October 10th, Wednesday.
Yu Fei sat at his workstation with information about “Ghostly General” on his computer screen and a small notebook filled with indecipherable scribbles in his hand.
His face wore an expression of absolute despair.
This was a complete nightmare!
He had absolutely no clue what to do!
After Monday’s meeting, Yu Fei had been pushed by Mr. Pei to begin the initial design work for “Ghostly General 2.”
This was Yu Fei’s first time participating in Tenda’s creative sharing meeting for a new game, and the experience was completely different from what he had imagined!
As a fan of “Return to Shore,” Yu Fei had always admired Tenda Games and was curious about how these classic games were designed.
But after actually joining Tenda Games and even participating in the development work as an acting chief designer, Yu Fei suddenly realized that the reality was very different from his expectations!
What exactly was different?
There were probably differences in many areas, but the most prominent one was the overall vibe!
It felt like he had opened the wrong door, and where he was now wasn’t supposed to be Tenda’s game department but somewhere else entirely.
After all, Tenda’s game department was renowned—mention it anywhere and people would recognize the name immediately.
Within the gaming industry, Tenda’s game department was considered the elite of the elite in the domestic gaming industry. They had produced so many successful games they couldn’t even count them all, and no two games were of the same type.
Although this should mainly be credited to the genius designer Mr. Pei, the employees who could turn Mr. Pei’s ideas into such high-quality games were also formidable. Any one of them could probably outperform producers from other companies.
And within Tenda, everyone knew that the people in the game department were Mr. Pei’s closest confidants, the elite of the elite. There were so many outstanding employees that once they were fully trained, they would be assigned to other industries.
People like Huang Sibo and Lü Mingliang were all in this situation.
But for a department with so many accolades, after actually joining, something seemed off!
Yu Fei thought it was already absurd enough that he, a complete outsider with no game development experience whatsoever, had been entrusted with such an important task by Mr. Pei.
And now Mr. Pei was actually asking him to be responsible for designing and developing a fighting game?
What was he thinking?
Of course, despite his doubts, Yu Fei—who had repeatedly told himself to stand his last watch well—ultimately gave up struggling and began working according to the plan.
His thinking was, since the task had been assigned, he would do as much as he could. Not completing it would be normal, but doing a little something would be worth the salary Mr. Pei was paying him.
The matter of making “Return to Shore” free had already been negotiated with the official platform, which was very supportive.
After all, “Return to Shore” had a Chinese cultural background and was a rare high-quality action game in its category, perfectly aligned with the official platform’s mission of promoting traditional culture and advancing the game industry.
But the news hadn’t been officially announced yet because the official platform said they wanted to make it a big event!
For a game of “Return to Shore’s” caliber to become free, they couldn’t just change the price tag and be done with it. That would be too unceremonious.
Moreover, Tenda had proactively requested refunds for recent purchasers, with different refund amounts based on purchase dates. This needed careful consideration and required improving relevant functions and reconciling revenue sharing from different periods.
So, the official platform decided to prepare for a while and officially announce the news next week, opening up the official refund channel.
At the same time, they promised to bundle the free “Return to Shore” with “Eternal Reincarnation” and give it the best recommendation in a prominent position for a whole month!
Such a wonderful thing naturally deserved a grand celebration. They couldn’t let a good company like Tenda contribute silently.
Yu Fei certainly had no objections.
In his view, making “Return to Shore” free might cost the official platform a small amount of revenue sharing, but the influence would be enormous. Whether it was driving traffic to the platform, expanding the player base, or promoting traditional culture, the invisible benefits to the official platform were considerable—far greater than that small amount of revenue sharing.
Under these circumstances, wasn’t it normal for the official platform to provide good resources for promotion?
So, this matter was essentially settled. Yu Fei handed over the liaison work to others in the department and began wracking his brains for the design plan of “Ghostly General 2.”
As for why he didn’t seek advice from others…
He had tried, but without results.
The other people in the game department were consistently unhelpful!
This wasn’t due to a lack of camaraderie—everyone had very sufficient reasons.
First, this creative idea was proposed by Yu Fei, and different people had different ideas, making it difficult to provide suggestions.
People in creative industries knew that different individuals had different perspectives, so randomly giving advice could easily turn a project into a “patchwork monster.” For example, if one author made an outline and handed it to another author to write, the result would certainly be unrecognizable.
Since Mr. Pei had adopted Yu Fei’s creative ideas, others naturally couldn’t think through this problem for him.
Second, Mr. Pei had specifically named Yu Fei to be responsible for this matter, indicating that Mr. Pei must have seen some special quality in him directly related to the game.
This quality could only be unearthed by Yu Fei himself. Help from others might actually be counterproductive, preventing Yu Fei from discovering this quality.
Finally, there was another important reason: others weren’t very familiar with fighting games either!
