Otherworldly Architect

At the end of December, the first batch of "game peripherals" in the true sense of Bluestar Studio was finally launched on the official website mall.

Since this batch is basically at the sample level, there are many processes, exquisite workmanship, and relatively few quantities.

Every game in Mingyan occupies a perimeter.

The surrounding of "Minecraft" is of course the furry dolls of "Ding Ding Wei" creepers.

The green ghost figure, the round and cute eyes, plus a little fluffy feeling of "may explode at any time"...

Well, this is the surrounding of a mysterious sand sculpture, but it is still the most popular one.

Minecraft players still eat this set!

Mosaic monsters are familiar strangers to them, and they are the most recognizable monster images.

Changed other monsters to be the peripherals, and they still felt that they were not happy enough.

Around "The Story of Hachiko" is a Q-version Hachiko badge.

Things like this are naturally useless in the interstellar era, they are basically collectibles.

Like the Blue Star in the 21st century, stamps are collected as collectibles.

Very memorable.

And all the income from this badge, Blue Star promises to donate all to the pitot rescue foundation.

This message will appear directly in the badge purchase information.

Let the players who see it, can't help but feel a little proud, and can't help but feel a little worried.

——Alas, Blue Star has started throwing money again! Come and stop him!

League of Legends is surrounded by a mug.

The game map has been carefully modified into beautiful graphics, which are decorated on the cup.

Players who buy this cup will also receive a "small cup" emoji in the game.

The expression is cute and the price is very low.

Even if the expression is sold directly at this price, there will be many players who will pay for it.

Not to mention a limited edition mug?

Before the official website started to sell, a large number of players have already set their alarm clocks and are ready to start robbing them regularly.

On the day of the sale, a total of 100,000 mugs were swept away at an astonishing speed.

You know, Blue Star's first batch of peripherals is only allowed to purchase one per account.

But Rao was like this, and it was completely sold out in just two minutes!

Players who are late can only refresh the page over and over again, and then look annoyed at the prompt message that "the baby is sold out".

They know that their favorite game is very popular, but they still didn't expect it to be so popular.

Most of these players who bought peripherals really took a fancy to these beautiful and memorable little things.

But there are also a small number of people who want to send money to Blue Star.

There is even a small group of people who are here to "invest".

You must know that the first limited editions of some classic works also have a high value-added space and are valuable for collection.

Over time, players' feelings for a good game will slowly grow.

The limited editions sold that year will naturally rise.

Therefore, they think that the League of Legends will eventually reach the height of feelings——

Let their collection of limited-edition peripherals become high-end items on the market, and eventually sell for hundreds of thousands of times the price.

Each of the first batch of peripherals has only 100,000 in stock, and there will be no more sold out.

At the same time, it also brought millions of sales to Blue Star.

But this is actually not very profitable, because the cost of trial works is actually very high.

It will only be until mass production starts later that the cost will drop enough to be profitable.

Bluestar Studio made an internal estimate, and first placed the first batch of peripheral orders for official sale from the foundry——

If the development goes well, the official peripheral mall will be officially launched early next year!

This batch of peripheral production also suddenly made the Blue Star Studio seem crowded.

During this time, the studio has slowly expanded to a team of more than 100 people.

After employees get their favorite surroundings, they generally choose to place them next to their workstations, where they can enjoy them at any time.

Coupled with the large-scale servers and workstations, the original seventh and eighth floors are really a bit hard to put down.

Ming Yan has entrusted a real estate agent to help him find a more suitable location.

Sooner or later, the Blue Star studio will be relocated, and it is best to do it in one step.

If the funds are sufficient, he will buy the entire building, which will be called the "Blue Star Building" in the future.

However, he is also looking for a suitable other world at the same time.

Well, when "Blue Star Doomsday" is launched, as long as the sales are not too bad, it is estimated that the funds on the books will be enough.

...

This month passed quickly, and it was another small New Year's Day.

There are only 50 days left until the New Year's Day when "Blue Star Doom" is scheduled to go live.

On this day, the closed beta of the BETA version of "Blue Star Doomsday" gradually came to an end.

The test team ended up bringing good news and bad news to Mingyan.

The good news is that the score of the BETA version of the internal test gave "Blue Star Doomsday" a high score of S grade!

They invited nearly 100 players in total, from all age groups, industries and educational backgrounds.

