OGP CH48
At this very moment, the people the classmates of Design Class 1 envied most weren’t Xie Yunfan, because after all, they didn’t have the strength to go to the Game Gala and win an award.
The ones they envied were Ji Yan, Zhang Zizheng, Xu Kairan, and Zhou Shiyue!
These few classmates who originally followed Xie Yunfan to do their graduation project together were directly carried to victory by the big shot. Not only did they take down the championship of the national design competition, but if they joined Yangfan Studio in the future, their prospects would simply be incredibly bright.
It truly made people both envious and jealous.
Entertainment Committee Member Lin Shu regretted it the most. Back when Xie Yunfan’s graduation project squad was short one person, Ji Yan proactively invited her to join, and she actually rejected it flat out?! Thinking back on it now, she truly wanted to time-travel back to the past and slap herself in the face.
Sometimes, what changes destiny isn’t ability, but choices at critical moments—she had clearly made the most erroneous choice in her life!
Someone in the class proactively messaged Ji Yan privately: “A-Yan, Yunfan is so awesome, and you guys actually kept it hidden from us this whole time?”
Ji Yan had an innocent face: “Damn, I also only found out today alright!”
Besides, even if he knew, why should he tell you guys? Just based on the fact that you guys sarcastically mocked Yunfan every day?
Ji Yan rolled his eyes, ignored these people, and opened the graduation project squad group.
In the “Graduation Project Squad” group, everyone was discussing fiercely, and the messages once again turned into a long-lost 999+.
Zhang Zizheng: “I thought Yunfan had an expert guiding him behind the scenes. In the end, he is the most awesome expert?”
Xu Kairan: “According to the sayings of the ghost realm, human realm, and heaven realm, our Yunfan can go straight to heaven, hahaha.”
Ji Yan: “The planner of Ghost Realm coming to do a graduation project, this is simply a dimensionality reduction strike! No wonder back when making the game with Yunfan, I always felt everything went very smoothly, and the progress was super fast.”
Zhou Shiyue: “The classmates from other schools are thoroughly convinced this time~”
Yan Ke: “I seem to have accidentally invested in a potential stock!”
Everyone excitedly typed: “Congratulations Captain!”
They originally thought Xie Yunfan was busy receiving awards at the venue and wouldn’t reply to messages; everyone was just sincerely expressing their congratulations in the group.
As a result, Xie Yunfan suddenly popped out and said: “Thank you everyone.”
He casually sent over a dozen red packets.
A red packet rain fell in the group, and everyone hurriedly competed in hand speed to snatch the red packets.
Xie Yunfan said: “I’m a bit busy over here, I’ll chat with everyone in detail later. By the way, don’t rush to find jobs yet. My studio will be recruiting soon. If you’re interested, you can continue working with me. Kairan and Yan Ke, if you change your minds, you are also welcome to my team.”
Everyone: “…”
What kind of dog-shit luck had they stepped in?
Being carried by Xie Yunfan felt very good. Being carried all the time was simply too good!
Xu Kairan sent a crying-from-being-moved emoji: “Thank you Captain for still remembering me. I’ve already contacted the school abroad, and the tuition is already paid. When I graduate with my master’s and return to the country, I will definitely come find you! Even doing miscellaneous chores will be fine by then.”
Yan Ke said: “I don’t know the first thing about game design, so I won’t come cause trouble! But I know many friends studying traditional music. If your games ever need background music or something in the future, I can help you contact big shots in traditional music composition!”
Xie Yunfan: “Okay, thank you both very much.”
The other three all planned to find a job after graduation. Hearing that Xie Yunfan was willing to bring them along, the three were overjoyed and privately messaged Xie Yunfan one after another, expressing that they were very willing to join Yangfan Studio.
**
The host announced the end of the award ceremony.
Luo Hang turned around and said to the two people in the third row: “Yunfan, Xinghe, I made an appointment with someone, let’s eat together.”
The two brothers followed Luo Hang backstage, and sure enough, they saw an acquaintance—it was precisely the Mobile Games Home CEO Qin Fang who had just presented the award to Xie Yunfan.
Luo Hang proactively introduced: “This is Qin Fang, my senior from university.”
Qin Fang raised his eyebrows and joked: “I was just about to tell you to push my contact card to Xie Yunfan, yet you took the initiative to bring him to find me? I’ve never seen you this active for your own matters!”
Luo Hang smiled slightly: “I don’t make mobile games, so I don’t have any business dealings with you. Yunfan is different, he still has to continue making mobile games next.” He looked at Xie Yunfan and said: “I booked a restaurant in advance, let’s go, we’ll go eat midnight snacks together.”
