Chapter 138 Extreme Speed

This year's Mid-Autumn Festival did not coincide with National Day, so the festive atmosphere was still pretty good.

Tianba Studio is very lively.

After a round of expansion, the studio’s current total number of employees has exceeded 20.

These are the core employees. If we include the employees of Xianyu Digital, media operations, channel specialists, etc., the total number of employees is almost close to fifty.

Mooncakes must be distributed during the Mid-Autumn Festival.

In order to make the customized mooncake gift boxes satisfy everyone's wishes and tastes, Chen Ba also organized a public vote to allow everyone to choose their favorite type of mooncake.

The result was unexpected.

I thought the five-nut mooncake would win the first place, but the final voting results showed that the red bean paste mooncake was the favorite! "I'm really tired of eating five-nut mooncakes."

I have to say, when it comes to mooncakes, the first thing that comes to mind is the five-nut mooncake. After so many years, no one has become interested in it anymore.

Just let it be bean paste!

Since it was a choice made by voting, Chen Ba did not object. He asked someone to customize a batch of red bean paste mooncake gift boxes, which were distributed to everyone the day before the Mid-Autumn Festival.

The mooncakes have been eaten and the short holiday is over.

On the first working day after the Mid-Autumn Festival, Chen Ba convened all the core employees of the studio to hold a new game seminar.

Yes, new game!

The official version of "Love Staff" has been released. Although the nature of the game has changed and many accidents have occurred during this process, it is finally on the right track.

Mobile development does not require so many people, and the next focus of Tianba Studio will definitely be to develop new games.

But here comes the problem...

What type of game will it be?

According to Brother Ba's description, the price of their next new game is expected to be over 100 yuan, which is three digits.

For a game of this price and size, there aren’t many themes to choose from.

"Guns, cars, balls!"

Chen Ba knew that he had to define a general scope for everyone, otherwise they would just discuss blindly and would not come to any conclusion even after a year of discussion.

So he defined a range.

That is the "gun, car and ball" combination that has been popular in the gaming world for a long time and is widely loved by players! Gun refers to first-person or third-person shooting games, that is, games like "Half-Life", "Call of Duty" and "CSGO".

Car refers to racing simulation games, or driving racing games. Representative works include "Need for Speed", "Forza Horizon", etc.

The ball is special...

Ball games in a narrow sense actually refer to ball sports simulation games, such as the classic "FIFA", "NBA", etc.

But since the rise of the Internet, the meaning of the word "ball" has changed slightly. The traditional gun, car and ball, ball in a broad sense also refers to those adult games that "are prohibited for people under 18 years old to play".

Cough cough!

Who says XX is not a ball? In short, "gun, car and ball" is a long-lasting game type in the gaming industry. It is absolutely appropriate to use it as the material for Tianba Studio's first 100-yuan game.

No one had any objection to this.

However, when it comes to the question of which one to choose among the gun, car and ball, everyone had a heated discussion.

"Let's play FPS!"

Xiao Lu raised his hand and said, "Shooting games will always have a market, so this is definitely the best choice."

“That makes sense.”

"But, aren't shooting games a bit too competitive? Regardless of whether it's a big company or a small company, they basically have their own shooting games. It's hard for us to outdo them."

"Also, although the market share of shooting games is large, the player base has already reached saturation. It is difficult for new games to snatch users from those old shooting games..."

This is indeed a big problem.

There is no doubt that among the gun, car and ball games, shooting games must be the most popular and have the largest player base.

But this field is really too complicated!

Even Chen Ba, who is fearless, feels tired when he hears the names of a series of masterpieces such as "Call of Duty", "Battlefield", "Counter-Strike", "Halo", "Far Cry", "Rainbow Six", "Borderlands", and "Titanfall".

Can't roll at all...

How much effort and hard work does it take to make a name for yourself in the field of gunfighting?

"Then let's play a racing game!"

"Ball games are niche on the one hand, and on the other hand, they are highly specialized. Without sufficient preparation and accumulation, it is difficult to make a good ball sports game," Yang Dong analyzed carefully.

