Why the bug I wrote became a core gameplay mechanic?!
Chapter 444 - 427: Me, a Producer?

Chapter 444: Chapter 427: Me, a Producer?

The next morning.

Gu Fan, Zhou Yang, Wei Chengjie, and Su Tong, four people, came to a small meeting room. Although it looked like a minor meeting, in reality, this would directly determine Nitiandang’s game development direction for the foreseeable future, making it extremely important.

Gu Fan first distributed some materials to the three.

"These are the sales and profit figures for our company’s games that I just got from the finance department. Take a quick look. Don’t worry too much about the specific numbers; just have a general idea.

"In short, the biggest trouble our company is facing right now is the problem of how to spend this money."

The materials were, of course, prepared in advance by Xiao Mingyu. In fact, the finance department produced such a report periodically. However, over the past six months, Nitiandang had been fully engaged in developing various games, and since funding was not an issue, no one had paid special attention to these figures.

They could only feel their bonuses getting bigger and bigger.

Last night, after President Li meticulously planned the strategy, the future long-term direction for Nitiandang was set, so everyone needed to adjust their mindset and focus on the previously neglected areas.

Indeed, for these core company members, they preferred focusing on new game development plans and had little interest in the specifics of the company’s financial situation.

All these numbers were headache-inducing at first glance.

However, seeing the specific figures, everyone had quite complex expressions on their faces.

Since when did our company... have so much money?

Even during the development of "Ascension," Nitiandang had already accumulated over 50 million in development and operational funds, which was almost too much to spend. The total cost for developing "Ascension" was around 37 million, but soon after its release, the sales had surpassed a million copies. They not only recouped the costs early but also continued to have strong sales.

Subsequently, "Road Rage Simulator," "Hell Racing," "Shadow World," "Legend of Infinity Fantasy," and "Heartbeat Dream," these games also steadily made money.

Of course, to say they made a huge profit? That would be an overstatement.

Because Nitiandang’s games were quite restrained in their monetization models. Like "Shadow World," being a successful MMORPG in two versions, could significantly increase revenue if it pushed sales of appearances and skins, and "Heartbeat Dream" could have compelled many players into spending heavily if all characters were acquired through random draws.

But Nitiandang did not adopt these practices and generally set pricing standards that just didn’t lose money.

Of course, this had its advantages too; though not a cash cow, the sales for each game by Nitiandang were very stable, and it was rare to see sales drop below three million in the long run.

For a single-player game developer, this was quite an impressive achievement.

Up to now, even though Nitiandang had held some major events, like directly purchasing a finished game "Demon Realm Conflict" to take over its management, or completely losing money in the launch of the first generation of Elios figures, overall, the funds on the books continued to grow steadily and significantly.

So much so that, up to now, Nitiandang’s accumulated funds for research, development, and operations had nearly reached five hundred million.

Moreover, due to Nitiandang’s rapid game development cycles, often launching a new game every three or four months, the old games maintained strong momentum. As time passed, the number of simultaneously money-making games increased, inevitably leading to a continuous increase in the company’s funds.

For Lilith, her thinking was simple: speed up the game production process by spending all these funds as quickly as possible!

Because the faster and more games they produced, the more likely they were to hit upon a lucky big earner with strong negative emotions.

This was also the reason why, last night, Lilith meticulously planned and made decisive strategies, setting the grand blueprint for Nitiandang’s future.

This could also be seen as the "Nitiandang 3.0" phase.

If the initial stage with only a few employees like Gu Fan, Zhou Yang, and Su Tong was Nitiandang 1.0, and the stage where they moved to the villa and continuously expanded, even working on two projects simultaneously was 2.0, then this moment, in pursuit of spending more funds and capturing more negative emotions, was precisely when Nitiandang needed to enter the 3.0 phase.

Zhou Yang put down the materials: "With so much money, it’s indeed enough to support us in continuing to expand, or even buy out many outsourcing companies."

For outsourcing companies, as long as there was money, any arrangement would work.

Even completely "supporting" an outsourcing company, turning it into a long-term partner or even a subsidiary of Nitiandang, was entirely feasible.

Initially, everyone worried that doing so would burn through cash too quickly, but since President Li and President Gu approved, they might as well burn it. After all, it was the company’s money.

Perhaps they could even explore a completely new business model.

Gu Fan continued, "According to President Li’s instructions from last night, in order for Nitiandang to transition better and faster into the 3.0 phase, we need to make the following arrangements.

"First, I will continue to manage Nitiandang’s physical business. This time, for a new game, I will launch a new physical product on my end.

"As for what the product will be, I haven’t decided yet, but that’s not really relevant to everyone else.

"Zhou Yang and Wei Chengjie, you two need to select a group of people from the company, mainly core employees, including programmers, planners, and artists, and head to Magic Capital and Sheep City to establish Nitiandang’s ’Magic Capital Studio’ and ’Sheep City Studio’.