Listening to Luo Hang’s words, Xie Yunfan’s heart felt slightly warm.
The two had cooperated pleasantly on the Ghost Realm project. If they were just business partners, there was no need for Luo Hang to care about his subsequent development. But Luo Hang already viewed him as a friend now, which was why he proactively introduced his own connections to him.
Mobile Games Home CEO Qin Fang—companies making mobile games all had to deal with this President Qin, so getting acquainted had no downsides.
The four came to a nearby restaurant.
Luo Hang proactively introduced: “Senior Qin Fang is from Imperial Capital University’s Computer Science Department. He was already making websites himself during university, and single-handedly founded Mobile Games Home after graduating.”
Xie Yunfan couldn’t help but admire him: “President Qin is indeed very formidable, this counts as starting from scratch empty-handed, right?”
Qin Fang said modestly: “I was lucky, just caught the dividends of the era, that’s all. During those years, PC client games were declining, and mobile games were just rising. When I founded the ‘Mobile Games Home’ website, at first, it was only for the convenience of players downloading games.”
He hadn’t expected this website to develop rapidly and become the largest third-party mobile game platform in the country. With more and more games, companies big and small were all willing to release new games here, and the snowball just kept rolling bigger and bigger.
The outside world all said Qin Fang’s luck was too good. But luck was also a part of strength. If he hadn’t discovered the massive market for mobile games and seized the initiative to create a mobile game website, he couldn’t possibly have achieved his success today either.
Xie Yunfan indeed admired this kind of person.
Qin Fang smiled and changed the subject: “Yunfan, since you are Luo Hang’s friend, you are also my friend from now on. We won’t beat around the bush. What are your plans for that game Soul of Music? It has to go on the Mobile Games Home platform, right?”
Xie Yunfan said: “Of course.”
He currently didn’t have a website to release games, and he couldn’t possibly just toss a link on Weibo and tell everyone to come download it.
Mobile Games Home had massive traffic and convenient searching. If it could get on the rhythm game scoring charts, it would have a very strong long-tail effect and be noticed by more and more players.
During those few months when Underworld Maze was exploding in popularity back then, the downloads reached a peak of 8 million, and later slowly gained another 2 million. During the award presentation, the host also said the current downloads had already broken 10 million.
This was the advantage of a large platform. Even if your game’s popularity had long passed, there would continuously be new players jumping into the pit (starting the game).
Xie Yunfan said: “However President Qin, I made this game mainly to promote traditional music. For charging fees, the pricing won’t be too high.”
Qin Fang asked curiously: “The market pricing for small-scale single-player games is all at 15 yuan, how much do you want to set it at?”
Xie Yunfan said: “How about 2 yuan?”
Everyone: “…………”
Not only was Qin Fang stunned, but even Luo Hang looked at Xie Yunfan in disbelief.
2 bucks, are you serious?
Xie Yunfan had a frank expression: “Small profits but quick turnover, right. With a lower price, more people will download it, which is good for promoting the game.”
Qin Fang said: “This price is indeed too low, it’s refreshed the lowest bottom price for single-player mini-games. Won’t it form toxic competition?”
Luo Hang interjected: “Senior doesn’t need to worry, 2 yuan and 15 yuan aren’t considered toxic competition. The single-player games of other companies can continue to be priced at 15 yuan. Yunfan’s rhythm game doesn’t have that many complex gameplay mechanics, I think players can understand.”
Xie Yunfan glanced at Luo Hang and said: “I think so too. If I price it at 12 or 13 yuan, it will cause an impact on the prices of single-player games. But below 5 yuan is a different track entirely; they won’t follow my train of thought.”
Qin Fang was helpless: “Alright then, it’s your own game, you have independent pricing rights. Let’s talk about the revenue split.”
Xie Yunfan joked: “President Qin, previously the commission Underworld Maze gave to Mobile Games Home was 20%. Watching the 30 million backend gross revenue enter your pocket made my heart ache.”
Qin Fang laughed: “Your game fighting its way out during the winter vacation and becoming the biggest dark horse, even I hadn’t expected it. This time I indeed earned quite a lot of money lying down.”
Xie Xinghe said thick-skinnedly: “President Qin, my younger brother will continue making mobile games next. The subsequent games will also keep going on the Mobile Games Home platform. We’re cooperating long-term, could you give a bit more discount regarding the commission?”
The commission for Mobile Games Home was negotiable.
For some globally published well-known IP games, in order to draw player traffic, Mobile Games Home would lower the commission to 5%, or even waive the commission.
