Restart life

Chapter 314 0311 [Using the Market to Command the Judges]

Last summer, Beijing experienced a drought with little rain, but this summer has seen an unusually large amount of rainfall.

After a heavy rain, the temperature dropped.

Taking advantage of the cool weather, Chen Guiliang and Bian Guanyue ran to the rooftop garden, where they sat embracing under the grape trellis and played mobile games. There were just too many mosquitoes, so they had to light mosquito coils.

Bian Guanyue leaned against Chen Guiliang's chest. At first, she was just playing around, but gradually her muscles became stiff and her breathing rate became lower and lower.

Finally, he even held his breath, not daring to breathe loudly.

"what!"

The sudden appearance of the terrifying scene almost made Bian Guanyue jump up in fright.

Luckily, she wasn't playing games alone, otherwise she would have been too scared to even open the door while cooped up at home.

"This game is terrifying!" Bian Guanyue exclaimed after recovering from her shock.

Chen Guiliang, however, stared at the mobile game screen, thinking to himself that the people at Dingguo Technology were truly amazing.

The better the phone's performance, the more exquisite and smooth the graphics of "Seven Nights" will be.

Achieving this effect is extremely difficult.

This small workshop of seven people not only developed their own mobile 3D engine, creating games with top-notch graphics and storylines, but they also completed testing on more than 40 mobile phone models with only 200,000 to 300,000 yuan.

The phones used for testing were either secondhand goods bought from Huaqiangbei or borrowed from friends.

If Chen Guiliang hadn't invested, Dingguo Technology would have released "Seven Nights" ahead of schedule after testing 42 different models due to running out of funds.

Now that Chen Guiliang has invested heavily, Dingguo Technology has tested nearly a hundred mobile phone models and patched some of them to fix bugs. They even tested Changhong and Bird mobile phones.

This is the base version of the game, compatible with 70% of currently playable mobile devices.

Several exclusive version packages have also been developed for the other 30% of special models. Users can selectively install the appropriate version for their phone when downloading.

The more powerful the phone's performance, the stronger its visual presentation, making it a revolutionary product that is ahead of its time.

Its dynamic lighting and camera work even surpasses the performance of other major titles released at the same time, such as "Prince of Persia Mobile"!
The promotional articles that Chen Guiliang had others publish didn't actually exaggerate much.

The fact that "Seven Nights" could run its 3D scenes smoothly on a Nokia 5300 with only 512KB of memory left the IMGA judges in disbelief. They had absolutely no idea what ingenious technology was used.

They had only a team of seven people, a year and a half of development time, and limited funds, while simultaneously developing another game, "Huangquan Dao".

Chen Guiliang found it hard to imagine how they managed to do it; he estimated that they spent 24 hours a day playing games, except for eating and sleeping.

Hard work alone isn't enough; you also need a host of advanced design ideas. They also have their own methods for testing different device models, enabling them to conduct tests quickly and cost-effectively.

Bian Guanyue was too scared to move at all, curled up in Chen Guiliang's arms and continued playing games, even forgetting that it was almost dinner time.

"Huh, how did I end up back on day one?" Bian Guanyue looked completely bewildered.

Chen Guiliang laughed and said, "You've played out the first ending. The protagonist is afraid to face his past and is forever trapped in an endless cycle of illusion."

Bian Guanyue asked, "So you lost the game?"

Chen Guiliang said, "You could call it a failure, or you could call it a personal choice. It's also a kind of outcome. There's nothing wrong with escaping reality; facing yourself can be very painful sometimes."

"Oh dear, it's so late, we haven't eaten yet," Bian Guanyue said in surprise when she checked the time.

Chen Guiliang said, "Let's go out to eat."

The two walked downstairs hand in hand and found a restaurant near the residential area.

Even with Director Kou's personal intervention, the State Administration of Press and Publication ultimately refused to approve "Seven Nights" because of some bloody and terrifying scenes.

But it doesn't matter, the relevant regulations are very vague at this point.

Mobile games can be submitted to the State Administration of Press and Publication, the Ministry of Culture, and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology for approval, but they can also claim that they do not belong to computer games and only need to be registered with China Mobile and China Unicom.

Policies were tightened in 2009, and mobile game censorship was not enforced until 2016.

……

Cannes, France.

A group of judges are voting, and the current vote for "Best 3D Game" is mainly focused on two games.

One is the Chinese novel "Seven Nights".

One of them is the Korean game "ONE SEQUEL".

James Watson, editor-in-chief of Mobile Games Insider, said: "The so-called 3D in Seven Nights is actually a trick. They use CPU software rendering to fake lighting and shadows, which is not even supported by OpenGL ES. It's like putting a Rolls-Royce logo on a bicycle."

Hansberg, Chief Technology Officer of Deutsche Telekom, chimed in, "That's right, South Korea's *ONE SEQUEL* is the real deal when it comes to mobile game 3D technology." Former Creative Director of EA Mobile, Ian McKellen, countered, "*ONE SEQUEL* has a terrible market prospect; it only supports high-end phones with GPUs. These high-end phones only have a 0.3% market share. Is this game just for the rich?"

Ian slapped the table and continued, “Ladies and gentlemen, Korean game technology is indeed orthodox and of a very high level. But Seven Nights uses a self-developed 3D engine that can realize 3D game scenes on all mobile devices. Regardless of whether it's pseudo-3D or not, its ability to cover all mobile devices is a huge help to the global promotion of mobile games!”

