Losing Money to Be a Tycoon

December 7th, Tuesday…

Tengda Network Technology Co., Ltd….

The examinations ended yesterday. Now, it was time for the papers to be intensely marked.

Pei Qian had expected there to be a lot of papers to mark, and so he had allocated a week for marking alone.

The interviews would be held on the following Monday. After that, the list of successful applicants could quickly be generated. From there, they would decide who could join Tengda as interns and get the opportunity to take the Tengda Spirit compatibility test.

Pei Qian was very happy with the time allocation for the entire process.

On one hand, the written examinations, interviews, and selection had lengthened the entire recruitment process by nearly two weeks. This worked to persuade many people not to try and apply for a job at Tengda.

On the other hand, having to take two Mondays off in such a short period made most working adults feel helpless. As a result, many experienced, potential applicants had been dissuaded from applying as well.

All in all, he had come up with many ways and means to dissuade as many people from applying as possible!

For now, the HR department and administrative department were handling the marking of papers. Given Tengda's current size, Pei Qian guessed that guarding against bribery and fraud was unnecessary.

In the future—as the recruitment drives get bigger in scale, they would mark the papers according to the standards of other large-scale examinations. They could purchase professional facilities and recruit professional markers. Then, Pei Qian would probably be able to spend a huge sum of money.

Just as he was considering this, someone knocked on his door.

Pei Qian looked up to see Ye Zhizhou.

Be Quiet had been completed earlier than GOG. Now, the first version of their demo was already out.

The current version could not be considered done. At the most, it contained the game's basic functions such as the movement of characters against the backdrop, the use of props, and the like.

Art resources were still far from done, and only one setting had been completed. There was also still a lot of room for improving the props, characters, and special effects.

Still, the initial demo offered some idea of how the game would look like.

Ye Zhizhou sucked in a long breath at the door of Boss Pei's office, trying to calm himself down.

In the past, Boss Pei had always gone over to Shang Yang Games to check on the game's research and development progress. However, this time, Ye Zhizhou had been summoned to 'face the god' alone at Tengda Games. Of course, he felt slightly nervous.

"Calm down, calm down. The demo isn't meant to be a perfect version. It's normal for there to be bugs in the demo. Boss Pei wouldn't blame me.

"As long as it can show the game's basic functions, it'll be good enough.

"That's unless… there are so many bugs that he can't even play the demo.

"That isn't likely, though. The testing team already ran the game once through. The serious bugs have already been fixed.

"There are still some minor bugs in the demo, but I probably won't be so unlucky. All of them wouldn't appear, right?"

Ye Zhizhou comforted himself before knocking the door and entering the office.

"Boss Pei, this is the game's program. Please install it."

Ye Zhizhou handed a portable hard drive to Pei Qian. Pei Qian took it and then installed the game's demo onto his own computer. Then, he handed the controller to Ye Zhizhou.

Actually, Pei Qian still had no idea what kind of game this was.

That was because he had only given several general instructions to Shang Yang Games earlier. After that, he had left them to create the game on their own.

Thus, Pei Qian felt quite hopeful about the game's demo. He had no idea what his instructions, which pointed to a dead-end, had led the team at Shang Yang Games to come up with.

Yet…

Could Pei Qian see the demo for what it truly was under the influence of Tang Yishu's halo effect?

Pei Qian highly doubted that.

There was a blank screen, and then the game started. Pei Qian was quite surprised. It worked! No error popped up and the game didn't crash!

The demo seemed quite good.

Ye Zhizhou had no inkling of his impending doom. He moved the joystick on the controller, operating the game and explaining it at the same time.

"We've completed the basics for the demo such as the movement of the characters, the use of surrounding props, and the like. Our main purpose was to show you the horror atmosphere and the overall style and see if they are to your liking.

"This is the first character we made. It's a male adult with a standard body type. His health meter, strength meter, and sanity meter are displayed on the screen.

"We expect to come up with more different characters later on, so that players can customize their appearance…"

Ye Zhizhou observed Boss Pei's expressions as he explained.

Boss Pei looked engrossed in the screen as if he was expecting something to happen. At the same time, it was mixed with the hopeful look was a hint of… surprise.

Ye Zhizhou could not help but feel proud of himself.

It looks like Boss Pei thinks highly of our project; he can't possibly feign this hopeful expression!

Furthermore, the hint of surprise in his expression showed that the game was more complete than he had expected.

The situation was looking good!

Ye Zhizhou began explaining with more excitement.

However, only two thoughts filled Pei Qian's mind at that moment.

When will the bug appear? I can't wait.

The bug hasn't appeared yet? I guess the bunch of people at Shang Yang Games has put in a lot of effort into this demo.

Pei Qian did not feel much about the game itself. He could only say that it was alright. He could not see signs of the game becoming popular from a mere demo.

The game's foundational contents and details, its art resources, and its style were all pretty well done. After all, the game was being produced by a game editor. As long as they were willing to pour in enough money, its art resources could not turn out that badly.

However, the horror atmosphere was far from good.