20% was usually aimed at newcomer studios with no publishing channels.
Large companies cooperating long-term weren’t charged this price.
Qin Fang considered it for a moment and said: “Since your Soul of Music is priced so low, I also feel bad taking more. Moreover, you are my junior brother’s friend, and we will cooperate long-term in the future… How about lowering the revenue split for this game to 10%?”
Xie Yunfan said decisively: “Okay, thank you President Qin.”
For the next game, if it could explode in popularity again, they could continue discussing the revenue split then.
With Luo Hang present today, it wasn’t good for him to haggle back and forth with Qin Fang over that bit of money.
10% was also fine, it was acceptable. After all, Mobile Games Home came with its own traffic, saving him too many promotion and distribution expenses!
This meal was eaten quite pleasantly. With a net worth of billions, Qin Fang had no airs at all, and he seemed to have quite a good relationship with Luo Hang.
On the way back, Xie Yunfan asked curiously: “How did you and Qin Fang meet? He’s about eight years older than you, right.”
Luo Hang said: “When I was a freshman, he was already in grad school. Back then there was a very popular online game. We were in the same guild, running dungeons, grinding bosses, and PK-ing in the wild together every day, and slowly got familiar.”
Xie Yunfan understood: “Met in an online game? No wonder.”
Good brothers met in games indeed had deep feelings.
He casually asked: “What game?”
Luo Hang sighed softly, seeming to fall into reminiscence: “A PC client game that was very popular back in the day… the servers shut down long ago.”
PC client games completely declined a few years ago. With not many people playing them, many games helplessly shut down their servers.
For people like Luo Hang and Qin Fang, that was truly the memory of an era.
In the blink of an eye, they arrived at the hotel. Xie Yunfan stopped his steps, turned around, and looked at Luo Hang: “Tomorrow morning, my brother and I are returning to Rong City for the New Year. Are you going straight back to the Imperial Capital?”
Hearing these words, Luo Hang’s heart suddenly felt somewhat reluctant to part.
Parting this time, who knew when they would meet again? He quickly restrained this strange emotion and joked: “Mhm, I’m returning to the Imperial Capital. Remember to release your brother back after the New Year; he’s still the Chief Consultant for the Fighting Master project group.”
Xie Yunfan smiled: “Don’t worry, I’ll let him go back after the holidays. Over on my side, the studio also has to prepare for recruitment.”
Luo Hang asked with concern: “Any ideas for the next game?”
Xie Yunfan said: “With my current strength, I can’t do holographic games, so I’ll make mobile games first. I’ve already thought of the theme, I’ll sort out my train of thought when I get back.”
Luo Hang: “Okay, looking forward to your new game launching.”
The two bid farewell in the hotel lobby.
The next morning, the Xie brothers returned to Rong City together.
At the same time, on the homepage of Mobile Games Home, an extremely conspicuous recommendation slot appeared—
“The champion work of the National College Student Game Design Competition, Soul of Music, is officially open for download. Welcome to the relaxing and casual world of music!”
Many players who opened “Mobile Games Home” were stunned.
In past years, the works from the design competition didn’t launch this quickly, right?
They remembered last year’s work was bought back by Wings of Dream, modified for a month until it became something “its own mother wouldn’t recognize,” and then launched to fleece money.
What was the situation with this year’s champion? The competition just ended a few days ago, and it’s already open for download. Doesn’t it need to be modified?
How was the degree of completion for a university student’s graduation project?
Many people clicked into it curiously, finding that this game was “a one-time buyout paid download, with no extra charging items within the game.”
Single-player game, one-time buyout download—this was very common.
It was just, priced at 2 yuan?
Were their eyes blurry? This pricing was truly something they had lived long enough to see!
Only daring to charge 2 bucks, just how unconfident was this planner? Did he make some garbage and feel too embarrassed to charge too much money?
Many people harboring the thought of “I just have to see how terrible a 2-buck game can be” went and downloaded the game.
Meanwhile, some veteran players who followed Yangfan Studio and the national design competition saw Soul of Music go online and immediately rushed to tell each other on their WeChat Moments.
“Everyone go quickly download Soul of Music, it has the same planner as Underworld Maze and even took the national competition’s championship. The quality definitely won’t be bad!”
“Coming to support the little sailboat’s new game.”
“2 bucks can’t buy you a loss, can’t buy you being swindled!”
“This pricing is too conscientious, it’s almost no different from a free promotion. A cup of milk tea costs over a dozen bucks, yet such a well-crafted game is actually selling for 2 bucks!”
