Chapter 55: Meta Hardware

At the end, there was some content hinting at the mastermind who had organized this match, a conspiracy, and a sequel, but Ras figured very few people would actually check the story while playing this fighting game.

He felt sorry for Aspa, who had worked on it with such enthusiasm and care.

In any case, regardless of the story, defeating the enemies in story mode was quite fun. The artificial intelligence patterns were not especially varied, but thanks to the many skills and variables, they were not easy to read. On top of that, the command system itself was difficult, so the game felt fairly challenging.

However, if one cleared it in a straight line, the playtime was too short, so they added Hard Mode.

It was a mode where players defeated two, three, and at most four enemies in a row, but honestly, even at Meta Soft, few people could clear two.

“Will anyone actually clear this?”

Garazt grabbed his head as he watched his character collapse after taking a Nuclear Punch from Michael Tyson after he transformed into pastor mode. Compared to Kelliper, he had adapted much faster and proudly showed off fairly flashy command skill chains, but even he had limits.

For PC users, this would probably be the extent of the content they enjoyed. But Ras had made this game with the arcade market in mind as well, so they began working on balancing Versus Mode.

The employees paired up in front of keyboards and played the game. Naturally, this was more exciting than Story Mode.

“Ah. Ah!”

Jenny let out a short cry as she watched her Dwarf Michael Tyson fail to properly hit Aspa’s Hyena Beastman and get one-sidedly beaten down.

Then, when the enemy character shook his waist in a strange way while striking a victory pose, Jenny’s plump and gentle-looking face suddenly twisted. Aspa was startled and quickly had to cover his awkwardly smiling face.

In truth, since she had been working on the graphics, she had played less than the other employees, and even now, the graphics team was only trying the game one person at a time in rotation, so it was inevitable that her skills were lacking.

“...Again.”

“Yes...”

But judging by Jenny’s competitive spirit, she seemed likely to catch up quickly.

The employees played while changing partners, and soon, they were able to identify the strongest and weakest characters. Since everyone’s skills were about the same anyway, the differences became even clearer.

“Mayweather is way too broken!”

Perhaps because she had a lot built up, Pana immediately raised her hand and gave her opinion. Most of the other employees nodded as well.

The shoulder roll was admittedly a little broken. After deflecting an attack, the character could unleash a powerful skill with almost no delay, so if it landed a few times, the opponent’s health dropped to the bottom in an instant. As a result, people kept using shoulder roll instead of attacking.

But refusing to attack together was not an option either, because the Mayweather character was on the faster side. If he threw a jab, swayed, threw another jab, and swayed again, the opponent would find themselves unconsciously getting dragged along.

In any case, the balance was off, so they made revisions. Even after that, there were characters that kept becoming stronger or weaker. But that did not mean they were aiming for perfect balance.

As long as the game was not one-sided, that was enough. Perfect balance itself was impossible anyway. Even when using the exact same character, advantages and disadvantages changed depending on standing position.

While they spent over a month adjusting balance, the graphics team continued improving the quality of the backgrounds. In truth, Ras had not paid much attention to backgrounds when playing fighting games in the past, but even he could not help admiring them once he saw the pixel art they created.

There were backgrounds like a seaside, an old castle’s basement, an underground fighting arena, and the peak of an active volcano boiling with lava. They definitely had atmosphere.

As Ras watched the game near completion and saw the team members continuing to test it while huddled close together and pounding on keyboards, he once again thought that they needed to develop a joystick quickly.

Of course, there might not be that much demand right away. But by the time demand appeared, it would already be too late, so he needed to prepare in advance.

Even now, aside from fighting games, there were shooting games and racing games, so if joysticks came out, there would definitely be people who bought them.

However, after forming the arcade repair team, his plan to make joysticks through those people proved unrealistic for the time being. Part of it was because the arcade was doing too well, but more than that, realistically, it was impossible to pull away people who already had assigned duties and use them separately.

So he was already hiring people separately.

“Can you make the control section of an arcade game machine?”

Ras kept asking this question when meeting interviewees. Of course, he did not mention connecting it to a computer. It might have been an insignificant idea, but for now, it was an item Ras was preparing ambitiously, so he kept it confidential.

“Yes... well. I don’t think it would be difficult?”

Perhaps it was not as difficult as he expected. Many applicants from technical high schools grasped the rough concept quickly, even if they did not understand every small detail. Of course, turning theory into reality would take time, but research seemed possible, so Ras first hired three young, inexperienced technicians.

“We’re going to connect this to a computer. Would that be possible?”

After hiring the employees and even having them sign nondisclosure agreements, Ras revealed the idea and sought their advice. The technicians looked slightly deflated, but since it was better than being asked to do something too difficult, they quickly corrected their expressions.

“Yes. We’ll have to take apart the keyboard side and check things first, but it shouldn’t be difficult.”

A young Gnome named Bentum spoke with a confident attitude. Ras was very pleased.

“Good. Then please make a rough concept diagram quickly. I’m planning to apply for a patent first.”

Since it was already something used in arcade games, he did not know whether he could receive a patent just by making it usable on computers. But patent costs were not a major expense for Ras, so he decided to try it first.

