Chapter 31: Stabilization of the Team
Chapter 31: Stabilization of the Team
It had been about half a month since the development team was assembled. At first, there was definitely some awkwardness, but things stabilized faster than expected.
Insu thought it settled down naturally over time, but in reality, a large part of it came from easing the team members’ anxieties.
After all, it was impossible not to feel uneasy when the development team’s leader was a first-grade Gukminhakgyo kid.
Even Park Yoonsu, who joined after being captivated by Insu’s genius, wasn’t completely free of that feeling.
But the next project was already prepared, and Insu, the team leader, assigned tasks and kept development moving without much fumbling or leaving anyone idle. As the team members gradually focused more on their work, they began to feel that this team was genuinely developing a game.
“It’s only because computer specs still have limitations right now and gamers aren’t used to overly complicated systems yet that we’re making separate games. Later on, though, I’m going to merge it with RPGs into one.”
“Then would that become The Land Of Fantasy 2?”
It was break time in the middle of work, a pause that existed entirely because Noona Eunha loved snacks too much. Yoo Juyeon asked the question, the dark circles under his eyes shining brightly. He already revealed it in his job application, but he was someone who applied to this company because of The Land Of Fantasy.
“I’m not sure about that yet. It could become 2, or we might jump straight into MMORPGs.”
Insu occasionally talked about his vision like this, and it was also one of the factors that helped the team members forget his childish appearance and focus on development.
In truth, a vision like this could easily be dismissed as a child’s fantasy. But Insu already proved himself with results, and his vision was highly systematic and clear.
That was why it looked less like delusion and more like the perspective of a genius.
As the development team stabilized and their capabilities improved, Insu’s expectations gradually lowered to match reality.
At first, his expectations were too high.
Unlike when he first began developing games in his previous life while still inexperienced, Insu was now at a level where he could practically develop an entire game almost by himself. But he hadn’t fully realized just how much he improved as a developer.
Because of that, he unconsciously expected the team members to perform at his level.
But aside from Yoonsu, the others had no practical experience yet. There was no way they could possess that kind of ability. After experiencing reality firsthand over several days, he finally realized it.
On top of that, coordinating with other people also came with energy and efficiency losses during the process of building and operating an organization, so development capability did not increase in exact proportion to the number of people involved.
As he became more grounded in reality, he was finally able to properly feel the effects of having a team.
Having a team really does make development much faster.
It felt more than twice as fast compared to developing alone.
Of course, considering the cost of facilities, including computers, and the salaries for three employees, he couldn’t say he felt no regret about the efficiency. But considering that he now spent half the day away after starting school, and that he no longer had to personally handle every single aspect of development from start to finish, forming a team still felt worthwhile.
At this speed, maybe around four months until the prototype?
The system itself was fairly complex, but most of it boiled down to numerical calculations, and the combat portion, which involved the largest workload, was heavily simplified. So for a simulation game, it wasn’t actually that demanding in terms of development resources.
But he was reconsidering the combat section again.
“I don’t think completely skipping it through logs alone is the right approach after all.”
That was what Lee Suhyeon cautiously brought up during the regular Monday meeting.
Although development started with everything already planned out by Insu, that didn’t mean he refused to hear opinions entirely.
It wasn’t because Insu particularly liked democratic procedures.
Rather, he believed that reflecting even a small amount of this era’s gamer opinions would help the game succeed. And because he had the life experience of his previous incarnation, he already understood that achieving better results required listening to other people’s opinions to some extent.
If he possessed absolute confidence in himself, Insu might have become a dictator too.
Even now, although he listened carefully, the corners of his mouth unconsciously twisted like a duck’s beak.
“I also think not showing combat at all is a bit too much.”
Yoonsu agreed with Lee Suhyeon.
“Like you said, Team Leader, repeated combat may lose meaning later in the game and become boring. But for gamers to stay immersed, there needs to be at least some level of interaction and visual feedback.”
Insu was already thinking along similar lines when he came up with the dice system and commander intervention mechanics, but apparently that still looked insufficient.
“Do you have any ideas?”
If someone opposed an idea, they needed an alternative. And Yoonsu didn’t seem like the type to criticize others for no reason.
As if he waited for the opportunity, he smiled slightly and began speaking.
“What I’m thinking of is a real-time auto-battle system.”
Listening to the explanation, the idea was to add graphics to the original log-only concept. Instead of detailed controls, players would issue commands like advance, retreat, or flank left and right, allowing movements to be understood at a glance.
