Why the bug I wrote became a core gameplay mechanic?!
Chapter 44 That’s Not the Core Gameplay, It’s a BUG!

Chapter 44: Chapter 44 That’s Not the Core Gameplay, It’s a BUG!

Guo Hongyu barely held back.

Divine my ass, it’s not like art resources are blown in by the wind or sprouted from the ground!

Yeah right, if I’ve got nothing better to do, I might as well doodle a few concept art pieces for fun!

Although Guo Hongyu’s current position was that of a 3D artist, and being a 3D artist requires a solid foundation in art, he could draw 2D concept art too, though perhaps not as expertly as professional concept artists.

If the company needed it, he wouldn’t mind moonlighting as a concept artist.

But what the heck does "for fun" mean?

Guo Hongyu could only interpret these words as President Gu’s unique sense of humor, or perhaps President Gu still didn’t fully trust him enough to entrust him with the management of art resources and communication with the outsourcing team.

Observing from the side for a moment, Zhou Yang waited until Guo Hongyu went back to his workstation before leaning in and whispering, "President Gu, I have a question too."

Gu Fan looked at him, "Yeah, ask away."

Zhou Yang asked out of curiosity, "What’s the core gameplay of ’Destiny of the Sleeping Dragon’?"

Gu Fan was a bit surprised, "Core gameplay? Isn’t it strategy management?"

Zhou Yang shook his head, "No, no, no, maybe I didn’t phrase it quite right. I mean, what’s the biggest highlight?

"President Gu, look, I’ve noticed that our company’s games all have very unique core gameplay, like ’Infernal Trajectory’s’ ’Bullet Bending,’ ’Sisyphus’s’ Rolling Stone Acceleration and ’Dragon Flap Wings,’ and ’Against Heaven Blocks’s’ T-Spin.

"But for ’Destiny of the Sleeping Dragon,’ there doesn’t seem to be a highlight like that?

"Did I miss something, or do I not fully understand this game, which is why I haven’t discovered it?"

Initially, Gu Fan was a bit distracted, but when he heard what Zhou Yang said, he suddenly became alert.

Well great, a dangerous element, huh!

Are you possibly a traitor sent by Lilith to gather intelligence?

Isn’t it normal not to have discovered the highlights of ’Destiny of the Sleeping Dragon’? I’m still figuring out where to stuff a bug in, if you’d noticed that, shouldn’t you be the one running Nitian Paradise Company and I should abdicate in your favor!

And who told you those were core gameplay features?

Even if the Jade Emperor himself came down today, they’d all still be bugs!

Thinking this, Gu Fan’s expression turned serious. He cleared his throat twice and earnestly said, "Firstly, I must correct you, those core gameplay elements you mentioned, to be accurate, they should be called ’bugs.’"

Zhou Yang was startled, "Eh?"

If it wasn’t Gu Fan who had said this personally, he might have thought he was hallucinating.

Bugs?

How could the core gameplay of these three games possibly be bugs? Is that some kind of joke?

Gu Fan continued with a serious face, "Yes, the ’Bullet Bending,’ ’Rolling Stone Acceleration,’ ’Dragon Flap Wings,’ and ’T-Spin’ you mentioned, they all were unexpected bugs that appeared during the development process.

"If you don’t believe me, you can ask Su Tong. She was involved throughout the development of the last two games.

"The original design drafts are still there, you can take a good look and see for yourself if there’s any mention of those features."

Zhou Yang’s expression gradually turned vacant, as the earnest expression on Gu Fan’s face made him realize that this was no joke.

But isn’t this more absurd than a joke?

If all these are bugs, then what highlights do the three games have left without them?

No, you could even say that without these bugs, some gameplay elements suddenly go from "supplementary core gameplay" to "deliberately nauseating, dumb designs," reducing the three games to be less than "mediocre" and only fit for the trash heap!

All three games were saved by bugs?

If that were truly the case, then the name of the company was indeed aptly chosen, such luck is truly defiant of the heavens!

After a moment of silence, Zhou Yang asked, "Then, President Gu, will there still be bugs popping up in ’Destiny of the Sleeping Dragon’?"

