Chapter 129: Spirit Space’s Success

This thing called comments was also quite fun. They were short pieces of writing where people wrote their impressions or thoughts, and unlike an article written straight through by a single author, it was clear that every comment came from a different person. Moreover, the expressions were so raw that they seemed to touch his ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠skin directly.

[Wow. That must be nice.]

It was nothing special as a comment. But once it was posted, Bikta felt amused, as though he had also expressed an opinion and joined the conversation. Some of the comments were quite inventive too, making him laugh despite himself.

How do people even come up with things like this?

And so, after reading the bulletin board posts, he began reading the comments one by one as well, giggling again.

Because of this, his expectations for the remaining content, chat, also grew. Just reading posts on the bulletin board and leaving comments already felt like having an enjoyable conversation, so he wondered how much more fun it would be to talk with several people in real time.

When he entered the chat room, a familiar format greeted him. It looked similar to Spirit Stone’s one-on-one chat.

However, it seemed far busier than one-on-one chat.

<Roleplaying Lover: So I’m telling you, the next game is definitely going to be Land of Adventure 3.>

<Dwarf King: How long has it been since that came out? You’re still waiting?>

<Xyl Addict: Still, it’s the work that opened the origin of role-playing games, so I think it’ll come out someday.>

This definitely felt like people were chattering. It had a different bustle from the bulletin board. But it was also different from talking with words. They were exchanging only refined information through text, without any exclusivity at all, creating a strange feeling he had never experienced before.

Bikta put his hands on the keyboard and thought of a greeting so he could join the conversation, but the other ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠side reacted first.

<Pudaro: Ah! A newbie’s here!>

<Give Me 100 Million Del: Hello.>

<Meat Man: Hello, Spirit Masters and Elves Are Truth.>

Bikta flinched for a moment at the excited atmosphere and the enthusiastic welcome he had never experienced before, then hurriedly tapped on ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the keyboard.

<Spirit Masters and Elves Are Truth: Hello!>

Then greetings appeared one after another below it. However, not everyone reacted. Some people continued talking among themselves, while others reacted in bewildering ways.

<Tryunsi Love Man: Sex! Sex sex sex!!!!>

<Spirit Masters and Elves Are Truth: What? Why sex?>

<Meat Man: Just ignore him. That person’s been doing that since two hours ago.>

<Pudaro: Right. He’s crazy.>

After that, Bikta spent two hours chattering about games. He had never thought of himself as a talkative person normally, but once he entered the chat room, conversation never stopped, as though things to say kept springing up endlessly.

“Huh?”

He was startled when he looked at the clock. Phone fees were so frightening that he had resolved to try it only briefly, but two hours had already passed before he knew it.

<Spirit Masters and Elves Are Truth: I’ll stop here.>

<Pudaro: Huh? Why?>

<Grumbling Gnome: Yes. That’s right. Don’t go! Talk more!>

<Spirit Masters and Elves Are Truth: It’s because of the phone bill... If I get hit by a fee bomb again, I’ll get kicked out of my house.>

<Pudaro: Ah... phone fees.>

<Give Me 100 Million Del: If that’s the reason, there’s no helping it. Ah. But now I’m scared of my phone bill too.>

As Bikta left the chat room, he thought about it. Just what kind of person was that guy who kept shouting “sex” while paying these expensive phone fees?

<Tryunsi Love Man: Sex!>

The reaction to Spirit Space was not bad. Since it was general software rather than a game, sales were not explosive, but among those who purchased it, everyone seemed satisfied.

This could be seen through articles in Gamers, but it was even more obvious from the server status.

There were many users connected, and their connection times were long. This was despite the fact that most of them were likely connecting through telephone networks, since the magical connector had not yet been released.

Ras was encouraged by this success.

Just because a business succeeded on Earth did not mean it would succeed here. He had also worried in his own way about whether it would sell well when it was not game software, and whether the people who bought it would complain that it was not a game.

However, it succeeded without issue. In fact, even on Earth, PC communication took quite some time to settle in, but Spirit Space could be considered a success almost immediately after release.

This should probably be attributed less to the content Ras provided and more to the reliability and loyal consumers that the company Meta Soft already possessed.

In any case, since it was true that it succeeded, Ras decided to release additional content. After all, iron had to be struck while it was hot.

The content Ras released was something also proven on Earth: “novels.”

Of course, there were many other types of content proven on Earth as well. But novels were text-only content that could be easily exchanged even under the current poor communication environment, and unlike MUG games and the like, they were easy to introduce, so he chose them as the first start.

On Earth, this kind of content probably began naturally in communities created by users, but instead of waiting for that, Ras decided to hold a contest.

“We’ll create a bulletin board and give serialization fees and publishing opportunities to several works with high view counts.”

Since it was free serialization, he did not intend to pay a large amount of money, but for people writing as a hobby, it would be a sufficient reward. And for those aiming to become professionals, a publishing opportunity would be quite tempting, so he expected they could attract enough participants.

“Yes. Understood.”

The owl-headed woman with large glasses answered while writing down Ras’s instructions. She was the team leader of the newly established Spirit Space Team.

