Bao Xu glanced at Pei Qian’s office: “Is Mr. Pei in?”

“No, he hasn’t come in these past two days,” Lü Mingliang replied.

On Lü Mingliang’s end, the voice acting had been completed.

He started recording on the 25th of last month and continued on and off until the 1st of this month before finishing. The efficiency wasn’t particularly fast, but it was acceptable.

After all, Lü Mingliang wasn’t a professional voice actor. Even with a voice coach guiding him, he often had to retake a single line dozens of times before being satisfied.

Now that the voice acting was complete, they could focus entirely on game development.

“Brother Bao, I’ve sent you all the design documents for the new game. Can you take a look and see if anything needs changing?”

Lü Mingliang still showed great respect for Bao Xu.

After all, Bao Xu was the creative source behind “Sea Fortress.” In the entire company, when it came to the ability to interpret Mr. Pei’s intentions, if Bao Xu was second, no one would dare claim to be first!

Bao Xu opened the document and briefly browsed through it.

“It’s all been personally approved by Mr. Pei, so I probably shouldn’t look at it. I might not understand it anyway.”

In game design, there was a taboo against making random changes.

Everyone had their ideas, and often there was no absolute right or wrong. The key was to have one person making the decisions to avoid creating a hodgepodge.

When Bao Xu heard that it was a project personally overseen by Mr. Pei, he knew it couldn’t be wrong.

Just study it carefully and learn from it—how could he possibly find fault with it?

This was exactly what Pei Qian had planned.

Game development had already begun, and even with Bao Xu back, he couldn’t get involved.

If Bao Xu couldn’t contribute to the work, he would surely bury himself in gaming.

This way, the chances of the new game succeeding decreased a bit more.

All according to plan!

…

Indeed, as Pei Qian had anticipated.

Bao Xu flipped through the design documents and observed the work status of others, feeling that the new game didn’t need his help.

So, he turned on his computer and started playing “Sea Fortress.”

Not having played much for a month, he had been suffering!

As the saying goes, a brief separation enhances reunion.

Bao Xu felt the company was simply heaven and didn’t want to go anywhere else!

As he played, Bao Xu sensed something wasn’t quite right.

The gameplay didn’t seem perfect.

A month ago, Bao Xu thought “Sea Fortress” had a perfect feel.

But after a month’s gap, playing it again gave him a new perspective.

“Since I have nothing else to do, I might as well optimize ‘Ghost General’ and ‘Sea Fortress’ a bit.”

…

Bao Xu casually picked up a notebook and jotted down things to change while playing.

Since the release of “Ghost General” and “Sea Fortress,” not a single new version has been released.

Did the players have no complaints?

Of course they did!

But… Pei Qian couldn’t hear them, so it was as if they didn’t exist!

“Ghost General” had been released for nearly four months, and “Sea Fortress” had been out for a month.

Some game developers with faster update cycles released a new version every month, which wasn’t unheard of.

For those with longer cycles, updating every three months was acceptable.

But for a game that was still profitable, with decent popularity and earnings, to have absolutely no updates for four whole months—that was unprecedented!

Pei Qian had no intention of updating the versions.

Because these two games were a bit too successful!

Look at the lifetime card sales for “Ghost General,” and then the Fire Kylin sales for “Sea Fortress”…

According to the system’s requirements, releasing a new version meant introducing new monetization points—you couldn’t just pour money in without profiting.

Pei Qian estimated that if new monetization points were introduced, players would spend even more!

So, he acted as if nothing had happened and focused on developing new games.

Not updating was an excellent way to reduce the game’s popularity!

The other developers in the team were too busy creating “Game Producer” to care about these two stable, operational games.

But…

Bao Xu had nothing else to do!

Since he couldn’t help with the new game, he might as well do what he could with the old games.

Bao Xu first carefully adjusted the feel of “Sea Fortress” again.

Then, he opened “Ghost General.”

Comparatively, “Ghost General” actually had many more issues than “Sea Fortress”!

Because “Sea Fortress” was the result of Huang Sibo and many designers working hard together, tested repeatedly, with a relatively mature design.

Whereas “Ghost General” was completely Pei Qian forcibly fitting ready-made templates together!

Much of the text in it was quite detailed, all carefully written (or made up) by Ma Yang.

But the combat system and some basic functions inevitably had minor flaws, because the template Pei Qian bought was already a failed project. Perhaps it had no bugs, but many functions could be optimized.

Of course, the impact wasn’t that significant.

After all, it was a mobile game, and players’ expectations weren’t that high. It was playable, so they made do with it.

Bao Xu played for a while and felt there were quite a few small issues that could be fixed.

Might as well fix them while he was at it!

Soon, Bao Xu’s notebook was densely filled with items to modify.

There was no new game content to create, so it couldn’t be considered a version update—at most, it was optimization and bug fixes.

Bao Xu looked at his notebook.

“Hmm, I should be able to fix everything in about three or four days.”

“Just a small effort!”

…

Three days later.

On the “Ghost General” forum.

Compared to popular mobile game forums, the layout here seemed a bit chaotic.

Because the official team hadn’t managed it!

For games like “Cute Three Kingdoms,” the official team would collaborate with the forum, parachuting in main and assistant moderators, and staff would regularly post and participate in discussions.

But for “Ghost General,” there was none of that!

It was completely left to its own devices.

Some people had competed for the moderator position, but they were also very laid-back, only deleting inappropriate or advertising posts.

However, because there were many members, it was quite lively.

From a month or two earlier, various complaint posts began appearing in the “Ghost General” forum, and recently, these complaint posts seemed to have increased.

“Are there going to be any more version updates???”

“I’ve been graduated for so long… I’ve almost collected all the rare cards. Can someone tell me what else there is to play in this game…”

“I envy ‘Cute Three Kingdoms,’ they update every two months, and they’re already in the mid-late game phase…”

“So frustrating, other games at least have long-term goals where you can spend money, but in this game, you can’t even spend money! What do you do when you feel like you have nothing to pursue?”

“First time seeing such a zen company. Logically, ‘Ghost General’ ranks quite high on the charts, so it should be earning quite a bit. Why won’t they update the version?”

“I don’t even expect you to introduce new gameplay—just release a new general, or at least a new monetization point!”

Many players who hadn’t played “Ghost General” would have a strange feeling when entering this forum.

Did they enter the wrong place?

This wasn’t what a game forum was supposed to look like!

In forums like “Cute Three Kingdoms,” there would be daily posts cursing the game company, the designers, and the event planners.

Events were money grabs!

New content lacked sincerity!

If they didn’t see such posts for a day, they would wonder if the forum had crashed.

But in “Ghost General,” everything was reversed!

Players were eagerly looking forward to “Ghost General” quickly opening new monetization points!

Players even seriously discussed what kind of new monetization points should be introduced.

The most common suggestion was to sell new general packages.

There were other suggestions too, such as launching some low-ceiling recharge activities, like spending at least 1 yuan and at most 50 yuan to get some special materials, and so on.

This situation, where players eagerly awaited official monetization points while officials completely ignored them, only occurred in “Ghost General”!

It had formed a unique landscape!