Gu Fan chuckled, "How could I know, I can’t predict the future.

"Let’s just leave it up to luck."

"Our company has always adhered to the principle of doing our humanly best and then leaving the rest to destiny."

Zhou Yang silently returned to his seat, temporarily at a loss for words.

He began to doubt whether his decision to take a pay cut to join Nitian Paradise Games was truly the correct choice...

...

...

About two weeks later, Lilith delivered all the art and music resources for the game as scheduled.

Gu Fan also handed these resources to the Chief Artist Guo Hongyu immediately, instructing him to simply adjust the format before putting them into the editor for easy use.

By this time, the main functions of "Destiny of the Sleeping Dragon" had been fully developed. What followed was setting up art resources, tweaking details, testing, and then the game could be officially launched.

Guo Hongyu, with an expectant heart, opened these art resources.

Then he was stunned because these art resources and music resources were completely different from what he had imagined!

First came the art resources.

In Guo Hongyu’s mind, since "Destiny of the Sleeping Dragon" was a Three Kingdoms theme, there were many standard references to emulate, such as the original paintings and large maps from the classic game "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" series, which fit very well.

Even if they were to avoid this type for fear of plagiarism, there were plenty of domestic mobile game artworks that could be referred to.

But the art style of "Destiny of the Sleeping Dragon" was quite peculiar.

Realistic style? It wasn’t very realistic actually, apart from the characters of the Shu Han faction, the rest seemed to ooze a malevolent air, looking nothing like good people.

But calling it fantasy style? It wasn’t quite fantasy either, as the attire was historically accurate, and there were basically no traces of demonic transformation or mutation in the characters’ appearances.

In short, it looked as if the characters from the Three Kingdoms were collectively possessed and then given a "demonic air" filter, rather bizarre indeed.

The music resources were even more outrageous.

Logically, the BGM of a Three Kingdoms game should either be soothing and natural or rousing and poignant, corresponding to the development and war segments in strategy games, respectively.

But the BGM of this game was somewhat hellish, perpetually conveying a sense of looming crisis.

Most outrageous of all was that the resource pack actually contained 50 different voice packs!

Of these 50 voice packs, 40 corresponded to different hero characters, while the remaining 10 represented certain types of voices for dubbing the other minor characters.

One must realize that the game had only a little over 200 generals in total.

Moreover, these so-called voice packs weren’t fixed dialogues that had been recorded, but more like "AI voices." After voice actors did extensive recording, the AI would imitate and learn their speech habits, and later, it could recite any text.

Although this feature seemed impressive, in practice, it still had some flaws.

For instance, when dealing with specific, more complex sentences, it sounded less natural, and most people could somewhat detect traces of AI dubbing.

One could tell, although it was recognizable, it definitely wasn’t as natural as dedicated voice acting.

Guo Hongyu had seen the design documents and knew that the game would use fake-AI to mimic personalities and generate dialogues.

What’s more, he had noticed that Zhao Haiquan, the man behind the programming, had been busy tuning the game’s AIs recently. He’d been feeding them a vast array of dialogues from various movies and games featuring Three Kingdoms characters, hoping they would "get into character" quickly.

Despite this, Guo Hongyu didn’t expect that individual AI voices would also be allocated to these characters.

Just displaying the text in a dialogue box seemed perfectly fine, didn’t it?

Was it really necessary to go the extra mile to add voiceovers, inflating costs?

All of it was puzzling, and it seemed like everything about Nitian Paradise Company, from top to bottom, from the inside out, was oddly out of step with other domestic game companies.

It appeared that there was something fundamentally unserious about the company...

Where was this root problem? Was it Gu Fan? But that didn’t seem right either; President Gu appeared quite professional.

Guo Hongyu was perplexed but in the end, he held back and didn’t ask any further questions.

After all, being a new employee and not yet familiar with everyone, it was best to focus on one’s own duties first. The rest could be observed and learned over time.

And so, in an atmosphere that was a mix of "each cleaning their own doorstep" and "each harboring their own schemes," "Destiny of the Sleeping Dragon" was smoothly developed over the course of a month, followed by two weeks of testing.

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