Having a basic understanding of fighting games and mastering them were two completely different concepts.
Being able to execute a few combos could be called a basic understanding, but this level compared to those true masters was a gap perhaps even larger than the one between Gold players and King players.
After all, in MOBA games, sometimes you could still get carried by teammates, but in fighting games, it was purely about your own skill—if you couldn’t win, you simply couldn’t win.
So, for these complex reasons, no one could provide suggestions, and Yu Fei could only desperately fill his notebook with scribbles, occasionally coming up with ideas that he quickly rejected.
Just as he was at his wit’s end, he suddenly heard Min Jingchao’s slightly surprised voice: “Oh? Old Hu, you’re back?”
Old Hu?
Hu Xianbin?!
Yu Fei jumped to his feet and looked toward the door.
It really was Hu Xianbin!
After two months, Hu Xianbin had become darker and thinner, but his spirits were good. However, the expression of being lost in time on his face still revealed the inhuman treatment he had endured during this period.
Yu Fei was overjoyed. Describing his current mood as “finding hope in desperate times” would not be an exaggeration.
A full two months! Hu Xianbin had finally returned!
Do you know how I’ve spent these two months?
But his return was good news. Old Hu coming back at this time was no different from a savior arriving.
Yu Fei knew that he finally no longer had to kill off vast numbers of his brain cells for “Ghostly General 2.” He could hand this mess over to Hu Xianbin, briefly explain Mr. Pei’s requirements, and then be free!
With this thought, he immediately rushed forward: “Brother Hu, you’ve come back at just the right time!”
“Come quick, let me briefly explain the design direction for ‘Ghostly General 2.’ We’ll hand over the work, and then I can go back to writing novels!”
“Honestly, Brother Hu, I’ve been completely overwhelmed as this acting chief designer who was thrown into the deep end. If you had come back two days later, I would have certainly been tortured to the point of collapse.”
Yu Fei was absolutely delighted, his face animated with joy, like someone who had finally hailed a taxi after standing in the cold wind for over an hour.
Hu Xianbin looked at him with a strange expression, trying to speak several times, but Yu Fei was too excited and kept talking to himself, giving Hu Xianbin no chance to interject.
When Yu Fei was actually about to pull Hu Xianbin to his workstation to hand over the work, Hu Xianbin finally found an opportunity and sighed lightly: “Well, calm down first and let me explain.”
“Actually, I’m back this time because the training camp gave us a break to rest and handle unfinished business in our departments, preparing us for the journey to Shennongjia.”
“So, work handover isn’t really feasible. You’ll probably have to continue for another month.”
Yu Fei’s expression instantly froze. Although he still wore a delighted smile, his eyes were filled with confusion.
“Shennongjia?”
“What are you going to do in Shennongjia?”
“Hasn’t the one-month period already passed?”
Hu Xianbin explained: “Last month was just physical training at the training base in Jingzhou, not considered the formal content. After completing the physical training, we still need to suffer for another month in Shennongjia.”
“The previous training was just preparation. This Shennongjia journey is the main content of this activity.”
Yu Fei was dumbfounded, temporarily losing the ability to speak.
Hu Xianbin patted his shoulder with great sympathy: “Trust me, I feel worse than you do…”
Yu Fei still didn’t give up: “Do you really have to go? Can’t we work something out?”
Hu Xianbin forced a smile: “Do you think if there was even the slightest possibility of working something out, I wouldn’t have tried?”
“It’s not like I want to go to Shennongjia!”
“I envy you so much. All you have to do at work is think a bit about the new game. I’m the one who’s really going to suffer!”
“How about we switch? You go to Shennongjia? I absolutely have no objections!”
Yu Fei’s face darkened: “That won’t be necessary!”
“Well, how about this, Brother Hu—since you still have a brief vacation, could you help me come up with the basic concept for this game?”
“My main concern is that my abilities aren’t sufficient. What if I mess up the game and damage Tenda Games’ reputation? Wouldn’t I become a sinner then?”
“I’m really not good at fighting games!”
Hu Xianbin chuckled: “What a coincidence, neither am I. I can’t help you.”
Yu Fei: “…Then what do we do?”
Great, no one in the entire project team was good at fighting games. How could they develop one?
Mr. Pei might be good at it, but Mr. Pei no longer did this specific design work.
Learning about it now?
That wouldn’t be enough time! This wasn’t something you could learn in just a day or two.
Hu Xianbin rubbed his chin, thought carefully for a moment, and then said: “Actually, Tenda Games did have someone who was excellent at fighting games.”
Yu Fei’s eyes lit up: “Oh? Who?”
Tenda Games was truly full of hidden talents. If Hu Xianbin hadn’t revealed this information, he would never have known.
Hu Xianbin was silent for a moment, then slowly said: “Brother Bao.”
Yu Fei: “…”
Well, that was as good as saying nothing.