Her name was Giselle, and she was scheduled to become its president once it spun off soon. She was originally a talented member of the Server Management Team, and she became team leader through Persple’s recommendation. That alone showed how capable she was.

In any case, Ras promoted this contest through various media, including Spirit Space and Gamers. The reaction was not bad.

No, it was enthusiastic.

<Kadario’s Sorrow: It’s a contest!>

<History Novel Lover: They said they’ll give official serialization?>

<Born as Charcoal: More importantly, they said they’ll publish it outright.>

The community on Spirit Space was fun enough, but it still had a strong feeling of something that happened only inside a virtual space. When an event connected to reality took place, it seemed to grant Spirit Space a sense of reality.

Also, most people who wrote novels as a hobby had dreams of becoming novelists, but at the time, there were too many difficult real-world obstacles besides writing skill before actual publication, so they had given up and only enjoyed it as a hobby. Now that simply serializing could bring them that opportunity, they had no choice but to be excited.

Thanks to that, everyone began writing, and the amount of server data began exploding.

Still, it was only text, and Ras had anticipated this reaction and expanded the servers considerably, so no particular problem occurred. No, before that, they had greatly increased capacity because of the magical connector incident, so it was almost impossible for novels to make the servers burst.

In any case, for those using Spirit Space, an atmosphere close to a festival unfolded.

An enormous number of novels began appearing every day, so there was an overflowing amount to read. Of course, most of them were low in quality. But among them, there were certainly fun works, and when those became topics of discussion, that itself became enjoyable content.

People began chatting about those works.

And once this contest opened, people other than Spirit Stone players also began flowing in. Some liked novels, and since debuting—or rather, publishing—was extremely difficult in this world, aspiring writers who had never had such an opportunity began entering to aim for it.

To avoid missing this flow, Ras added hobby boards and strengthened the community functions.

“Clubs?”

“Yes. Simply participating on each bulletin board will create a sense of belonging, but even within that, people will want to gather with like-minded people.”

It was a system that grouped such people into teams, like guilds in online games. It might seem insignificant, but later, there would definitely be people who wanted to meet and participate in activities outside Spirit Space as well. At that time, this club function would support that.

And naturally, it would expand Spirit Space beyond online space into reality. Currently, most Spirit Space users were still gamers, so this kind of expansion was necessary to draw in people outside that group.

That did not mean he intended to neglect gamers by treating them as fish already caught.

He had also thought of content for them. It was a MUD game. Ras was not from that generation, so he did not know much about it, but from what he had read online before, MUD games were one of the main reasons people paid huge information usage fees for PC communication.

(Translator’s Note: MUD game — Multi-User Dungeon; a text-based online multiplayer game common in early PC communication and internet culture, where users explored, fought, and interacted through written commands.)

PC communication had to keep people connected as long as possible to receive more fees, and bulletin boards and chat rooms naturally had limits.

If it were up to him, he wanted to make a proper graphical online game, a MUG, but everything had its order. Also, with the current computer specifications and network environment, it was impossible anyway.

(Translator’s Note: MUG — Multi-User Graphic game; a graphical online multiplayer game concept, contrasted here with text-based MUDs.)

There might be some possibility after the magical connector became fully widespread.

Even so, he had already begun preparing a game aimed at that time. It was the game Development Team 1 would make this time.

Originally, it was not a game he planned to focus on online features for, but the flow had turned out this way.

“A sports game?”

Garazt reacted somewhat negatively when Ras wrote baseball as the subject.

It was not his preference, and many sports games usually sold weak gameplay by relying on the topicality of their subject matter, so it was not the kind of game he particularly wanted to make.

Of course, since they had made things like Fighters’ Club before, he did not completely reject it either.

“Yes. I played a baseball game on Talados before, and at that time, I thought I should make a baseball game too. I think the title was Baseball. Has anyone here played it?”

This was a fairly old plan.

The baseball game he played back then had been so sloppy, and he had also wanted to make a sports game in a slightly different direction, so he decided he would make one someday. But there were many things he wanted to make, so it kept being pushed back until he finally started now.

“...”

It did not seem to be ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠a popular game, since none of the development staff appeared to know it. Then again, Talados had been mass-producing sports games at the time, so each individual game had left a weak impression.

“In any case, the game we’ll make this time will use baseball as its subject, but it will be a little different from previous games.”

At this, some people thought of Fighters’ Club and wondered if it might be a fighting game, perhaps hitting people’s heads with bats instead of balls or throwing balls as ranged attacks.

That kind of bizarre direction could not be called completely bad, but that was not it.

“Most sports games until now have been made in a direction where the player takes the role of an athlete.”

However, among Earth’s sports games, there were also games where the player took on roles other than an athlete. What Ras had in mind was a management game like Professional Baseball Manager or Football Manager.

“Ah... So the player becomes a team owner or manager?”

Aspa reacted with great interest. There were more people who wanted to become star sports players, but among people who liked sports, there were also quite a few who wanted to become team owners.

Because of that, before even entering the full game content, the subject of becoming a team owner itself was already quite interesting. Seeing Aspa’s reaction, Ras briefly wondered whether “Become a Team Owner!” might work as the game’s catchphrase.