James Watson said, "We're talking about who gets the award, not about marketing."

Ian countered, "What was the original purpose of IMGA? One of its objectives was to promote the development of mobile games, wasn't it? Which game is more suitable to be awarded: one that covers all mobile phone models, or another that covers only 0.3% of mobile phone models?"

Lee Jong-ho of Samsung's Mobile Game Partnerships Department said, "When it comes to awarding prizes, we should prioritize technical skill and game graphics. Even considering market factors, ONE SEQUEL uses a commercial engine that all global developers can follow, which benefits the global mobile game industry. On the other hand, 'Seven Nights' uses a self-developed engine. If they don't make their engine public, how can other developers follow suit?"

Jacques Dupont, a game consultant at Ubisoft's mobile division in France, said, "Other companies can also discuss and study the technical solutions for 'Seven Nights.' If the Chinese can do it, then other companies around the world certainly can. Giving the award to 'Seven Nights' is conducive to the diversified development of mobile game technology, rather than developing entirely according to the current technical route."

Maria López of the Barcelona Game Lab in Spain, however, is a player experience enthusiast.

She said, "ONE SEQUEL is a cover-based shooter, and there are so many games like it that I'm already numb to it. It has absolutely no creative elements; it's just pure skill-based gameplay. It's even pushed to the point where only high-end phones can run it."

"When I played ONE SEQUEL, I had no expectations. After finishing the game, I didn't remember anything. But 'Seven Nights' left a deep impression on me! While playing 'Seven Nights,' I was constantly on edge, trying to predict what would happen next. After finishing the game, I still remembered the plot of 'Seven Nights' and began to reflect on life philosophically."

"Seven Nights achieves a perfect balance in terms of technology, business, and art. Should people bravely face their past, or just escape reality and repeat the same life every day? The creators of this game are amazing, and I look forward to meeting them."

Indian gamer Rajiv Singh surprisingly voiced his support for Chinese games, pulling out a high-end phone and saying, "My phone is already very expensive, but while playing 'ONE SEQUEL,' it overheated and crashed twice. This Korean game has excessively demanding requirements for phone specifications. My gaming experience was extremely poor!"

Korean Lee Jong-ho said, "That's because your phone has a problem. High-end Samsung phones won't overheat or crash."

Rajiv Singh countered, "Really? I saw you re-enter the game halfway through yesterday?"

Lee Jong-ho said, "That's because I didn't play well and wanted to start over. We're awarding mobile games now, not mobile phones. The quality of a game has nothing to do with how many devices can run it! Mobile technology is constantly evolving. This year, only 0.3% of devices can run ONE SEQUEL, but next year it could be 30%. We can't just look at the present; we should focus more on future progress."

There were nine judges in total, from all over the world.

They are arguing endlessly about who should win the Best 3D Game award.

Finally, someone said, "Let's vote."

At this moment, there was a knock on the door.

Voting was suspended and an emergency meeting was called because people from Youke had arrived.

……

"Seven Nights" has been launched in China at lightning speed.

The game registration process with China Mobile and China Unicom went very smoothly, provided that you cooperated with the two major operators. For example, you can download games directly from China Mobile's mobile network.

The game is priced at 18 yuan, plus GPRS data charges. If the download is interrupted, you don't need to pay for the game again, but the data charges will be recalculated.

Alternatively, you can download it from the Youke Interactive platform using a computer, and then install it on your phone via data cable or Bluetooth.

Before downloading, you need to check your phone model.

On a regular phone, you can only play basic games, and the graphics are very rough.

For some phones, certificate verification needs to be manually disabled. For example, early Nokia S60v3 phones can bypass this by setting the date to 2005. Otherwise, the installation will fail.

"How many downloads have there been?" Chen Guiliang asked.

"A total of 102 downloads were generated on the first day across China Mobile, China Unicom, and our WAP site. 45 downloads were generated on the Youke platform. The total downloads for the first day were 147. However, there were a lot of comments and messages, and many netizens are still observing."

"The number of downloads on the second day increased to 218. On the third day, it increased to 691... The cumulative number of downloads in the first week was 4556."

To be honest, sales were a bit low, not meeting Chen Guiliang's expectations.

With such extensive advertising and high online discussion, a first-week sales figure of just over 4500 copies is far too low.

More and more people may play it in the future, but pirated versions will also appear, and the vast majority of players will choose to download pirated versions.

Unless, of course, "Seven Nights" actually wins an award.

Simply being shortlisted is unlikely to lead to a surge in sales.

Once an award is won, it will definitely be publicized in official newspapers, and will be hotly discussed on major game channels, forums, and online communities.

The IMGA mobile game award is only in its fourth year.

The judging process was relatively objective, with not much influence from game developers.

Because it's not time to divide the cake yet.

It is in the stage of expanding its market share and must rely on objectivity and fairness to enhance its authority!
Moreover, the first thing the representatives from Youke said to the organizers in Cannes, France, was: "There are already more than 10 million mobile internet users in China, and nearly one-third of them were added last year. This year, it is very likely that the number will exceed 18 million, or even break through 20 million... We are willing to introduce games that have won awards at IMGA, so that more Chinese users will pay attention to IMGA and more Chinese users can play mobile games from all over the world."

A huge potential market is laid out before those foreigners.

Whether or not to give a prize is up to you!
(End of this chapter)