After leaving Mr. Pei’s office, Meng Chang returned to the Advertising and Promotion Department.

Sitting down at his desk, he suddenly felt overwhelmed with pressure.

Earlier, he had only felt that the promotion of “Mission and Choice” was a matter of great importance, and had felt a slight twinge of compassion. But when forced to choose between his conscience and commission, he had unhesitatingly chosen the latter.

However, after careful consideration, he realized that deliberately sabotaging this promotional campaign would actually be quite challenging.

Because the investment in “Mission and Choice” was enormous—both a game and a movie—and he’d heard that Lu Zhiyao was also starring in it. With such a massive production, even the slightest hint leaked out would generate an enthusiastic response.

Having it go unnoticed seemed virtually impossible.

Meng Chang considered that if the promotional campaign couldn’t remain obscure, then he would have to actively promote it in the wrong direction to reduce the hype.

Ideally, as soon as the promotional materials came out, viewers would instinctively feel uncomfortable and repulsed, yet he would still get his commission.

Meng Chang opened Baidu, intending to search for relevant information.

His knowledge of games and movies wasn’t extensive, just at the level of a casual enthusiast, but that wasn’t an obstacle. He still had two weeks to develop a promotional plan.

According to Mr. Pei’s requirements, the promotional warm-up for “Mission and Choice” would begin next month. Two weeks was enough time for Meng Chang to cram some relevant knowledge and come up with a promotional plan that would sufficiently repel the audience.

“First, let’s see if there are any rumors about ‘Mission and Choice’ circulating online.”

Meng Chang first searched for the keyword “Mission and Choice.”

To develop a promotional plan for a product, one must first understand the public’s attitude toward it. If people’s impression was good, then that impression should be reinforced; if people’s impression was poor, the priority would be to change that impression.

Of course, this was the normal approach to promotion, but Meng Chang needed to do the opposite.

“Oh? So many search results?”

“That can’t be right. I thought Tenda’s confidentiality work was always excellent. How could so much information have leaked? And why haven’t these made it to the trending topics?”

“Wait, what are all these strange results?”

Meng Chang carefully examined the search results and felt dizzy.

“Mission and Choice (Game Software) Baidu Encyclopedia”

“Do You Remember ‘Mission and Choice’? Did It Really Destroy the Development of Chinese Games?”

“The Most Disappointing Game in History: ‘Mission and Choice'”

“‘Mission and Choice’ Ranks First: Counting Down the Top Nine Money-Grabbing Garbage Games in Gaming History!”

All the search results contained similar content.

Meng Chang was puzzled. Only after careful reading did he understand that “Mission and Choice” shared its name with a single-player game from the 1990s that was considered a “national gaming disgrace”!

It was a game from the 90s, about a decade and a half ago.

Meng Chang didn’t play games regularly and knew virtually nothing about the history of Chinese games. He only knew from internal company information that Mr. Pei’s new game was called “Mission and Choice,” completely unaware of all the secrets behind this name.

He immediately perked up and read through all the introductions to “Mission and Choice” on these web pages from start to finish.

“I never imagined this was the origin of the name?”

“Then… does Mr. Pei have some special intention behind naming the game this?”

“Could it be that Mr. Pei wants to redeem this ‘national gaming disgrace’?”

“Hmm…”

Meng Chang drew in a sharp breath, feeling even more pressure.

Undeniably, the concept of “redeeming a national gaming disgrace” was extremely likely to generate discussion and easily ignite players’ patriotic enthusiasm. Once this topic was introduced, the attention it would receive would be anything but small.

This undoubtedly made Meng Chang’s reverse promotion even more challenging.

“Looking at the genre, it’s an RTS game with a sci-fi theme.”

“This type of game probably doesn’t have many players.”

“So, to prevent the promotion from achieving its intended effect, I need to make it ‘stay within its bubble’ as much as possible.”

“As long as it doesn’t break out of its bubble and keeps its popularity limited to Chinese single-player gaming communities and RTS game player groups, it definitely won’t recoup its massive investment, and the promotion will naturally fail.”

“Therefore… I must focus on the promotional materials!”

Meng Chang quickly determined a general promotional strategy: make outsiders feel indifferent and core player groups uncomfortable when they see it.

If circumstances allowed, he could also employ some tricks to create an effect of false advertising.

Of course, the premise was not to violate contractual regulations or relevant laws and regulations—walking this fine line was a technical challenge.

“From what I can see, Tenda’s confidentiality work has been too good; the outside world basically doesn’t know that the game Tenda is developing is a remake of ‘Mission and Choice’.”