And these players almost unanimously gave praise.

The most shocking part of the whole game to them, in addition to the smooth and natural combat operations, lies in the extremely realistic game scenes and plot characters.

Therefore, when these players experience the core plot under the guidance of the staff, almost all of their feedback focuses on the plot.

Some even ended the experience with tears streaming down their faces, unable to get out of their emotions.

In order to get more objective data, the staff had to extend the testing process to give players time to calm down.

But most people still have a steady stream of things they want to say about the plot, and a lot of emotions they want to express.

Fortunately, the test experts are professional and can guide them one by one to answer the questions they want.

For example: What do you think are the shortcomings and inadequacies of the current "Blue Star Doom"?

This question has left many people pondering.

A more senior player replied: "The game experience is too short, I can hardly see it, and I experience new surprises every minute. And about the flaws and deficiencies, I have no impression... Hey, let's be honest, I Now I like Blue Star Doom so much, it's a bit cruel for you to ask me to pick on you, right?"

"..."

Afterwards, the staff quickly showed him a few clips of himself playing.

The player frowned and tried to recall, and finally said: "Really, whether it is the gameplay, the depth of the plot, or the details such as dubbing, they are almost impeccable. I can only pick a few meaningless flaws, For example, in the scene of the fight on the train, there seems to be a place to wear the mold."

"Moulding" is a game term, which refers to the phenomenon that objects, characters and other models in the game overlap each other, resulting in visual errors.

In any case, the staff carefully recorded the opinions of the closed beta players.

And that player is indeed very discerning.

——Because that "train fight" plot was the bad news that had to be reported to Ming Yan.

The plot was about when Russell and Louis were walking alone, they encountered a group of survivors who were besieged by mutant zombies.

Russell led away the mutant zombies, and then Louis started the train, and the three followed the train away from the group of survivors.

Naturally, there was a fierce fight on the train, and of course Russell won the final victory in a dangerous situation.

And here's the problem: Russell needs to fight on the vehicle and then switch scenes as the vehicle progresses.

The problem of vehicles and switching scenes is simply a big problem that has never changed.

In the 21st century, Blue Star was struggling with PC games, and VR games in the interstellar age are still the same.

With Bluestar's existing technical means, there is really no way to solve it.

You know, the vehicle in the game is really not necessarily a vehicle, it is usually done by tricks.

In the eyes of the player, a train is coming.

In fact, maybe the production team was too lazy to do the train movement, so they made a train-shaped helmet, put it on a monster's head, and made the monster run along the rails...

Well, it looks very realistic anyway, that's enough!

It is impossible for players to get into the ground and find that there are two short legs of monsters running desperately under the train!

And vehicles with fighting scenes are even more difficult.

If you want to move, but also want to make the protagonist move, there will be many technical difficulties.

Wearing the mold is only one of the problems. What is more serious is the gravity disorder. The protagonist flew into outer space...

Or there are too many things to calculate inertia, the protagonist's hair is left floating in place, but others are still advancing, so the protagonist becomes a big bald head and plays handsome in place...

The most tragic bug, Ming Yan has also seen the protagonist kiss directly with the BOSS, directly fit together, regardless of each other.

For this problem, the solution given by Ming Yan is to make the scene move.

- Another classic visual deception.

Hold the vehicle in place while the whole scene moves backwards quickly.

From the player's point of view, it is indistinguishable just like the scene does not move and the vehicle moves.

There will still be some bugs in this scheme, but at least it's better than the protagonist's head flying out.

Because I don't know how long the fight will last - God knows how long it will take the player to beat this BOSS to death.

So this moving scene doesn't know how long it will take to fly, and it can only be made into a looping scene that can be used indefinitely.

When zoomed out, it looks like a doughnut is spinning.

Then comes the problem.

What if this vehicle that has a play still needs to switch scenes? !

"Blue Star Doom" fell here.

When Russell pushed the boss into the second stage, he needed the train to pass through a tunnel and into the forest.

This translates the map to show that Russell saved those survivors.

The infinite loop donut scene cannot solve the problem of cutting the scene.

Moreover, it is necessary to cut from the ruins of the city to the tunnel, and then cut out from the tunnel and enter the mountain forest—two switches!

This incident has troubled Bluestar's design team and program team for a long time.

They have made four sets of solutions, but no matter which one will still leave certain bugs.

