Of course, Eric wasn’t being kind. He was just worried that Mr. Pei might suddenly change his mind halfway through the preparations for the activity.

If Mr. Pei backed out midway, all of Eric’s preparatory work would be wasted, and nobody likes working for nothing.

And if Mr. Pei agreed verbally without even reading through these terms, then the possibility of him changing his mind halfway was actually quite high, even inevitable.

That’s why Eric specifically gave him a reminder.

“Hmm… alright, I’ll look through it again,” Mr. Pei said somewhat reluctantly from the other end of the phone.

After two minutes, Mr. Pei said, “Okay, I’ve gone through it again.”

“These terms are indeed fine overall, and I completely agree.”

“Of course, if I had to point out anything inappropriate, there are some issues.”

Eric let out a sigh of relief.

That’s more like it!

At least put on a show of bargaining! If you just accept everything immediately, who would dare to cooperate with you? Who doesn’t know that you, Mr. Pei, are cunning and devious, with a belly full of schemes?

Mr. Pei paused slightly and continued, “The cooperation method has a slight issue, mainly because it’s not written clearly enough.”

“It says here: ‘Register an account for another game through the game panel, and bind the two accounts.’ So does it have to be a newly registered account? Can’t it be an old account?”

“As far as I know, many GOG players already have ioi accounts, they just haven’t logged in for a long time.”

“Considering that registering an account requires binding an email, phone number, and ID card, and these details cannot be repeatedly bound to multiple accounts, if someone already has an ioi account, registering a new one would be troublesome and unnecessary.”

“In my view, if players don’t have an ioi account, they can register a new one; if they already have an account, they should be able to link their existing account.”

Eric was stunned for a moment, then carefully considered the issue Mr. Pei had raised.

It seemed… that was indeed the case.

There used to be quite a few players who played both GOG and ioi, but gradually, many had shifted towards GOG.

Even so, their accounts on ioi still existed.

According to the current registration rules, email addresses, phone numbers, and ID card numbers generally couldn’t be bound to multiple accounts, especially phone numbers, which often served as the unique identifier for an account.

Once a password was lost, a verification code sent to the phone could be used to change the password, which was very convenient.

So, if a GOG player already had an ioi account and wanted to participate in this activity, would they have to register again?

That obviously wasn’t appropriate.

For players who had already accumulated some wealth in ioi, not being able to continue with their old accounts and having to create new ones to receive rewards was too inhumane. It would create a huge barrier for them to switch from GOG to ioi.

This clearly went against the original intention of ioi participating in this activity.

So, as Mr. Pei had said, they shouldn’t restrict the activity to new accounts only, but should extend it to all accounts, allowing those old players who had played ioi before to return through this opportunity.

Mr. Pei’s point made a lot of sense, but Eric fell silent again.

Because he felt that something was even more wrong!

When Mr. Pei had mentioned “inappropriate aspects” earlier, Eric had felt relieved, thinking that Mr. Pei was finally going to start bargaining, and things were becoming normal.

But now he realized that Mr. Pei wasn’t bargaining at all! He was actually considering what was best for ioi!

Things were becoming even more bizarre!

Based on Eric’s understanding of Mr. Pei, he felt that the most correct approach now would be to not analyze this plan at all, and not to think about the motives behind Mr. Pei’s actions, because they were probably meaningless.

He should just hang up the phone and refuse to cooperate!

But the problem was that Eric didn’t have much autonomy now; he was just a messenger.

Moreover, this activity was global in scope, and he was only responsible for the Greater China region. Whether to hold this activity or not, and how specifically to run it, was not up to him. He had to consult his superiors.

Eric wanted to advise the higher-ups to abandon this cooperation, but he couldn’t think of an appropriate reason.

After agonizing for a while, Eric said, “Alright, Mr. Pei, I’ll relay this suggestion to the higher-ups.”

“If there are no issues, we’ll officially sign the agreement and begin the cooperation.”

Eric had come to terms with it—since he was just a messenger now, he should act like one.

Report the facts faithfully and let those above make the decisions.

If something went wrong in the future, they couldn’t blame just a messenger, right?

……

After hanging up the phone, Pei Qian let out a sigh of relief.

Thankfully, there was still some good news!

Every time he reached such a critical juncture, he had to rely on his good friend Eric.

Last weekend, “Eternal Cycle” had predictably become a hit.

Although Pei Qian had prepared for the worst, Qiao Laoshi’s series of elaborate operations had pushed the reputation of “Eternal Cycle” up another notch, making it dance repeatedly at the edge of Pei Qian’s tolerance!

But for Pei Qian, these things were no longer important.

When an unfortunate event happens once, it’s a tragedy, but when it happens ten thousand times, it becomes routine…

The only thing Pei Qian cared about now was whether “Eternal Cycle” could fulfill its original mission—reducing the sales of “Turn Back to Shore” to one-fifth or less in the second month of its release, so that Pei Qian could happily make “Turn Back to Shore” free.