“Does this game not have the Yangfan Studio LOGO hung up? It seems this is the work of Classmate Xie Yunfan. I wonder how the quality is. Anyway, it’s only 2 bucks, buy it and try it out!”
“Has anyone who played it said a few words, is it fun?”
“I’ll download it and try it first, charging ahead!”
The game forums were extremely lively.
At this time, Purple Cauliflower, Brother Liu, and the others also saw the news of this game being listed.
Of course they had watched the entire “Hua Xia Game Award Gala” last night. Seeing Xie Yunfan go on stage to receive awards, everyone was very surprised.
A few days ago at the university student design competition, they had even given scores to Xie Yunfan. Back then, they hadn’t expected at all that this was the chief planner of Underworld Maze whom they appreciated the most.
Xie Yunfan hadn’t exposed his alternate identity at the competition, probably worried that exposing it would directly cause a “dimensionality reduction strike,” leading the competition to lose its fairness.
But even without exposing his identity, the quality of his game was indeed the most outstanding among this batch of students! Soul of Music‘s championship was well-deserved.
The reporters, streamers, and gaming bloggers who participated in the jury that day saw Soul of Music go online and all ran to download it.
When watching Xie Yunfan introduce it at the venue, they had already wanted to play it very much!
Finally able to play it, they hurried to download and take a look.
Charging 2 yuan? Xie Yunfan saying he wanted to promote traditional music seemed to be serious—directly offering a jump-off-a-building price, delivering welfare to single-player gamers.
At 12 noon, in the Blue Fish TV live broadcast room, a gentle melody suddenly rang out. The viewers in the live broadcast room were all a bit confused—
[Brother Liu, what’s the situation, playing music in the live broadcast room?]
[Not broadcasting Ghost Realm today?]
[The music is very beautiful, begging for the track name!]
[High Mountains and Flowing Water or Fishermen Singing into the Night? Can’t tell the difference!]
[This is Three Variations on the Yang Pass Theme! Can you group of music idiots stop spouting nonsense]
[Hahahaha]
After a moment, Brother Liu appeared on camera, saying with a serious face: “Hello everyone, introducing to everyone a rhythm game, Soul of Music!”
“When I went to participate in the university student design competition jury the other day, I heard the game planner’s explanation. The game is indeed made very well, and now it’s officially open for download. Everyone can give it a try.”
“I am also trying out the new game today, continuing to be a lab rat!”
Brother Liu continued: “By the way, this game has the same planner as Underworld Maze. He’s actually a university student! Damn, I truly didn’t expect that.”
Everyone: “???”
Serious? This fresh-styled rhythm game and the horror-styled labyrinth game have the same planner?
Then this planner’s style is quite “ever-changing.”
Many people’s interest was hooked, and they ran over to Mobile Games Home one after another. As soon as they clicked in, they saw the homepage recommendation.
The champion of the university student design competition had an independent promotional banner; Mobile Games Home gave it plenty of face (respect/visibility).
Charging 2 bucks? So cheap! Hurry up and download a wave!
Aside from Brother Liu, there were also some streamers who started broadcasting Soul of Music with titles like “Testing the Waters with a New Game.”
Technical streamers with fast hand speeds attracted eyeballs by continuously combo-ing.
For some complex songs, combos exceeding 3000 triggered a massive string of “6666” flooding the screen in the live broadcast room, and even gift floods.
Meanwhile, some clumsy streamers created comedic effects by continuously missing.
“Damn, I missed another one. Save me, save me, save me, this song is too fast! I’m not a fucking spider, can I even keep up pressing all this?”
“Full combo again! This game has a very strong sense of rhythm, anyone with hands can play it. Thank you boss Sister Dou for the bazooka gift.”
For a time, across different live broadcast platforms, this uniquely styled rhythm game appeared in a massive number of live broadcast rooms.
Some people played the pipa, some people redeemed the guzheng first.
Moe Rabbit didn’t take the usual path, saying with a smile: “I like the erhu old grandfather, exchanging the first Music Soul fragments for the erhu!”
As a result, a tune of Erquan Yingyue (Moon Reflected on Second Spring) paired with a desolate story almost made her cry from listening.
While wiping her snot, Moe Rabbit choked out: “Damn, I actually cried playing a rhythm game! Planner, you simply have no heart!”
A certain restaurant in Demon City.
A girl waiting for a besties’ gathering opened Mobile Games Home out of boredom. Seeing the homepage recommendation, she spent two bucks and downloaded Soul of Music.
After playing a few songs, she found that this game’s sense of rhythm was immensely strong, the combos felt super exhilarating, the operations were fluid, and there were also exquisite instrument codex entries and a rich plot system.
