I was in my final year of high school, and my deskmate found out I was writing a novel!

As Ye Feng stared blankly at the outline of "Ring of Destiny" on the computer screen, his fingertips unconsciously typed a string of random characters on the keyboard, much like the sound effects of elemental bullets colliding in that pixelated otherworld game that suddenly popped into his mind.

It's a roguelike mobile game that's only known by word of mouth among a small group of players in another world. It doesn't have fancy 3D modeling, only retro 8-bit pixel graphics, but its core gameplay is incredibly addictive.

Six basic element bullets can be freely combined to create 18 special effects attacks. Fire and water combine to create steam bullets, ice and electricity intertwine to create thunderbolt arrows. Each game's map is randomly generated, and even the BOSS's weaknesses will change depending on the element combination.

Ye Feng suddenly sat up straight.

He scoured the app store and found that the roguelike mobile games in this world were either heavily pay-to-win 3D masterpieces.

They either have simple casual games with limited gameplay, but they lack mid-range products that are "low-barrier to entry and highly addictive," which is exactly what students have in their spare time.

They have a high acceptance of new ways of playing, which is clearly a market gap that no one has noticed.

"Want to try making it?"

Once the thought popped into my head, I couldn't suppress it.

Chen Guowei is currently studying computer science at Nanjing University. He often posts demos of the small games he wrote on his WeChat Moments. He also complained recently that his graduation project lacked originality.

With a try-it-and-see attitude, Ye Feng typed out a long message on WeChat, from the element synthesis logic to the random map mechanism, and then to his idea of ​​targeting the college market, and sent it all over at once.

Unexpectedly, just ten minutes after the message was sent, Chen Guowei made a video call, and his eyes on the screen were frighteningly bright.

"Brother Feng, your idea is exactly what I've been thinking! I've talked to my roommates Zhang Ming and Li Hao, one of them can draw pixel art, and the other is good at testing and optimization. The four of us can form a team!"

Over the phone, the four quickly finalized their division of labor: Ye Feng would take the lead in product positioning, gameplay design, and marketing, and contribute 10 yuan in royalties as start-up capital; Chen Guowei would be responsible for core program development, Zhang Ming would handle art design, and Li Hao would oversee testing, using their spare time to push forward, and then intensively working on the project in Shanghai during the winter break.

In the first week of the research and development, Ye Feng produced the "Element Synthesis System Requirements Document V1.0", which listed the properties of the six basic elements (fire, water, ice, electricity, wind, and earth).

Furthermore, it also specifies the triggering conditions for 18 synthesis rules: "Fire + Water = Steam Bomb (Area Slowdown)".

"You need to hold down both elements for 1.5 seconds to trigger the synthesis." "Ice + Lightning = Thunderbolt (Penetrating + Paralyzing)".

"After synthesis, the bullet's flight speed is increased by 30%", and even a hand-drawn elemental counter chart was attached, noting that "Steam bullets deal +20% damage to fire-attribute bosses".

Upon receiving the request, Chen Guowei's team immediately divided the tasks.

Chen Guowei was responsible for writing the core code of the synthesis logic, Zhang Mingxian drew the pixel icons of the basic elements, and Li Hao built a simple testing framework.

However, the problem became apparent when the results were submitted on Friday.

According to the code logic, players need to release the first element key and then press the second one to trigger the synthesis, which is completely inconsistent with Ye Feng's requirement of "pressing down simultaneously".

During the review meeting, Chen Guowei scratched his head and explained.

"Unity's touch detection prioritizes single-finger touch by default; pressing two virtual buttons simultaneously will trigger a false touch detection."

Ye Feng didn't rush to deny it, but instead opened the prototype demonstration.

"I played an older mobile game before and solved a similar problem using 'two-finger press detection.' Could you try adding logic to your code that 'two-finger presses with an interval of ≤0.3 seconds are considered simultaneous triggers'?"

Over the next three days, Chen Guowei repeatedly debugged the touch detection code and finally achieved the effect of "simultaneous pressing and merging".

During the second week of review, Ye Feng raised new requirements.

This achieved the effect of "simultaneous pressing and combining". During the second week of review, Ye Feng raised a new requirement: "Add a 'combination memory bar' so that players can directly click to use the 3 most recently used combinations without having to reselect elements every time. Students want a fast-paced game during breaks."

This time, Chen Guowei's team quickly got to work and even added the "long press to delete in memory bar" function. After Ye Feng tried it out, he immediately decided: "Let's go in this direction and start working on the map generation system next week."

As the gameplay prototype was being developed, disagreements over art direction gradually became apparent.

Based on his own understanding, Zhang Ming produced the first version of the protagonist's pixel art: a 16x16 pixel character wearing exquisite armor, with weapons detailed in 5 frames of animation. Upon seeing this, Ye Feng immediately produced the memory manuscript of the otherworldly game at the review meeting.

The main character is a rough 8x8 pixel design, the armor is distinguished by only 3 colors, and the weapon animation is simplified to "raise gun - fire - retrieve" 3 frames.

"Zhang Ming, your style is too refined and doesn't fit the retro feel of 8-bit. Besides, student phones have limited performance, and the more frames the animation has, the more likely it is to lag."

He then produced the "Art Style Requirements Document V1.0", which clearly stipulated the requirements.

"All characters and props are uniformly 8x8 pixel in size, and the number of colors does not exceed 6; the element bullet effects use a 3-frame loop animation, with fire bullets being 'orange-red-bright yellow-orange-red' and ice bullets being 'light blue-white-light blue'; the scene is divided into three layers (foreground shrubs/midground buildings/distant sky), with each layer having a decreasing pixel density to ensure the image has depth without taking up too many resources."

Although Zhang Ming disagreed, he still revised it according to the requirements. As a result, the ice bullet effect he submitted was purplish in color, which did not match Ye Feng's requirement of "light blue".

Ye Feng didn't let him try and fail repeatedly. Instead, he found an 8-bit style color chart and circled the two color values ​​"#E0F7FA" and "#B2EBF2".

"Use these two colors: #B2EBF2 for the highlights and #E0F7FA for the shadows to ensure a sense of unity."

To verify whether the style matched students' preferences, Ye Feng also designed an art survey questionnaire, listing sample images in three styles: "delicate pixel art", "retro 8-bit", and "cartoon chibi". He mobilized Chen Guowei's team to forward the questionnaire to game groups in 20 universities, and finally collected 823 questionnaires. 80% of the students chose "retro 8-bit".

With this data in hand, Zhang Ming completely agreed with Ye Feng's judgment, and the subsequent scene and BOSS designs were strictly carried out according to the requirements. For example, the first BOSS, "Flame Lord", was made into an 8×12 pixel shape according to the requirements, and the attack effect was "3 frames of fire ring spread", which not only fit the style, but also allowed players to clearly judge the attack range.