God Game, Trash Game: Worlds Reversed

"It's simpler than I expected."

"Nothing major, right? We don't really have any big demands on our end either. We used to have a separate advertising manual, but these days… well, our situation isn't exactly great. Just enjoy the game at your own pace. If anything comes up while you're running the ad, feel free to contact me right away, and we'll be monitoring in real time on our side too, so you don't need to worry too much—"

It was a call with the advertising manager.

For all the talk of humiliation and persecution, the sponsorship Nvision had offered was the first ad I'd ever run on my stream.

Naturally, that meant there were things I was looking forward to—and I genuinely wanted to do a good job.

That was why I'd grilled the manager with so many questions. Even if I was going to roast the game, I figured I should at least do the work first. That was just how business worked when money changed hands between people. You had to deliver on what you'd been paid for.

The answers I got back were a little unexpected. When they'd sent the proposal asking me to talk about the good and the bad, it hadn't been empty talk—Nvision genuinely hadn't laid out any particular requirements.

There hadn't even been a detailed briefing. Just a simple message: we won't interfere much, so please just enjoy the game.

Apparently the moment a host starts micromanaging, players ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠can't immerse themselves anymore, or something like that.

They seemed to want this ad to showcase a gamer freely and happily playing Nvision.

That worked out fine for me. Fewer things to stress about was always a plus.

Still, I needed to stay a little tense. My streaming career wasn't that long yet.

They'd apparently valued the fact that I was still new enough that my image hadn't calcified—that I still felt fresh—but I hadn't forgotten how easy it was for something to go wrong if I slipped up.

Yu Sia and Kim Jaejun had already warned me about it several times. Casual streams were one thing, but during an ad, there absolutely could not be any broadcast accidents.

Especially when it came to alcohol—they'd gone so far as to issue a full ban starting the day before, as if they meant to lock it down completely.

Come on. No matter how reckless I am, I'm not going to drink during an ad. A celebratory drink after it was over, maybe. But during the ad itself, I planned to be more clear-headed than ever.

"Kayak, is this your first time playing Nvision?"

"No, I used to play a lot. About… three or four years ago?"

I wasn't bluffing. I really had played a ton. Even if my motives had been a little impure.

Back when Abyss was circling the drain and Nvision was the god-tier PC café king that everyone played. To me, that period still felt like a few months ago rather than a few years.

I'd infiltrated Nvision like an industrial spy, trying to dig out the secrets of the number-one game.

I'd analyzed how Nvision had risen, what its strengths were, what points users found appealing, and passed it all along to Ionix.

If you don't know what you're doing, stop making weird patches and just benchmark them already. Not that Ionix had ever stopped digging itself into holes.

Looking back, it wasn't exactly a beautiful memory… yeah, it was a pretty shitty one.

Still, seeing how completely our positions had flipped now, maybe my efforts hadn't been entirely wasted.

"Three or four years ago…."

As I drifted briefly into nostalgia, a small sigh came through the phone. It had to feel hopeless for the manager too. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠That really had been Nvision's glory days.

"Anyway, we're counting on you. Please save our game the way you saved Abyss!"

"I didn't save Abyss, though…."

The manager's voice was desperate but playful. Half a joke—which meant the other half was serious. His insides had to be burning pretty badly.

He couldn't see it, but I let the corner of my mouth curl up slightly as I answered.

"I'll do my best."

Saturday, around 6:30 p.m. I went live earlier than usual.

Because of the ad. The sponsorship scheduled to start at 7:00 today.

I hadn't told the viewers I was running an ad today, or what it was for.

Part of that was just my personality—I was never great about posting notices—but Nvision hadn't wanted me to either.

Apparently every time they handed streamers ads, they got roasted so hard that they now preferred to run them under the radar.

I couldn't exactly blame them. I'd already watched that same train wreck play out a few times with Abyss. I myself had been the type to throw rocks whenever Abyss wasted money advertising to streamers, telling them to fix the random bugs in the game instead.

But ads weren't completely useless. Right after a sponsorship ran, concurrent player counts always spiked hard—proof that a solid chunk of gamers watched streams.

The problem was that they couldn't hold onto those new users. That was an internal game issue, though. The ads themselves were perfectly capable of pulling in traffic.

And that traffic was arriving right now.

Even though I'd gone live earlier than usual, people started flooding the chat in under five minutes.

It meant the channel had grown enough that viewers would show up no matter when—or how irregularly—I streamed.

A quiet satisfaction settled in as I slowly changed the stream title.

"Ahem. Today's an ad stream. A historic day, really. I have finally received a sponsorship."

The chat started reacting. Because Nvision had once been a god-tier game, there wasn't a single "what game is this?" comment.

I was thinking the response wasn't bad at all when—

"Hey now. Who are you trying to ruin business for? You don't see the 'Ad)' stuck in front of the title? We're playing Nvision today."

"Yeah, I used to play Nvision a bit. I was a Veteran-tier dabbler back in the day."

While I was bantering with chat, my phone buzzed.

The alarm I'd set for 7:00. It was time.

"Alright then—today's game, Nvision. Let's get started. Since this is an ad, please keep the excessive flaming to a minimum. Viewers who stick around until the end will get a coupon code with a special gift. Is it a code that works in Abyss too…? Hey now, our dear friends of the worst game on earth Nvision, you can't say things like that. Of course it's a code for use in Nvision."

Accompanied by Nvision's signature grand BGM, the ad stream began.

"First off, the controls feel weird. Stiff, somehow? I don't remember this being a problem when I played before… was there a silent patch or something?"

"Sniping, smurf accounts, trolling—those problems are pretty serious too. I'm a former Veteran so I can handle it, but if this were some other streamer, they wouldn't even have been able to finish the ad."

"Sword Genius Gloomy Hayden… isn't this concept and skill set basically identical to Lenok's? Oh, Hayden came out three days earlier? Never mind then."

Kayak's ad stream proceeded smoothly.