"Sorry, the number you have dialed is not in service."
The betrayal of his mentor made John feel an unprecedented sense of loneliness.
So it turns out everything was a lie.
It turns out you didn’t want me to release the game, not to help me refine it, but because you thought... it could make you money.
What hurt John the most about the game that plagiarized the work of him and Catherine’s team was not the act of plagiarism itself.
But the fact that the game was filled with content that induced spending. Even... even the zombies’ skins could be changed through spending money.
If you were a player afraid of blood, you could even change zombies into cute animals through spending.
As long as you had money, you could redefine almost 40% of the game content.
Looking at all this, John desperately sought an answer; he wanted to ask his mentor, why did you do this?
But the only response John received was the repeated message, "the number you have dialed is not in service."
Deep within John’s heart, a vague shadow suddenly emerged.
It turns out this is the world of adults. Leaving the ivory tower, he received his first lesson in society.
At the end of cg08, John was in a bar, completely drunk, but he raised a bottle and said:
"I will not fail! I can definitely create the game I have always dreamed of."
Facing his mentor’s betrayal, the boy who loved games was not defeated.
...
cg09
In the same cramped office, Catherine said:
"John, I want to marry you."
All the companions cheered along, John never expected that Catherine would propose to him.
Catherine said:
"John, I like you. Among all of us, you are the most diligent and hardworking one. I have always liked you since we were kids. You possess a passion and creativity for games that we all lack."
"I know this is our toughest moment, but... I want to tell you in this way that we are a team, we share the same initial aspiration."
"John, will you marry me?"
Such is life, full of ups and downs. John did not expect that after experiencing betrayal, a ray of light would immediately appear to heal him.
At that moment, he looked at Catherine and felt as if he was looking at an angel.
At the end of cg09, John held Catherine and passionately kissed her.
...
cg10.
This scene was very similar to cg06.
Everyone was working hard, everything seemed like a cycle, they seemed to go back to their college days, carrying the purest initial aspiration, starting to create a work truly worth their full efforts.
Doomsday.
Unlike the previous plagiarized version, this time, John achieved personal breakthroughs in technology, creating more innovative designs, and the world view was more complete.
Moreover, the overall art style became increasingly hardcore and realistic.
John’s team had studied the feedback from the plagiarized game’s comment section, where many players expressed that the skins in the game were very out of place.
I’m fighting zombies in the game while other players wear revealing, cool clothes, and all the zombies have faces like they’ve had plastic surgery...
John’s team realized that people needed an immersive, engaging world.
Only a serious theme couplred with a serious game style could truly achieve realism.
Thus, John believed that although his mentor had plagiarized it, constrained by the desire to make money, his mentor didn’t capture the essence!
At the end of cg10, Catherine’s eyes sparkled with excitement. She looked at John, who was passionately creating, firmly believing that this man could bring victory to everyone.
...
cg11.
The live demonstration of "Doomsday" sparked a lot of discussion.
"Wind City’s own AAA game!"
"Look at this texture! Can you believe it was made by a team of eight people?"
"Many zombies in the game have their own past. They say the game has an interesting setting where zombies follow their instincts but perform behaviors that set them apart due to their past obsessions. If you carefully observe some zombies, you can slowly understand their past from their actions!"
"In the game, we play as the savior!"
"The spenders are the saviors, we are just the savior’s sidekicks!"
"Upstairs, this is a single-player game!"
Both the live demonstration and the released first-level demo ignited players’ expectations.
John read the players’ comments and shed tears.
He knew that he hadn’t deviated from the players’ expectations; the game he made was the game players envisioned.
He was eager to see the smiles on players’ faces after the game was released.
But at the end of cg11, one of the team members suddenly received a call from the bank for overdue payments.
At the same time, Catherine had just finished talking with the landlord, who said that if they didn’t pay the rent soon, he would arrange for all the equipment in the house to be thrown out.
John had no idea that the workings of this world were far darker and more brutal than he imagined.
...
cg12. This was a long segment of cg.
Different from the visuals of other cgs, the opening of cg12 was a cold white.
Winter in Wind City comes with snow.
Many couples would build snowmen and have snowball fights in the heavy snowfall. This was the joy of Wind City people in the winter.
But John was not happy. Cg12 was an utter... winter that belonged to John.
In stark contrast, "Doomsday" continued to be a massive hit, skyrocketing in popularity.
Because of the game "Doomsday," there was an overwhelming amount of promotional advertising.