Of course, it was probably because the monsters and other gamers had not been added. There was also no sign of danger. No matter how dark and scary they made the game look, there was a limit to how frightening it could be.

Still, no matter what, this demo had not left a lasting impression in Pei Qian's mind for now.

"Boss Pei, this is a special tape recorder. Once players use it, a deafening, scary soundtrack would play. The sanity meter of all players around it would take a huge hit. Take a look…"

At that point, Ye Zhizhou moved his character forward and tried to interact with the props in the surroundings.

However, nothing happened.

Ye Zhizhou, "?"

He was confused inside. He clicked the prop once again.

It still didn't work.

"Heh, Boss Pei, I think there might be a bug. It's alright, we have other props prepared."

Pei Qian smiled and said, "That's fine. It's a demo after all. It's expected to have bugs."

Ye Zhizhou heaved a sigh of relief and moved to the next prop that he could interact with.

"This is an ax. You can pick it up and attack enemies with it, just like that."

Ye Zhizhou made the character wave the ax around, causing the crates, old tables, and other random items around him to shatter to pieces.

Ye Zhizhou heaved a sigh of relief once more. Thankfully, nothing had gone wrong with the weapon system.

However, just as he was starting to feel better, the character holding the ax dropped into a chink in the map.

Ye Zhizhou was speechless.

He reacted immediately by clicking the prepared hotkey. Once again, the character reappeared in the starting position on the map.

"Hehe, that was an accident. I accidentally dropped into a chink in the map. Don't worry, Boss Pei. We will definitely fill the gap later on."

Pei Qian nodded. "Yes, yes, of course."

Ye Zhizhou did not dare to over-explain himself, for fear that Boss Pei would think he was both incapable and unwilling to own up to his own mistakes. Thus, he continued steering his character forward, toward the arranged next prop.

However, he only made it a couple of steps before the image jammed.

Deng!

Deng! Deng! Deng!

The program stopped suddenly, projecting them back to the desktop. Multiple error windows popped up, stacking one on top of another rather ceremonially.

Ye Zhizhou felt too ashamed to explain himself. He quietly took hold of the mouse and closed the error windows before trying to reboot the game.

This time, however, the game could not launch.

Ye Zhizhou was speechless…

Confused…

Puzzled…

What was going on?

Before he came to Tengda, Ye Zhizhou had tried the game on different computers at Shang Yang Games. Although one or two bugs appeared every now and then, the game functioned quite well on the whole.

Yet, now, he could not even launch the game.

Ye Zhizhou looked at Boss Pei, ashamed. "Boss Pei, I don't know why this is happening. The game was functioning well before. I'm really sorry. There are too many bugs in the game. I'll go back and make some edits… and then demonstrate it to you again in the future…"

Ye Zhizhou was too embarrassed to look at Boss Pei in the eyes.

Boss Pei had thought so highly of the game, and he had been so expectant as well. Yet, Ye Zhizhou had completely blown it!

Now, he had only one feeling: he was too ashamed to face his superiors!

How would he explain this to Director Lin when he got back to Shang Yang Games…?

Unexpectedly, Boss Pei grinned at him and said, "Don't worry. It's only a demo. This is very normal. Don't blame yourself.

"Although I didn't get to see a demonstration of the actual game's contents, I felt your sincerity and genuineness in researching and developing the game. Continue along the same path!

"You don't have to give me a demonstration of this version anymore. You can give me another demo when you've completed the game's basic gameplay."

Boss Pei… isn't blaming me?

Ye Zhizhou tried hard to look for any hint of reproach in Boss Pei's expression, but he failed.

Boss Pei's expression was benevolent. He even looked a bit comforted.

Wait, comforted? Why was Boss Pei feeling comforted?

Ye Zhizhou was confused.

He could not have been comforted about the appearance of so many bugs.

Could it be that Pei Qian had deciphered the direction of our design through the short demonstration? Has he confirmed that we are on the right track?

Yes, that must be it!

After all, Boss Pei was the one who set the game's general direction. Boss Pei must know how the final version of the game would look better than any one of us.

Since that's the case, there's nothing strange about Boss Pei's expression.

Ye Zhizhou knew very well that everyone at Shang Yang Games had been working hard during this period. The demo was indeed more or less complete. It was just that his luck had been bad today, and bugs kept appearing in the game for some reason.

Thankfully, Boss Pei was not pursuing the matter. Instead, he was very understanding about this unlikely scenario.

"Rest assured, Boss Pei. I'll go back and fix all the bugs. The next time I come, I'll demonstrate an early version of the game that will definitely be good enough!"

Ye Zhizhou turned to leave the office.

Before that, he had been quite remiss. He had thought that the research and development of Be Quiet had been progressing quickly and smoothly. Thus, he started slacking off.

Now, however, all of those feelings were gone. They still had a long way to go! He had to keep working hard!

Seeing that Ye Zhizhou's motivation had been renewed, Pei Qian felt slightly confused.

I didn't say a word. Why is he becoming so agitated…?

Still, whatever that had happened today had confirmed something for Pei Qian. Tang Yishu's halo was indeed effective. In fact, it was extremely effective!