Pei Qian had been confident initially, but now the situation seemed uncertain again.

It was all Qiao Laoshi’s fault!

In his video, Qiao Liang had closely linked “Eternal Cycle” and “Turn Back to Shore,” saying they were two sides of the same coin, complete only when combined.

This had directly led many players who hadn’t yet purchased “Turn Back to Shore” to buy both “Eternal Cycle” and “Turn Back to Shore” together.

And the official platform had very timely launched a bundle package, making Pei Qian’s situation even worse…

In short, whether “Turn Back to Shore” could be made free or not depended on the next month’s sales.

Pei Qian now wished he could simply release an announcement telling players that if they didn’t buy “Turn Back to Shore” this month, it would be free next month!

But this matter involved the internal rules of the system and couldn’t be explicitly stated.

Today was Monday, and Pei Qian had been quite desperate about the current state of “Eternal Cycle,” but fortunately, good news had come from Eric’s side.

The higher-ups of the Dyack Group had made some very excessive demands.

But this was exactly what Pei Qian wanted!

Especially the point that “GOG players would only be able to receive specific rewards in GOG after playing for a certain amount of time and making small purchases in ioi,” which particularly satisfied Pei Qian.

In simple terms, players would consume in ioi and collect rewards in GOG.

It was equivalent to GOG paying for rewards, encouraging players to recharge and spend on ioi.

A grand art of money transfer!

So, Pei Qian agreed without hesitation and even thoughtfully found a small bug for the other party, making the effect of this activity even better.

Eric needed to consult his superiors, and for both parties to reach a consensus, it would take until tomorrow at the earliest.

After that, they would need to sign agreements, develop corresponding activity sections on their respective clients, and connect certain data between the two games, including account information…

Fortunately, none of these were particularly complex, and by the end of the month or the beginning of the next, this “blood transfusion activity” from GOG to ioi should be up and running.

Letting his good friend survive a bit longer meant Pei Qian could also survive a bit longer.

“Hmm… the Morning Dew Gaming Platform won’t be sending work reports, but according to the previous plan, the Connoisseur System seems to be officially launching today.”

“No need to be nervous, it’s still in the early preparation stage. The first batch of connoisseurs need to be selected, and that will happen next month at the earliest.”

Two weeks ago, Morning Dew Gaming Platform had released an announcement regarding the Game Connoisseur system and began making major reforms to the platform’s recommendation mechanism.

Many players were eager to try it out, and started accumulating game time on the platform and privately writing game reviews, waiting for the platform’s redesign to be completed so they could post these reviews.

The selection of connoisseurs was based on three main criteria: game duration and quantity, number of game trophies, and the number of likes received on game reviews.

Behind these three criteria was a set of undisclosed algorithms, mainly to filter out players who maliciously inflated scores.

For example, if a player continuously idled in a niche game to accumulate a high amount of gameplay time but didn’t have valuable trophies and their game review articles received no attention, then no matter how long their game time was, it would be useless.

For genuine players, the way to obtain connoisseur status was actually simple: play more of one type of game, strive for trophies and rare achievements, and write more high-quality game reviews.

And today, the Morning Dew Gaming Platform’s redesign update was officially completed, and it should usher in a peak period of player activity and massive uploads of game review content.

“The initial enthusiasm is actually within expectations.”

“After all, the Connoisseur System is a system that looks good on paper and is unassailable from all aspects.”

“The key is whether, after a period of continuous operation, human nature will be exposed under the temptation of benefits, whether the powerful authority to arrange recommendation positions will cause internal strife among players, and thereby make the entire platform’s rules and systems unbalanced, developing in an uncontrollable direction…”

Pei Qian decided to take a look at the current situation of Morning Dew Gaming Platform.

He didn’t expect to see a state of “nobody cares”; he just hoped that the platform’s popularity would remain within a reasonable, controllable range.

As long as nothing unusual happened, even if the popularity steadily increased for a period, it would be a minor issue.

“Hmm, the number of active users on the website has indeed increased significantly, and the average online duration has also improved.”

“New players are flooding into various games, which might lead to more games being launched on Morning Dew Gaming Platform… but there shouldn’t be any obvious changes in the short term.”

“So many review articles have been updated, how many reviews have these players written during this period? Are they all so free?”

“It’s okay, there aren’t many truly reliable reviews, most are just filler.”

“Hmm? Wait, what is this?!”

At first, Pei Qian kept reassuring himself that all the current situations were within expectations and not a big problem.

However, after seeing the last message, he couldn’t remain calm anymore.

“Famous gaming section UP host, game review expert Qiao Laoshi, and 37 other well-known game reviewers have joined Morning Dew Gaming Platform!”