There are still some flaws in this plan.

According to the experience of testing, if the players in the internal test can find a problem, it means that there are at least ten potential problems.

With a clear-cut personality, he can't stand this level of contradiction.

He will only hand over the best works that he has done his best to the players!

And when he clearly found a problem like this, he couldn't pretend to be deaf and mute, and treat a defective product as a finished product.

That night, for the first time, Mingyan asked the members of Bluestar Studio to work overtime unexpectedly.

The secretary gave advance notice and made sure everyone was clear about the reasons and goals.

This time, when they were concentrated in the conference room, they all silently faced the title written on the whiteboard.

【How to solve the vehicle problem? 】

That night, Blue Star's technical staff discussed overtime until the evening, and they were reluctantly forced to stop working overtime by Ming Yan.

And Mingyan sat on the spot alone, lost in thought.

The lights in the conference room came on and off, and off and on.

Until the next morning, Varian stepped into the room and was stunned the moment he opened the door.

"Boss, didn't you go home last night?!"

Ming Yan was awakened by him, raised his head sleepily, and then subconsciously gathered the scratch paper on the table.

Varian said: "Stop, boss, you won't sleep all night, will you?"

Ming Yan smiled bitterly, got up and laughed at himself: "Alas, the knowledge reserve is still not enough."

Ming Yan from 4,000 years ago has always been troubled by high-end knowledge.

He has worked very hard and has slept very little, but he often feels that he does not know enough about the sophisticated technology of the interstellar age.

In this world where interstellar people have lived for decades, it is clear that they have only studied for a short period of seven or eight years, but they still feel deeply about their ignorance!

Just like the current technical problem, he read the information overnight and thought about it all night, but he couldn't come up with an effective solution.

Varian was already frightened by Ming Yan, and quickly said: "Don't make fun of your health. Boss, I'll clean up here, you go to the office and sleep for a while."

Mingyan shook his head and said, "My mind is too active, I can't sleep."

He then sighed softly, picked up the documents, and continued back to his office.

Varian: "..."

He looked at Ming Yan's back and thought a little worriedly.

Past experience told him: Mingyan often forgets to sleep and eat when he is lost in thought, and it is difficult to listen to other people's words to persuade him to rest.

Well, except for one person.

Thinking of this, Varian decisively took out his mobile phone and sent an email to Xia Cheng's public mailbox.

On the other hand, after Mingyan returned to the office, he also dealt with his daily email exchanges.

Since the time when the League of Legends joined the League A, he has had a certain connection with the chairman of the committee, Ning Yufeng.

At this moment, seeing Ning Yufeng's name, Ming Yan asked him this question on a whim.

——As the boss of the League A, maybe he can give very reliable advice?

Unexpectedly, the reply to Ning Yufeng's email was very fast.

[…Compared with senior game architects, I can’t say that I really understand game production. However, in terms of the performance of the game screen, there is a trick that can be shared...]

[…The architect is actually doing a magic trick to the audience. When the audience cannot understand the logic behind the scenes, they often marvel at the incredible phenomena they see...]

At the end of the email, he expressed his trust in Mingyan's design ability.

By the way, he also jokingly said: [I recently received two VIP tickets for the magic show, is the chief designer Ming interested? 】

Ming Yan smiled after reading the email.

He was really busy recently with Ning Yufeng's invitation, so he could only decline.

However, Ning Yufeng did give a good idea, which made Ming Yan ponder.

-A magic show?

...

Two hours later, Xia Cheng had arrived at the Blue Star Studio.

Because his relationship with Mingyan is really familiar, he reported to the front desk and stepped into Mingyan's office.

As soon as he entered the door, he saw Ming Yan,

——Ming Yan has fallen asleep on the table.

On the computer, a video explaining magic is still playing in a loop.

The magician's hands are playing with a coin, attracting the audience's attention, but behind the scenes is the use of magnets to operate in the dark...

On Ming Yan's table, there were several new design drawings scattered.

Xia Cheng picked up two of them and looked at them. They were all CG storyboards.

Xia Cheng understands Ming Yan - he can sleep at ease, he must have solved the problem in front of him!

He never doubted Ming Yan's design talent, even for a second.

In this field, it can even give people a god-like sense of trustworthiness.

Everyone knows he will solve the problem sooner or later, and everyone depends on him.

