Losing Money to Be a Tycoon

Qiao Liang was an old gamer of Game Designer. He had been playing this game ever since it was released.

In order to produce a new episode of Products of the Gods, Qiao Liang had gone through almost all the endings. He was very familiar with the various forks in the road. as though it was his own backyard.

However, after entering the game this time, he realized that Game Designer seemed to have changed significantly.

The most obvious point was that the original standalone game had become a standalone game with internet connection.

The previous downloadable content of the game had only been updated with new voice-overs and new settings. The gameplay had not improved much even though there were many new updates.

Strictly speaking, this game would only be fun the first time they played it. It could only become a collectible after playing for a while and knowing all the endings.

However, after this update, some online gameplay had been added to this game.

While web-based gameplay was not the main form of entertainment, it was still enough to surprise people.

There was a new message board function in the game, which was a closed mode. It could be activated after clearing the first level of the game. After opening this function and entering the game, one would be able to see the words left behind by other players in various rooms, corridors, and doors.

Qiao Liang tried writing a message as well. He realized that these messages were not randomly typed in. Instead, they were made up of some existing vocabulary. They could only express relatively simple and vague meanings.

This might be because they were worried that too accurate meaning would cause serious spoilers and reduce players' enjoyment of the game.

Using this type of message that was pieced together could easily create a 'reverse guidance' effect for players because the results would be different if they made the same choice under different circumstances.

That way, the new players would not only have to compete with the voice-overs, but they would also have to compete with malicious comments. There would be more obstacles on the way to success.

The second gameplay that was added was the contrarians mode. It could also be activated after completing the game play for a week.

In the original default mode, players would remain silent throughout the entire process while the voice-overs would speak to themselves throughout the entire process. Before players made their choice, the voice-overs would come up with bad ideas; after players made their choice, the voice-overs would make sarcastic remarks; and when the final outcome was out, the voice-overs would either mock the players or be stubborn.

All in all, it was mainly to attack players' mentality.

However, after activating the contrarians mode, the status of both parties immediately reversed!

Under the 'contrarians mode', players would no longer be helpless. Instead, there would be a 'little bickering assistant to fight back against the voice-overs'.

Before making a choice, the voice-overs would come up with a bad idea, and the little assistant would point out the drawbacks of players choosing that way and the benefits of choosing another option.

After making a choice, the voice-over would make sarcastic remarks, and the assistant would rebuke it, leaving the voice-over speechless.

At the end of the game, the assistant would comfort or congratulate the player. At the same time, the assistant would start to mock and despise the voice-over.

The voice-over was speechless and angry, but it could not do anything to the little assistant.

On top of that, if players followed the voice-overs' instructions in the contrarians mode, the assistant would mock the voice-overs in various ways, just like how the voice-overs mocked players in the past.

At first, Qiao Liang was not very interested. However, after playing for a while, he realized that it was quite interesting!

"Actually, the so-called bickering assistant is nothing more than another pre-arranged voice-over that can be triggered. These are all pre-arranged program settings."

"However, why does it feel so good to hear this little assistant bickering with the voice-overs?"

At first, Qiao Liang had thought that the voice-overs were not real so what was the point of insulting it?

However, on further thought, the voice-overs were not real but players would get angry when the voice-over dissed them!

Players had been fuming with anger because of the voice-overs on their first play. It was quite satisfying now that they had an assistant who was criticizing the voice-overs back, rendering them speechless.

What's more, this little bickering assistant had also indirectly pointed out the pros and cons of various choices for players. It might not directly point out what the right choice was but it also gave players more reference information when making choices. It was quite amiable.

The only regret was that the voice of the little assistant was emotionless. While it did not sound as annoying as the voice-overs, it was not much better.

When they cleared the game, the little assistant would tell the player its name: AEEIS. There was no other information.

There was also a new way of playing that was to show the care and concern to the new players.

Qiao Liang tried it out and realized that it was a heaven for the sarcastic people and people who loved to bait others.