“This is a major advantage for me! This way, I can use the public’s habitual thinking patterns to mislead them…”

“Come to think of it, the original promotional materials for ‘Mission and Choice’ would be perfect. What would happen if I were to use them directly?”

Meng Chang searched online and quickly found a large amount of promotional material for the original “Mission and Choice.”

As a classic example of false advertising, the promotional materials for “Mission and Choice” had been nailed to the pillar of shame along with the game itself, repeatedly flogged.

The internet wasn’t as developed back then, so the main promotions were in various magazines and physical posters. Those provocative promotional phrases and Chinese soldiers wearing space combat suits had left an extremely deep impression on people.

“Your homeland, Blue Star, has just suffered a devastating attack from the Insect Race…”

“Join your comrades to defeat the insect swarm and save Blue Star!”

“Million-yuan investment, all-out production, grand scenes, the epitome of Chinese gaming!”

These kinds of promotional phrases made players of that era boil with excitement.

Of course, these promotional phrases seemed very stiff by today’s standards, and the images on the promotional poster were very crude. The 90s-style artwork could only be described as “unbearable to look at” by today’s standards.

Meng Chang fell into deep thought.

“For a positive promotion, one would definitely showcase the most brilliant parts of the game and film, then vigorously promote concepts like ‘washing away the disgrace of Chinese gaming’.”

“This would stir up players’ enthusiasm for supporting domestic games and generate extremely high attention.”

“But then I wouldn’t be able to expect any commission, so I must do the opposite.”

“I shouldn’t use any materials from the new ‘Mission and Choice’ game or movie, and I should completely avoid concepts like ‘remake’ or ‘washing away the disgrace of Chinese gaming’.”

“Just directly use the old game’s promotional materials and let players fail to recognize that this is a remake of ‘Mission and Choice’! Make them mistakenly believe it’s just that old game from over a decade ago!”

“Um… wait, that still has loopholes.”

“As long as people see that the game is published by Tenda Games, they’ll understand it must be a remake.”

“Would it be possible to deliberately avoid using Tenda Games’ name when publishing? Negotiate with officials to deliberately conceal the company that made this game?”

“Although it’s a bit strange, it could be justified as ‘a special marketing technique’ without violating contractual regulations.”

“Or, bundle it with many classic old games as a collection, create an activity like ‘Revisiting Classic Chinese Games’ to confuse the audience.”

“Although it would eventually be exposed, as long as it lasts for a month, I’ll have my commission, right?”

Meng Chang suddenly realized his previous thinking had been too rigid. There was more than one way to earn his commission.

Previously, Meng Chang had been thinking about trying to make the project go unnoticed and never make money through his promotional efforts.

But now he realized that this was too difficult, because Mr. Pei’s projects often generated their own hype, especially the “Mission and Choice” project—it was simply impossible to achieve such a goal.

Given that reality, could he change his approach?

This month, release the promotional plan, which would go unnoticed; next month, increase efforts, still with no response. This way, he would successfully secure commissions for two months.

As for the month of the official release, when the confusion tactic failed and the project exploded in popularity, at worst he would just miss one month’s commission, while the commissions for the previous two months would still be secured.

Meng Chang was impressed by his own cleverness and immediately began writing the promotional plan.

This promotional campaign would primarily use the old game’s promotional materials from the 90s—the same poster, the same promotional phrases, nothing changed.

This promotional poster would not have any Tenda-related icons or logos, so people wouldn’t know who the game’s developer actually was.

But one line would be added: “Relive the classics, savor Chinese games from a decade ago!”

Package all domestic single-player games from that era into a collection, then secretly slip “Mission and Choice” into it.

However, before Tenda’s “Mission and Choice” was released, the collection would include that disappointing old game, and after Tenda’s “Mission and Choice” was released, the old game would be replaced.

Then, on official platforms, allocate substantial resources to promote this collection, while promotions elsewhere would primarily feature the original promotional materials for “Mission and Choice.”

This would create an effect where reality and fiction became indistinguishable, making everyone think they were promoting a collection of old Chinese games, and no one would investigate too deeply into what games were actually included.

This way, the deception could last at least a month or so, right?

Meng Chang’s expectations weren’t high—he just wanted to secure two months’ worth of commission first.

After all, he had developed so many plans previously without earning a penny in commission, and his mental state was nearly collapsing. So he wasn’t hoping for a permanent solution that would guarantee full commission—he just wanted to earn at least a few tens of thousands of yuan first.

Of course, this idea was just an embryonic form, and the specifics of how to implement it would require careful consideration and long-term planning.

But the general direction seemed sound.

The more Meng Chang thought about it, the more he felt his plan was excellent, and he immediately began working on the promotional strategy.