FIFA is the best of its kind! But it is also very difficult for a studio that has never developed such a game to create a game comparable to FIFA from scratch.

"Can!"

Chen Ba thought about it and decided that although racing games were also quite competitive and it was difficult for new developers to win the trust of players, they were at least better than shooting games.

"Is everyone okay with this?"

After asking around and making sure everyone agreed with the proposal, Chen Ba made the final decision: "It's settled then. We'll release a racing game next year."

The direction has been decided.

What we are going to discuss next is some general framework of this project, as well as the core selling points and gameplay of the game.

There's not much to say in this regard.

Chen Ba heard a joke a long time ago. It was about the boss of a company who wanted to make a new game, for which he put forward many requirements.

As a result, the person in charge of the project, the general producer of the game, did not listen to what the boss said, but simply asked: "Tell me, who did you copy?" Yes, it was so rude!

Don't tell me all that nonsense, just tell me who the new game copied from.

Is it useful to say so much? It would be better to keep it simple and use a ready-made game as the object of plagiarism, directly activate the Sharingan, and copy it pixel by pixel...

certainly!

Chen Ba is too thin-skinned to plagiarize his competitors openly. He hopes to make a different game based on the successful experience of his competitors.

"It's a reference, I understand!"

Everyone burst into laughter and instantly understood what Brother Ba meant.

"Don't smile so obscenely..."

Chen Ba said speechlessly: "I did ask you to learn from our competitors, but I didn't say to copy them exactly. We can't do things that will get us sued. We still have to have the bottom line."

There are so many racing games out there, there's no need to focus on just one.

Learn a little from this one, a little from that one, and focus on integrating the best of all schools! "It's also possible to become a stitched monster, a pile of shit..."

Chen Ba smiled and said, "It's better not to do that. We still need to create some characteristics of our own to distinguish it from other racing games."

What are the characteristics?

He thought of something, that is, to make a fuss about the "racing car" model. Not limited to those sports cars or rally cars, maybe he could take a different approach and make a "classic car" racing game? "The King of Garbage Contest, right?"

Xiao Lu couldn't help but say, "A bunch of antique scrapped cars found at a scrap yard made a creaking sound and crossed the finish line at a speed of 30km/h..."

"What's the problem?"

"Who stipulated that this type of racing game must use luxury sports cars or professional-grade racing cars?" Chen Ba asked in return.

As racing games have developed to this day, many car models are too far away from players.

Any racing game enthusiast has a garage filled with all kinds of luxury cars and sports cars, such as Porsche, Lamborghini, Ferrari... It's enough to make you drool.

Luxury cars, sports cars, and even professional-level racing cars have already been shown in other games.

Chen Ba didn't want to make cars that were too far away from ordinary players, and that they might never be able to drive even if they worked hard all their lives. He wanted to make cars that were close to the people, down to earth, not that expensive, and could be seen everywhere on the streets.

"Non-mainstream?"

Zhong Shengwei turned the gel pen in his hand and said thoughtfully: "Mainly family vehicles and shopping vehicles?"

"right!"

Chen Ba nodded: "Not only family cars and shopping carts, but also old man's cars, three-wheeled vehicles, and electric cars can be included."

The main focus is on being down-to-earth!

Not only are the models very down-to-earth, the track map is also down-to-earth. Traffic lights, morning and evening rush hours, random lane changes, ongoing construction... it's not an exaggeration to say it's an obstacle course.

There is no mistake in the poem, post, content, and read the book on 6, 9, and bar!

The gameplay of the game is actually very similar to other games. A group of cars start from the starting point, pass through a series of checkpoints, complete a series of road sections, and finally calculate the ranking and performance points.

But the game has built-in traffic rules.

For example, if you encounter a red light, you must stop and wait for the green light, otherwise you will be fined. If you encounter pedestrians and electric vehicles running around, you must also avoid them, otherwise you will be fined.

“Is there still a speed limit?”

As the only person in the studio who has never passed the driving test, Zhang Xiaojuan proposed a very strange idea: "If a racing game has a speed limit, it would be too abstract..."

“No speed limit!”

