Game Development: Starting with Recreating the Anime Game Style

Chapter 216 A Peculiar Payment Model

Like many survival games, The Last Survival Guide also features a day-night cycle.

Moreover, thanks to the game engine, this day-night system is quite visually appealing. It's one of the few games that allows for noticeable changes in the scenery from dawn, noon, dusk, to night through variations in lighting.

The first day in the game goes by quickly. After digging a small pit and burying the bones, the time progress bar in the lower left corner leads to night, and the sky gradually darkens.

Ye Feiyang took his sister back to the shelter. The shelter's "warehouse" system in the game is a large shelf. After placing the items on it one by one, the items will appear on the shelf.

"Huh? This is interesting..."

The more Ye Feiyang played, the more he discovered how much attention this game paid to "details," like this shelf, which simply visualized the neat arrangement of items.

But for some reason, Ye Feiyang felt an urge to collect more things and fill the shelves.

After placing the found cans and parts on the shelf, the game popped up a notification that he could upgrade the shelter.

"A construction system?"

Ye Feiyang opened the building interface, and his eyes lit up again.

I initially thought that this kind of "story-driven" game might not have a very rich gameplay system, but in reality, once you open it, you'll find that there are many upgrade options for this shelter.

They can be broadly divided into two categories.

One type is technology-based production tools, such as workbenches. There's not much to say about these; many survival games have them. They allow you to gradually craft better items and tools.

The other one is more interesting.

In addition to production-related features, the game also includes a "decoration" function.

For example, you can use the fabric you find to make a soft sheet for the simple stone bed, or even use the intricate parts you found in the grandfather clock to try to repair a strange wooden box in the shelter.

These options are essentially an extension of the interaction system. Simply put, if you find an item and bring it to the shelter, you can see the interaction between that item and the shelter.

Therefore, these upgrade options are usually accompanied by a small line describing the character's inner thoughts.

[Reinforce the walls: That way, I might sleep more soundly at night.]

[Making the bed: My sister isn't well, she can't sleep on the cold stones anymore.]

Without hesitation, Ye Feiyang chose to upgrade the bed. With a series of knocking animations, a relatively clean bedding appeared on the stone bed, and a happy smiley face bubble appeared next to his sister's portrait.

On the second day in the game, the shelter was quiet and warm. The younger sister had already fallen asleep, and only the flickering campfire and the falling ice crystals outside the window remained on the screen.

Ye Feiyang played for another two hours straight until his stomach started growling, at which point he finally turned his stiff neck.

He stopped because along the way, after fighting monsters, exploring, solving mysteries, surviving, and repairing a railcar that had crossed a valley, the road ahead was blocked by a huge crater.

Ye Feiyang was stunned when he first saw the giant pit.

This is a huge pitfall. The game uses a camera-up view for the first time here, and as you walk, the camera gradually shifts from 2D to 3D.

although.

Although the scene is fixed after switching to 3D, the siblings' views on the giant pit are shown in what is essentially a "transitional performance".

This performance still greatly shocked Ye Feiyang.

First, he was awestruck by the game's presentation. Second, looking at this enormous, seemingly endless pit, he found it hard to imagine what could have caused it.

Moreover, the area around the pit and the bottom of the pit were completely bare.

Ye Feiyang tried to bypass the giant pit, but after walking for a few minutes, he still found the area barren. He sensed something was wrong and turned back. Clearly, the production team had provided a detour.

But it's obvious that this isn't the correct way to solve the problem.

However, this did not cause Ye Feiyang any trouble; on the contrary, it aroused his interest.

If it weren't for the fact that I was really hungry because I hadn't eaten lunch.

Otherwise he would definitely continue playing.
Having traveled all the way to this place, Ye Feiyang had a big question mark pop into his mind.

Is this game really free?

Based on his years of gaming experience, the production quality of "Final Survival Guide," from its art style to its core gameplay, far surpasses those games that are shoddy but advertised as free.

Even if Starry Sky Games is a large and powerful company, it wouldn't stoop to this level of charity.

There must be something fishy going on here. With this question in mind, he switched out of the game and opened the Starry Sky Games Plaza with practiced ease. Soon he saw the celebration poster for "The End of Survival Guide".

[Global sales exceeded 150,000 units within six hours of launch!!!]

"??? There are sales?"

Ye Feiyang almost thought he had misread the news. Is this game pay-to-play? Why don't I see a payment interface? How come there's talk of sales figures?

In fact, The Last Survival Guide has always been priced, but a free trial was offered. Ye Feiyang always thought it was a free game simply because he hadn't looked at it, just like he never looked at tutorials.
That's why.

He was puzzled when he saw the celebratory poster for "The Last Survivor".

I casually clicked on the comments section of the Starry Sky Tap game, and the comments section was very popular at the time. The most popular comments were all discussing the game's payment model.

"I hereby declare that Starry Sky Games has redefined 'trial play'! After I starved to death while wandering around the sinkhole, a purchase interface popped up directly."

"Same here, the difficulty around the sinkhole suddenly increases, and you can die if you're not careful."

"This payment model is so innovative! Who else offers a trial version that only gives players one life?!"

"A bunch of bumpkins. What's so new about this paid system? Isn't it just the old arcade model? Except StarCraft gives you a coin, and at least buying the game unlocks the save system."

Ye Feiyang glanced at the comments and quickly figured it out.

The End Survival Guide is indeed a free download and free trial.

However, the duration of this "trial play" is not based on a specific time point, but rather on the player's "first life".

Once a player dies for the first time in the game, the game will display an option to make a purchase.

After paying, players can unlock not only the "Rewind" function (saving data), but also the "Online" mode, which allows them to invite friends or directly match with others, with one person controlling the older brother and the other controlling the younger sister.

Social systems such as the world leaderboard were also unlocked at the same time.

(End of this chapter)