Game Making: Start By Healing the Player-Chapter 60

The buzz around ‘Outlast’ seemed to just keep snowballing.

How long would this hype last? It was honestly hard to say, and it depended on how long people enjoyed watching the content of it on video and streaming platforms.

Of course, expecting unending popularity for any game was unrealistic, even more so for a game of the horror genre.

But what we can expect is trend chasing. At this moment, several game developers and designers were reportedly working on horror games similar to ‘Outlast’.

Clearly, they intended to ride the wave of terror sparked by this game. Bonus points if they also adopted the zero combat, run-and-hide mechanics too.

Chen Xu paid them no heed.

For him, this entire venture into horror territory was more of a side quest than a main quest. He only did it to make use of his time-limited bonuses.

From his point of view, he had 2 months to work things out. It wasn’t very much time.

He crossed out large-scaled games and VR games immediately, the capital needed for those were still out of reach.

Chinese New Year was soon approaching as well, so if he wanted to start a medium sized project, it would be best to wait until after the holidays.

Perhaps it was time to shift focus, recruit some new talent for roles beyond just game development.

The Nebula Games platform needed a lot of work if it was ever to reach the levels of the Steam platform from his old world.

In terms of function, it was doing well.

It had a store, a personal library, a community forum, a friends list, a space for reviews, and even a workshop to encourage modding.

But it was still too limited.

Features like the recommendation algorithms and UI designs weren’t up to par yet. And there were still only 3 games on the platform.

The quality of the platform was almost there, but the user base was still insignificant.

Only 15,000 copies of games have been sold on the Nebula Games platform, and the daily active users were just around 1000.

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But despite this, Chen Xu was optimistic.

Nebula was currently not short on funding, so it was a good time as any to start building this platform up.

For major companies, they would employ the strategy of exclusive titles. This went for both domestic and overseas companies.

But this wasn’t something Chen Xu was keen on doing. He was wealthy, but not that wealthy.

So he could only depend on creating an irresistible exclusive game for his own platform, and he knew of several multiplayer online games from his previous life that would cause storms across the gaming world here.

But for now, releasing something that like would backfire.

Gaming mechanics were not protected by copyright, and his larger competitors with their larger workforce could quickly churn out a higher quality copy and rob him of his playerbase.

No, he would not reveal his hand yet.

Chen Xu sat down and made a list of features his new project must have.

He thought for a long time before highlighting these words. This would be the strategy for his next game.

Eventually, he expanded on the core points.

Multi-platform, because exclusivity wasn’t an option yet.

Buy-to-Play, so that he could offer discounts on his own platform.

Account Linking, forcing players who buy the game to make a Nebula account. (Very annoying, but had to be done)

Multiplayer, because Chen Xu has big things planned for the future, so this would be good for practice.

The project should be small or medium scaled. No need to go all-in for something meant to test the waters.

Two months should be enough for what he had in mind. Something nice to capture the seasonal spirit.

Chinese New Year and Valentine’s Day happened to coincide soon on February 11th. And he wanted to capitalize on that.

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With a rough draft in mind, Chen Xu left his room to take a stroll around the office, taking the time to ponder.

There were plenty of good options that came to mind, and many games he wished to make, but which would serve his immediate needs was yet to be seen.

It was nearing the end of the workday, some of the employees were wrapping up their business and heading out. They greeted him as they passed.

Chen Xu nodded in acknowledgment, noting how crowded the office seemed to be now, perhaps it was time to expand…

“Boss man! You’ve been turned into memes!” Ruan Ningxue laughed as she caught sight of him nearby.

“Technically, it’s your quote that got turned into memes,” Yang Xin added, letting him have a look at her phone.

It showed a photoshopped screenshot of the doctor from ‘Outlast’, teabagging the protagonist with the caption: “I am a warrior of love!”

The next was an image of the Big Guy ripping off the head of an inmate, censored with pixelation.

The caption read: “I, too, am a warrior of love!”

“This thing still going around?” Chen Xu was both amused and exasperated.

“Of course! If you don’t know this meme, you’re not a real ‘Outlast’ player! You’d be letting the community down!” Ruan Ningxue laughed as Ying Xin nodded her head.

“Your explanation turned out great, and it got us a lot of attention.” Ruan Ningxue pulled up some social media statistics.

The original comment made by Chen Xu got over 500k likes and 70k replies.

“Ahh… It seems I am fated to be misunderstood.” Chen Xu dramatically wiped a tear from the corner of his eye.

But then, he had an idea.

“Alright, new plan! Time to clear my name as a warrior of love. The next game will be something truly heartwarming,” Chen Xu said with a smile.

Ruan Ningxue was surprised, “Already planning out the next project? What do you have in mind?”

“Heartwarming? Are we gonna troll people again!” Yang Xin asked excitedly. It seemed an eccentric boss would raise eccentric staff.

“Don’t you worry about it yet. I need to iron out a few more details, mull it over a bit. I’ll share when I’ve got a good outline,” Chen Xu assured them.

“It’s not going to be a big project, and it’ll be fitting for Chinese New Year and Valentines. Think of it as a small gift for the players.”

He couldn’t keep the grin off his face.

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