Chen Ba knew what she was thinking and rolled his eyes. "How can there be a speed limit? The game is about overcoming a series of obstacles along the way in the shortest time and reaching the finish line as quickly as possible."

The shorter the time, the higher the record! This type of game cannot be speed-limited, because speed-limiting means that the upper limit and playability of the game are greatly reduced, and there is no motivation to break new records.

So all other rules are there, except for the speed limit. The game does not object to people driving fast, and the faster the better...

As for how to drive a vehicle at such a fast speed and move flexibly on city roads, it will test the players' skills.

“Will there be traffic jams during the morning and evening rush hours?”

"meeting!"

Chen Ba further explained: "Traffic jams will certainly occur, but the traffic jams in this game will leave enough room for players to squeeze in."

To put it bluntly, if you have good skills and are confident that you can squeeze in and overtake, the morning and evening rush hours will not be a problem for you and you can pass through them easily.

But if you don't have good driving skills, just wait in line and wait for the right to pass! Don't try to squeeze in, or you'll end up getting fined...

“What about the car model?”

"Go to the car manufacturer and buy the authorization!"

Chen Ba was mentally prepared to bleed for this. Fortunately, he was targeting some family vehicles and shopping vehicles, and the authorized price should not be as expensive as luxury cars and sports cars.

In addition to the basic appearance of the vehicle, if there is an opportunity, you should also get some specific parameters and component details of each model from the car manufacturer.

This is also very useful!

Most of these racing games support "car modification".

Modifications have nothing to do with performance. They only affect the appearance and paint modifications of the vehicle, and there are also modifications to parts that affect performance.

The latter is more important.

Chen Ba knows that personalized modification of racing cars is also something that players care about very much, so he plans to provide a variety of modification details.

However, the performance ceiling must be locked.

There is a high degree of freedom in modification, but you can't modify an Old Man's Le to be faster than a rocket, that's too outrageous.

“That’s right!”

"In addition to buying from 4S stores, you can also go to used car markets and scrap centers to find bargains."

Chen Ba couldn't help laughing and said, "This can also satisfy the desire of some players to repair a car that is on the verge of being scrapped and modify it into an excellent racing car to accompany them in various competitions..."

Doesn’t Xiao Lu look down on classic cars?

With some serious modifications, it’s not impossible to have fun with a classic car, it just takes more time.

That’s the basic framework.

As a racing game, the core is still "racing". As long as the car and the track are done well, there will be no big problems.

As for the track...

In addition to standard city roads, Chen Ba also plans to build several common tracks, such as beaches, grass, ice and snow sections, steep mountain roads, etc.

These are some common track types in racing games, used to enrich the content of the game.

“And the weather system!”

Chen Ba seemed to have thought of something, and finally added: "Thunder and rain, wind and snow, fog and scorching heat...all kinds of weather changes, I hope to show them in the game."

Weather is pseudo-random.

Pseudo-random means that before a game starts, players will receive a weather forecast and can make targeted adjustments, such as car model selection, tire replacement, etc.

“That’s easy!”

A completely random weather system may not be easy to make, but a pseudo-random weather system is not a particularly big problem for Yang Dong and others.

After all, they have made similar attempts in previous games.

For example, in the game "Shennong Continent", different weather conditions will appear in the game as time goes by.

Compared to this...

What everyone is actually more concerned about is how to solve the controllability of this game?

The main feature of racing games is the controllability. If the controllability is insufficient and the driving experience is terrible, no matter how good other aspects are, it will be of no avail.

"Brother Ba, what's the name of the game?"

"A name..."

Chen Ba frowned and thought for a moment before saying, "Speed!"

The names of this type of games are all in this style, either extreme speed or fast, or furious or wild, or speeding or racing, the main feature is that the name can be chosen casually.

Just don't go off topic.

If a sequel is released later, it will be "Ford 2", with a serial number added to the end of the original name.

Why doesn’t the first model have a number?

This is industry practice!

Normally, the first game in a series will not intentionally add a "1". Only the sequel will start adding the number 23456...

It's been stuck in review again. Let's see if it can be released later.

(End of this chapter)