"Your task is to find some capable outsourcing companies in these two cities and turn them into a part of our game development process by investing money, thereby achieving President Li’s goal of speeding up game development.

"Of course, as this is the first time trying this cooperation model, the initial efficiency might not be high, and even the development progress of ’Blood of Lies’ might not show improvement."

"But as time went on, our collaboration matured, and the development time for subsequent games would likely be shortened to some extent.

"This matter is of great importance, and President Li is also very concerned about it, so I’m counting on you two."

Zhou Yang and Wei Chengjie had obviously discussed this with Gu Fan beforehand and were mentally prepared, so they both nodded, "Don’t worry, President Gu, we will handle this properly."

However, Su Tong, who had not been paying much attention, suddenly realized something was amiss.

"Hey? That’s not right.

"Among the three of you, one is busy with the new physical products, and the other two have to go to Magic Capital and Sheep City, but what about ’Blood of Lies’? Who will be the producer?"

All three fell silent and then said in unison, "What do you think?"

Su Tong was somewhat shocked as she pointed to herself, "Could it be me?"

At that moment, she felt as if she were minding her own business walking down the street when suddenly a billboard fell from the sky and hit her, leaving her a bit dazed.

Clearly, before this, Su Tong had never imagined that one day she would make a cameo as the lead strategist for a game.

After all, since joining Heavenly Games, she had always been the Test Team Leader. Moreover, before this, she hardly had much experience with games.

Even after she became the Test Team Leader, she had indeed played numerous games, even creating a top-tier Speedrunner account during the process of playing ’Sisyphus’ and ’Ascension,’ but her experience with games was still notably lacking.

She might be well-versed in individual games, but her understanding of game genres might not be as good as some veteran gamers.

Let alone being a game producer.

Gu Fan cleared his throat lightly, "Don’t worry, this isn’t as difficult as you think.

"Firstly, your role as the producer of ’Blood of Lies’ is specified by President Li, she insisted multiple times, and there’s no room for negotiation.

"To expand as quickly as possible, Zhou Yang and Wei Chengjie are indeed the best candidates to go to Magic Capital and Sheep City. And if we have to choose a producer from the remaining staff, it indeed has to be you.

"As for how to do it, you really don’t need to worry too much.

"Because the whole design plan for ’Blood of Lies’ is still completed by the design team, Zhou Yang and Wei Chengjie will each be responsible for a part.

"All you need to do when the time comes is to strictly supervise the production according to the design plan.

"Besides, ’Blood of Lies,’ as an action game, actually has some similarities to ’Ascension,’ which you were thoroughly familiar with before, so you should also be able to adapt without too much trouble."

Su Tong felt helpless, "Other than both being action games and having a bit of Cthulhu style, how are they the same?"

She had also seen the concept drafts of ’Blood of Lies’ and obviously, the differences between these two games were too great, whether it was the story background, combat mechanisms, or special systems.

But clearly, Su Tong was being irrevocably thrust into this role by President Li.

As for why Lilith made such a decision, Gu Fan knew very well.

Letting Zhou Yang and Wei Chengjie start the Magic Capital and Sheep City branches of Nitiandang was just a pretext, because Lilith had also lost her trust in them.

After all, the games they had been responsible for had previously exhibited bizarre bugs, resulting in very serious consequences.

No evidence was found, but it was suspicious enough!

Thus, after excluding these ’Three Scoundrels,’ Lilith reluctantly had no choice but to select Su Tong.

Of course, Lilith didn’t fully trust Su Tong either, but she couldn’t really pull someone completely unknown to take over the project as producer, since a basic capability is still required for a producer, otherwise, what if it slowed down the development process or led to a difficult birth of the game, then who would compensate for that lack of negative emotion?

Moreover, in all the time Su Tong served as the Test Team Leader for Nitiandang, she had always been diligent and had not made any significant errors, even helping Lilith score points by exploiting Hell Frontline in the process.

Lilith thought beautifully: As the Test Team Leader, Su Tong had always worked methodically according to the design documents, so when made the new game’s producer, ’Blood of Lies’ should be able to be developed completely according to the design documents, right?

In that case, Lilith could already be thankful.

Even if problems arose, a straightforward tester was easier to deal with than those planners full of schemes, and also more likely to leave loopholes.

Thus, the roles of producer and Test Team Leader for ’Blood of Lies’ were both gloriously assumed by Su Tong.

"Okay, if there are no other issues, then let’s all hurry up, President Li hasn’t given us much time."

Gu Fan stood up, "Right, as usual, let’s release the promotional trailer and trial demo of ’Blood of Lies’ first, develop and promote simultaneously.

"This time, not only do we want to bring an unforgettable experience to the players like ’Ascension,’ but we also need to make a clear distinction from ’Ascension,’ and present something... irresistible!"

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