Shangyang Games.

Ye Zhizhou had been waiting anxiously for a long time and finally received Mr. Pei’s reply.

However, upon seeing the content of Mr. Pei’s response, he was stunned.

“Brother Wang, come quick and see this!”

Wang Xiaobin had nothing else to do at the moment. Hearing Ye Zhizhou’s call, he immediately stopped what he was doing and came to his workstation.

“Brother Wang, Mr. Pei has given us the plan for the new game. He… chose my proposal.”

Ye Zhizhou pointed at the document on the screen: “Hot-Blooded Battle Song: Power-Enhanced Version.”

Wang Xiaobin’s mouth opened slightly in surprise: “Did you come up with this name?”

Ye Zhizhou: “…No, Mr. Pei changed it. I originally wanted to call it ‘Hot-Blooded Battle Song 2’.”

“Hiss…”

Wang Xiaobin drew in a sharp breath.

This name reeked of knockoff vibes!

How could Mr. Pei give a game such a name? This was…

Incomprehensible!

“Did Mr. Pei change any other parts of the design?” Wang Xiaobin asked.

Ye Zhizhou felt a bit embarrassed: “I’ve checked carefully. He didn’t change a single word, just the name…”

Wang Xiaobin: “…”

He couldn’t help feeling a little emotional.

Wang Xiaobin understood clearly that the main reason Ye Zhizhou wanted to make a sequel to “Hot-Blooded Battle Song” was because he wasn’t satisfied.

Ye Zhizhou had created the Chosen One system for “Hot-Blooded Battle Song,” completely transforming the monetization model of this pay-to-win game according to Mr. Pei’s requirements, which was something Ye Zhizhou took great pride in.

Now, “Hot-Blooded Battle Song” maintains good levels of activity and various metrics, with many old players returning and its reputation completely turned around.

But the only problem was that the game wasn’t making money!

This bothered Ye Zhizhou quite a bit.

In his view, a game that didn’t make money was still a failure, no matter how good its reputation.

Thinking carefully, why wasn’t it making money?

Mainly because “Hot-Blooded Battle Song” had terrible graphics that were completely behind the times, and Shangyang Games didn’t have enough funds for promotion, so no new players were coming in.

With all the payment options cut, relying only on the pitiful number of old players was simply not enough to sustain the game’s income.

So Ye Zhizhou wasn’t satisfied. He hoped that the innovative “Chosen One system” could be experienced by more players, and by developing a sequel, the game could turn losses into profits.

But Wang Xiaobin didn’t agree with this.

In the past, they made pay-to-win games out of necessity.

Now that they had been acquired by Tenda and had hitched their wagon to Mr. Pei’s star, they had enough to eat, so why keep eating dirt?

“Hot-Blooded Battle Song” wasn’t some impressive big IP; it was just a third-rate garbage pay-to-win game. Was it worth clinging to?

So Wang Xiaobin had submitted a design document for a single-player game, hoping Mr. Pei would select it so he could fulfill his long-standing wish—to develop a truly high-quality single-player game.

Wang Xiaobin had originally been very confident about this design document.

Because his experience was the most extensive among everyone at Shangyang Games, the design of a single-player game should also best suit Mr. Pei’s taste.

In Wang Xiaobin’s mind, Mr. Pei must be a genius designer with a mission to save the gaming industry, a noble person who had transcended base interests, someone who didn’t covet money.

Otherwise, how could he have done something like cutting most of the monetization options from “Hot-Blooded Battle Song”?

But now, Mr. Pei’s choice had been made.

He chose Ye Zhizhou’s proposal, not his.

Not only that, Mr. Pei hadn’t changed a single word of Ye Zhizhou’s proposal, just modified the name.

This left Wang Xiaobin feeling confused, perplexed, and somewhat disappointed.

“Oh, by the way, Brother Wang.”

“Mr. Pei said your proposal was also good, but too conservative. He said you should revise it during development, and there might be opportunities to use it in the future.”

Ye Zhizhou faithfully relayed Pei Qian’s message.

Wang Xiaobin immediately perked up.

Oh! So that’s how it is!

So Mr. Pei did approve of my proposal, but my approach was too conservative, not excellent enough as a single-player game!

Wang Xiaobin was instantly reinvigorated.

Now he roughly understood why Mr. Pei had chosen Ye Zhizhou’s proposal instead of his.

Ye Zhizhou’s proposal could be considered quite innovative among pay-to-win games.

While Wang Xiaobin’s proposal seemed very ordinary among single-player games.

Within different reference systems, Ye Zhizhou’s proposal was more innovative, naturally making it easier to win Mr. Pei’s favor.

“Mr. Pei said this design was too conservative.”

“Yes, that’s right.”

“Out of caution, I used some very mature designs, but now I see they’re somewhat outdated.”

“The environment changes rapidly; what barely keeps up with the times now will be obsolete after several months of development.”

“Mr. Pei is right, I was too conservative.”

“As expected of Mr. Pei, he identified the core issue at a glance!”

“Looks like I need to keep working harder.”

Wang Xiaobin’s negative emotions instantly vanished.

Given the circumstances, he would first fully cooperate with Ye Zhizhou to create “Hot-Blooded Battle Song: Power-Enhanced Version,” and then make the single-player game he wanted for the next project.

During these three to four months, he could also continue to explore some creative ideas and make major revisions to the current proposal, striving to satisfy Mr. Pei when the time came!

Ye Zhizhou flipped through the design document again.

Indeed, Mr. Pei hadn’t changed a single word!

“Brother Wang, what should we do? Should we proceed according to this?”

Ye Zhizhou felt a bit uncertain.

Wang Xiaobin, now at the peak of his blind faith in Mr. Pei, immediately nodded: “Of course! If Mr. Pei has made the decision, what’s there to hesitate about? Let’s proceed according to this!”

“Plus, there’s an advantage—the development time can be greatly shortened.”

“The ‘Hot-Blooded Battle Song: Power-Enhanced Version’ we’re making—man, that name is awkward—can be seen as a high-definition remastered version.”

“As for the game functions and gameplay, we don’t need to make major changes, at most just put in some effort to optimize various features.”

“This way, we can use all the energy we save to focus on art resources.”

“Didn’t you always say that the current ‘Hot-Blooded Battle Song’ has been completely transformed and just needs a good appearance? Perfect, we can use this opportunity to give it one!”

“I think that must be Mr. Pei’s intention as well.”

Ye Zhizhou nodded: “Yes, that’s right. I’ll organize the design document and prepare the art resource list right away!”

After finalizing the design plan, the first thing to do was to prepare the art resource proposal.

Shangyang Games was currently in a state of continuous losses. All their money had been submitted, but even so, they couldn’t cover daily rent and salary expenses, requiring Tenda to provide funds to fill the gap.

Making a new game would require another large sum of money, which could only be requested from Mr. Pei by submitting a report.

“I’m a bit worried. I want to request two million yuan, but I don’t know if Mr. Pei will approve it,” Ye Zhizhou felt a little anxious.

Wang Xiaobin was silent for a moment: “Let’s try. When it comes to game quality, Mr. Pei should be willing to spend. If it doesn’t work out, we can cut the budget.”