After a moment, her three besties arrived at the restaurant.
Today the few of them had an appointment to eat and watch a movie together. The girl excitedly said: “You guys hurry up and download Soul of Music. This game is so fun, it actually even has an ensemble mode.”
Under her recommendation, the few sisters all downloaded the game.
The girl said: “Come come come, I’ve already unlocked ensembles on my end, I’ll share it with you guys, let’s play a song together to try.”
Everyone added each other as friends. After sharing, a song synchronously appeared on everyone’s phone screens.
Pipa, guzheng, bamboo flute…
The operation interfaces were actually different too?
“Wow damn, this is a bit impressive!”
“An ensemble rhythm game, it’s much more fun than Rock Master.”
“How do you play this game? Quick, teach me.”
“Just tap the notes following the rhythm, come on let’s start!”
The four girls huddled together playing an ensemble.
Someone was clumsy and missed a few, receiving a barrage of output (scolding/complaints) from her sisters. After playing one song, everyone felt they hadn’t had enough and continued to the next one.
They kept playing right up until the food was served.
“This game is quite good for playing at gatherings.”
“Yeah, there’s no threshold either, anyone with hands can play.”
“I’ll research that codex system later!”
In the student group chat of the Imperial Capital Central Conservatory of Music, someone sent a link: “Sharing a fun game, Soul of Music. It’s a rhythm game based on traditional music, made very exquisitely. Everyone can try it out!”
Students studying instruments at the music conservatory had very fast hand speeds and very precise grasps of rhythm. Playing rhythm games was, of course, a piece of cake for them.
Some people downloaded the game out of interest, played a couple of rounds, and found it wasn’t bad!
There were also people earnestly grinding proficiency to watch the plots.
After a while, messages suddenly started flooding the group chat.
“This game has some substance!”
“I study traditional music; you can see the planning team’s emphasis on traditional music. It truly is a rhythm game full of sincerity. Recommended to everyone.”
“There’s actually a plot? I unlocked the story behind the pipa tune House of Flying Daggers, it’s written quite well!”
“That Yu-tier difficulty guzheng solo is so awesome, the speed is too fast, there’s simply no way to combo, my hands are almost cramping from pressing.”
“Is anyone playing the bamboo flute route? Curious about the story later.”
“You guys are progressing this fast? My fragments aren’t even enough to redeem a codex entry.”
“Damn, just saw the WeChat Moments posted by Senior Sister Lin, she cleared all the erhu tunes in one breath!”
“Senior Sister is awesome plus, I’ll go grind the niche konghou.”
The discussions in the group scrolled non-stop, and more and more people participated.
When the previous rhythm game Rock Band launched, everyone only played it for one day before being persuaded to quit by the flashy, colorful special effects gift packs in the cash shop.
This game, however, made people’s eyes light up.
A very exquisite, very fresh rhythm game with fluid gameplay. The anthropomorphic design of the codex entries was also very unique, and those beautiful portraits gave people the urge to keep playing and collect them all.
That night, public opinion on the internet gradually fermented.
WeChat Moments and various game group chats saw the most recommendations for Soul of Music. Streamers broadcasting it also attracted the attention of many people. Coupled with the promotion of a massive number of official media outlets, and the review posts published by gaming bloggers…
By 12 AM that night, Xie Yunfan checked the backend. Soul of Music had only been launched for one short day, yet its downloads had already broken through the 2 million barrier.
Many single-player games couldn’t even reach 2 million in a year.
Soul of Music being able to break through 2 million this fast, the low price was one aspect. On the other hand, the word of mouth for this game was also very good. It wasn’t an 18+ (adult) theme; men, women, old, and young could all download it, and they could also play an ensemble with family and friends.
This game stepping out of the circle (reaching a broader audience beyond its niche) was inevitable. Given a few more days, the downloads could double again. The audience for rhythm games was far larger than that for horror games. For Soul of Music‘s final downloads to surpass Underworld Maze, definitely wouldn’t be a problem.
Of course, with the cheap pricing, its money-making ability definitely wouldn’t match Little Underworld.
Thinking back to the day Underworld Maze launched, the downloads were only a few dozen people. He started from zero, and up to now, he had gradually gained visibility and accumulated some word of mouth. For new game launches, he finally had unpaid promotion helping out.
In over a year’s time, with the convenience of producing games in this world, he had finished Underworld Maze, Ghost Realm, and Soul of Music.
Yesterday he also took two awards, and currently the studio’s account also had deposits of 300 million. But he wasn’t satisfied.
To him, this was only just the beginning!