The joystick development team, meaning Ras’s third company, which he named Meta Hardware, also cleared out a section upstairs from the office and made a small office there.

“It’s annoying to do construction little by little every time. Ella, just contact the interior company and ask them to clean up this whole place for now.”

“Yeah. Got it.”

Ella checked that there were no other employees nearby, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠then grinned and nodded. By now, she was gradually growing used to secretarial work and had more room to relax. At first, she had only said, “Yes! Yes!” to everything, but now she often checked the mood and answered comfortably like this.

At the same time, seeing her always use formal speech in front of the employees made Ras feel both proud and as if she had become rather sly, leaving him with a slightly complicated feeling. Still, no matter what, she looked cute to him, so he was clearly wearing rose-colored glasses.

In any case, Meta Hardware’s technicians took apart a spare arcade game control board from the arcade and a keyboard, groaned over them as they studied, and within only a few days, they drew up a concept diagram for the joystick.

To Ras, who was an outsider to the field, it seemed like an incredibly difficult task, but apparently, to specialists, it was truly nothing.

“We’ll have to make it first to see if it actually works.”

“Yes. I’ll give you the budget, so make it right away.”

The budget the development team requested was not much, so Ras approved it immediately. Then the development team bought a circuit board from somewhere, soldered something, worked at it quickly, and within a few hours, brought over a test item.

It looked almost like junk, with buttons and a stick roughly attached to a wooden board while the circuit board and wires remained completely exposed, but seeing the thing Ras had imagined actually appear like this felt rather fascinating.

“We made it very simply, but it should work for now.”

A young man named Baros, who had shaggy red hair, an innocent-looking face that gave him a clumsy impression, and only his height going for him, connected the joystick to the computer with an unconfident attitude.

“Oh. It works!”

Ras had no idea why these guys were amazed by something they had made themselves. In any case, he was satisfied when he confirmed that the Tetris block moved sideways whenever he moved the stick and rotated when he pressed the button.

Ras immediately applied for a patent. Then he had them refine the prototype for commercialization. However, Ras had to decide things like the design and basic functions himself.

“Put the stick on the left and eight buttons on the right. Leave enough space between them so there are fewer cases of wobbling or pressing the wrong button. No, I’ll just draw it for you.”

It seemed like nothing special, but the design Ras remembered was the result of many years of trial and error. If he left it to people of this era, some bizarre and unexpected design could come out.

“Yes. Understood. We’ll make it like this.”

In any case, once they received the design, they immediately began detailed drafting, since they had learned drafting as ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠a basic skill.

For the button and joystick standards, they decided to simply use the same ones used in the arcade game industry.

Parts were easy to obtain, and developing them separately would only consume a lot of money and time. It was also because Ras knew that in matters like this, following the standard specification was what survived. He did not know the exact reason why, though.

And the joystick development team brought over the prototype right around the time the fighting game’s development ended and all that remained was giving it a name.

Since the material had not been decided yet, the development team simply made the outer shell out of wood, which was relatively easy to handle. If this were Earth, they might have made it from acrylic sheets, but this world had only just begun using plastic, so it was not easy to obtain, and wood was more common.

But when they connected the completed item to the computer and tried to play a versus match, there was one problem.

“Huh?”

Since it was made by taking apart a keyboard and using ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠it as a base, it had to be plugged into the keyboard port. That meant only one person could play. Ras scratched his forehead, then turned to Bentum, who had brought the joystick to Meta Soft’s office, and spoke.

“Could this be connected through another port?”

“Another port?”

“Hmm. A printer port, I suppose. Could it work through a mouse port too?”

“Hmm. We’ll have to look into that.”

In the end, it seemed they would only be able to play versus matches with joysticks after the game was released. For now, they tried Story Mode and Free Battle Mode with it, and playing with a joystick definitely felt different.

“Everyone, try using it. This is also a kind of test.”

“Yes!”

Ras handed the joystick to Nebrania, who showed interest, as he spoke. This Dryad young woman rather liked the fighting game they had developed this time.

Thanks to that, the quality of the sound going into the game reached a fairly high level.

It felt a little strange. It was different from any fighting game in his memory, but the graphics, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠sound, characters, and system were all high quality. And in reality, it was quite fun. The fact that he had made something like this felt a little hard to believe.

It might sound strange to feel that way now, but perhaps because the graphics looked convincing enough that even compared to his memories, it felt game-like, it finally felt real to him.

Many suggestions came out for the title, but this time, Pana’s was chosen.

“Fighters’ Club?”

“Yes. Honestly, there are a lot of things that make it hard to call it boxing, so I thought we could just call it Fighters, and since it takes place in a secretive place, I used Club. What do you think?”

It was a title he seemed to have heard somewhere before. But that seemed to have been on Earth, not in this world. If so, it did not matter much. And it was much better than something like Dark Boxing, which Garazt had suggested.

Because many of the characters were Beastmen, Ras suddenly remembered a game from Earth he used to enjoy in the past called Altered Beast. Of course, it only felt that way, and aside from the animal-headed characters, there were almost no similarities, but Ras simply gave a faint laugh.

The completed game was immediately delivered to Barbal Soft.