Only those close to you will feel distressed.

"You are working too hard."

Xia Cheng sighed, brushed Ming Yan's messy forehead, and saw his dark circles under his eyes.

Ming Yan slept soundly, completely unconscious.

Xia Cheng gently picked him up and put him on the camp bed next to him.

During this period, Ming Yan suddenly said: "The player is waiting..."

Xia Cheng looked down and realized that this person was talking in his sleep.

——I'm afraid that I didn't encounter a reminder in a dream?

Xia Cheng put a blanket on Ming Yan in a funny way.

After a long time, he sighed helplessly.

A few hours later, when Mingyan woke up from the camp bed, he was a little confused.

Fortunately, his secretary told him that Xia Cheng had come.

Ming Yan suddenly realized that he looked at the time, it was just three o'clock in the afternoon.

He woke up frightened because he had a dream that the player rushed to his office to rush to update.

Ming Yan immediately informed the meeting.

He has found a solution to the train puzzle!

"We can use magic tricks to grab the player's attention and stealthily change the world where they don't realize it."

With that said, the projection was turned on.

"With our technical means, it is really impossible to seamlessly switch the background map at any time. But we can insert the battle connection CG, and when the player sees this close-up shot, the scene will be switched immediately!"

Offstage, a pair of eyes looked at him with reverence.

——Master Ming actually only spent one day thinking independently and came up with a solution!

As expected of a clear statement, this is convincing to watch.

According to the clear plan, this plot does not need to be modified at all.

Even in terms of expressiveness, it is even better than in the past!

The only problem is that the program needs to re-architect the logic here, which may take a certain amount of time.

However, the newly recruited programmer "Ling Lingqi" by Blue Star is quite amazing.

He took over the production of this part, and can ensure that it will be re-produced in a week.

"Blue Star Doom" will definitely be released later than expected.

But never too long.

Speaking of which, Ling Lingqi, the programmer, also made it clear that he was directly invited to interview from the forum.

Because of his poor health, he clearly and exceptionally allowed him to work from home the whole time.

And Ling Lingqi has never even appeared in the studio since she joined Blue Star.

When everyone mentioned this, they all fell to the ground for Boss Ming.

——That is, a genius like Chief Master Ming can accommodate the eccentricities of other geniuses.

...

At the end of January, the last puzzle of Blue Star Doom was overcome.

However, the later debug time is very tight.

So Bluestar Studio still needs at least a month to package it up.

In other words, its official release date was forced to announce a bounced ticket!

Bounced tickets are actually quite common in the game industry.

After all, the production cycle of a game is so long, and it is impossible to be predictable in project management and arrange everything that has not happened.

But common is common, and players who are waiting for it should cry or cry.

【I'm going to die, I can't breathe, I'm going to die without Blue Star Doomsday... 】

【Dry! ! ! Why should I play League of Legends so early? If I didn't play League of Legends, I wouldn't know about Bluestar Studios; if I didn't know Bluestar Studios, I wouldn't have seen the promo of Bluestar Doom; I wouldn't have seen the promo of Bluestar Doom now. It's so painful to wait for the release! 】

The propaganda of Blue Star Doomsday has not fallen since the ALPHA version was tested.

To this day, there have been three official promotional films, all of which have aroused great repercussions among players.

Ling Xiaoman's retro-style rock soundtrack is on full display in this game that describes the end of the world 4,000 years ago.

The moment every player heard the music, goosebumps all over his body.

Very emotional, very shocking!

In order to quell the anger of players over the bounce event, Bluestar Studio hastily released a fourth promotional video.

Well, because the main body of the game has been basically completed.

So this time, the "actual demo video" was released——

In other words, show players what the closed beta players have played.

Seeing that the promo was released again.

The internal beta players move around in it, destroying one cool BOSS after another;

As soon as the camera turned, it showed their shocking expressions when they saw the plot;

And in the actual screen of the game, a desolate and mysterious city ruins, two figures walking alone on the vast map...

The players who have been looking forward to it are about to go crazy.

【I have waited hard enough! You guys even let me watch other people's videos! ! Why can't I play it! Ah ah ah ah ah! 】

【Devil! The person who planned this promotional video is definitely the true inheritance of the leader! 】

[Do you want me to cry and beg you to earn my money quickly? I'm TMD... I cried first QUQ, you guys come. 】