyan took out another piece of white paper with random simple drawings on it.

"I hope the monster's style is like this. What do you think, Teacher Hong?"

Hong Fei pondered for a moment and said, "Your painting style is quite interesting. Let me try it."

"Then thank you, Teacher Hong." Qin Shaoyan smiled and made a please gesture, "If you need anything, just ask."

Hong Fei picked a computer, and after carefully checking the screen and graphics card, he inserted the hand-drawn tablet he brought into it.

Putting on his headphones, he picked a song and turned it on. With a solemn expression, Hong Fei picked up a pen and started writing on the hand-drawing board.

In less than two hours, Hong Fei drew several versions of the most basic monster images and presented them to Qin Shaoyan for discussion. Qin Shaoyan was amazed after reading the sample. Teacher Hong's art ability is definitely top-notch in the game industry.

The painting style was very accurately grasped, not only meeting Qin Shaoyan's requirements, but also making several different versions and images for reference.

Qin Shaoyan nodded, "Teacher Hong's professional ability is admirable. This is the style of painting. You can control the specific details yourself. You can choose a version of these monsters yourself."

Hong Fei was a little surprised, "That's it?"

"Yes." Qin Shaoyan looked at Hong Fei's expression a little strange, "What's wrong?"

"Don't you need to change it?" Hong Fei asked hesitantly.

"Isn't this good? It's exactly the style I need." Qin Shaoyan felt baffled, "What else should I change?"

"Then it's settled." Hong Fei let out a sigh of relief.

The knowledgeable Mr. Qin does things differently from those bosses in China. In China, if you are engaged in design, the boss will not let you change it ten or eight times before it is complete.

If something doesn't feel right, it's just a basic operation. Returning to the first version will boost your blood pressure.

Mr. Qin's straightforward style of doing things boosted Hong Fei's spirits. This is someone who does great things.

Qin Shaoyan was also quite satisfied with Hong Fei's efficiency and speed. After finalizing the painting style, he could just leave the rest to the art director.

Teacher Hong can accurately control the painting style, and let him do the rest. There is no need to insist that the details be exactly the same as the original.

The next step was to recruit two animators and start working on the official version.

2D is generally divided into two methods, one is skeletal animation and the other is frame animation.

Skeleton animation is to divide the character into different parts, then attach bones to each part, and perform movements by controlling the deformation of the bones and slices.

The advantages are low cost and fast development, but the disadvantage is that the movements are stiff and not smooth and realistic enough.

Of course, if you want to slice the slices, you only need to slice them in enough detail to make them realistic.

Frame animation requires decomposing the character's movements into pictures, drawing them, and then composing the animation.

Almost every action requires a new drawing, which is a lot of work.

The advantage is that the quality is easy to control and there is no need to compromise too much. This is almost always the case in traditional fighting games.

Qin Shaoyan directly chose skeletal animation. It was Plants vs. Zombies anyway, and it wasn't a fighting game, so it didn't require finesse.

The movements are stiff, right? That's a characteristic of the game.

Within a few days, the game had some art resources replaced and began to look like a formal game.

Time passed little by little, and after two weeks, most of the art resources were in place, and the game development was nearly completed.

On weekend nights, everyone crowded in front of a computer to watch a demo of the latest version.

Everyone burst into cheers as they watched the corn cannon soar into the sky and bombard the zombies.

Qin Shaoyan, who was in charge of the demonstration, paused the game, took a deep breath, and turned to look at Hong Fei.

"Teacher Hong, what do you think?"

"Personally, I think it's bullshit." Hong Fei said seriously, "But I don't know what the players think?"

"Well, let the market test whether it is good or bad." Qin Shaoyan nodded, "Now we are ready to make preparations and then contact game publishers."

"Okay." Hong Fei nodded, "The rest is up to Mr. Qin."

"It's not hard." Qin Shaoyan said with a smile, "Zhang Tianshi, do you have a passport?"

"Ah? No?" Zhang Minyi looked confused, "Why do you need a passport?"

"Of course I'm going to the United States." Qin Shaoyan said seriously, "Hurry up and get ready to go on a business trip with me."

"Going on a business trip again?" Zhang Pingyi's heart skipped a beat and he felt bad. "Where to go?"

"Go to the United States, and you and I will go meet the publisher together."

Zhang Minyi was stunned. He thought Qin Shaoyan was acting in front of everyone, but when he saw Qin Shaoyan taking out his passport, he was immediately stunned.

Damn it, are you serious?

(End of this chapter)