Theoretically, the right way to play the game should be for the old players to guide new players who did not understand the game to make the right choice. That way, both the new and old players would be happy.

However, when he started playing, he realized that that was not the case at all!

After going through the voice-overs, the old gamers had become weirdos with their own unique styles.

Some old players would purposely lead the new players down the wrong path.

Some old gamers would not reveal any answers and would only start to mock the players after they had chosen wrongly.

There were also some old gamers who led the new players down the right paths at first to gain the trust of the new gamers. In the end, they would beat them down the wrong paths at the crucial moment.

The scariest thing was that this model was not one-on-one. A maximum of four old players could enter the game of the same new player at a go. They could display their avatars in the four corners of the screen respectively. The content of the words would be displayed in text bubble form.

Some of the four old players were speaking the truth, some were lying, some were trying to undermine each other, and some were working together to deceive others. Coupled with the original voice-overs, the new players could experience five times the joy.

Apart from that, the most exciting part was that there were many fake new players baiting the rest!

Many players had already cleared the game many times, but they purposely started a brand new game to lure the older players in. Then, they pretended to be newbies who knew nothing and fought with them, leading all of them in circles.

"These new modes are quite interesting. Ordinary players should be able to play for two or three days without getting tired of them. The elites should be able to play quite well, right?"

"For all we know, the UP Masters might start producing programs like 'Baiting in Game Designer' soon."

Qiao Liang played for a while and found it quite interesting.

The old gamers found a new source of entertainment after these two games were added to the internet mode. They had originally been left to collect dust in the game library, but after updating their downloadable content, they brought it out again for a new source of entertainment.

Games that had been played many times over were no longer interesting. With these changes, they could fill up the old bottles with new alcohol and refresh them a few more times!

After playing for a while, Qiao Liang read the gamers' thoughts on the two games in discussion forums.

"Holy sh*t, Tengda is the conscience of the industry! How long ago was this game? The main body is free, and it's still being updated?"

"Compared to the content of the downloadable content, the price is still as cheap as a cabbage. I seriously doubt that they can even break even back from this."

"It's too worth it. I'll just buy it brainlessly!"

"Finally, I managed to be one up on the voice-overs in Game Designer. I don't need to be mocked by it anymore. Thank you, AEEIS, the little bickering assistant!"

"There are too many people baiting on the internet mode! They are all veteran gamers, why are they pretending to be newbies? I'm speechless!"

"However, the two downloadable content seemed to have hidden some Easter eggs this time. For example, The Lonely Desert Road gave a spacecraft and an extraterrestrial scene. Does that mean that Tengda's next game is a sci-fi-themed game?"

"A 3A level FPS game? That's awesome!"

"The Easter egg for Game Designer should be this little assistant, AEEIS, right? Are these two Easter eggs for the next game? Then what is AEEIS for?"

"Er… the robot teammate of the protagonist in FPS games?"

"I'm not sure, but I suddenly feel like I'm looking forward to it! After all, there are too few sci-fi games in the country at the moment. There are Xianxia and Wuxia everywhere. I'm sick of seeing them."

"That's because sci-fi games are a technical job. All sorts of details and settings are very important. They are not as complete as the settings for xianxia and wuxia. I wonder if Tengda can do it well."

"Tengda's products are always top-quality. I think there's no problem!"

Qiao Liang scrolled through the forum and found that the players were basically praising the updates.

It was rare for a company to spend so much time and effort updating unimportant old games and focusing on the gaming experience of old players after all.

Most games companies did not value the interests of old gamers at all. They would not do anything that wasn't profitable. They would even do things to hurt old gamers for the sake of profits.

However, Tengda was the exact opposite. They might not be able to make much money from maintaining these old games and might even incur losses, but they were still updating their downloadable content.

What kind of spirit was that!

The players expressed their gratitude. It was just downloadable content, buy it!

Would they still be humans if they did not buy the sincere downloadable content with new gameplay and new contents?

They could not let Tengda's sincerity towards old players go to waste!