Romance of the Three Kingdoms? No, I think I saw something similar in Japanese turn-based strategy games too.
Insu recalled games he played in his previous life. It seemed people’s ideas were ultimately similar.
But the problem was that those games weren’t particularly successful, making it hard to call the system truly effective.
“If repeated combat becomes tiring, we could include an option that skips the graphics and displays only logs. That should reduce the monotony of late-game play.”
Yoonsu spoke confidently, but although Insu didn’t reject the idea outright, his reaction was weak and his expression ambiguous.
Because of that, Yoonsu soon closed his mouth and stepped back.
Silence briefly settled over the meeting room.
Is there really no sharp solution?
For a moment, Insu even considered real-time battles like StarCraft. But while that might feel fresh temporarily, it would still eventually become repetitive and boring, so it failed to solve the core issue.
(Translator’s Note: StarCraft — A highly influential sci-fi real-time strategy game developed by Blizzard Entertainment and released in 1998, especially popular in South Korea’s esports scene.)
And there was something similar in my previous life too, wasn’t there? Aman Jeonsa-rok or something?
It was a Korean game. He enjoyed it quite a bit, but it was difficult to say it was commercially successful.
Just as the meeting seemed about to end on an uncomfortable note, Yoo Juyeon cautiously raised his hand.
“Ah! Yes, please speak.”
After briefly gauging everyone’s reactions, he spoke.
“Why don’t we just use The Land Of Fantasy’s combat system?”
Insu instinctively thought the genres were different, but after shutting his mouth and thinking again, the idea actually sounded plausible.
Grid-based turn systems are used in both RPGs and turn-based strategy games anyway, aren’t they?
The reason Insu used position-based turn combat in the first place was to eliminate the complexity and tedium of grid-based systems, so it seemed possible to apply it to strategy simulations as well.
“I think that sounds pretty good.”
Yoonsu also thought for a moment before agreeing, though his expression remained sullen.
This position-based turn combat system definitely contained a lot of strategic depth, so there was potential for representing warfare to some extent.
Suddenly, Insu thought of the classic turn-based game Heroes of Might and Magic.
Of course, that game used grid-based turn combat, making it different from the currently proposed position-based system.
But the fact that its battlefields were extremely compact provided justification in Insu’s mind for compressing battlefields into a position-based turn combat format.
Was I trapped in a fixed mindset?
Thinking about it again, perhaps because he was East Asian, he unconsciously imagined war only in terms of massive Romance of the Three Kingdoms-style battles.
That was why his thought process leaned toward simply omitting the battlefield entirely if he couldn’t fully recreate it. But the game currently in development, while set in a fictional world, had a background similar to medieval Europe.
And if I make units like in Heroes, where the HP represents troop count within the same unit type, I could probably implement battlefields without much trouble.
Furthermore, this combat method would also make implementing auto-battle systems easy. Characters didn’t move, and the field size was small, meaning the range of choices was limited.
Of course, players could still think carefully about maximizing efficiency within those limited options. But unlike grid-based systems, absurd situations like units wandering off into nonsensical positions wouldn’t occur.
That meant even simple AI patterns could guarantee a decent baseline performance.
Afterward, Insu reorganized those ideas into a revised design document and showed it to the team members, and it was accepted without much resistance.
As expected of a genius!
No, it was closer to praise than simple acceptance.
Yoonsu especially became even more amazed by Insu’s abilities.
The reason Insu could immediately produce such a refined system was because of memories from the future, but since Yoonsu had no way of knowing that, he could only see Insu as a genius.
After that, the overall framework of the planning remained intact, but small changes continued appearing little by little.
That made Insu both uneasy and pleased.
In other words, while there was a possibility the planning could lose focus and become a mess, at the same time, it genuinely felt like things were improving.
In this way, Insu gradually became accustomed both to school and to the development team.
Before he knew it, a month had passed since he became a Gukminhakgyo student, and April arrived.
And four months had already passed since the release of The Land Of Fantasy, yet its popularity still hadn’t faded.
[Deposit: Hyundai Soft ₩41,648,000]
3,425 copies? That’s right, isn’t it?
Sales actually increased compared to the previous month.
Normally, the first three months were the key sales period, and afterward, once the initial customer base became saturated, sales gradually declined.
Works that broke that pattern became hit titles and blockbuster successes.
At this point, The Land Of Fantasy could already be considered part of that category.
But instead of cheering at the money, Insu felt relieved.
Even though it looked like a huge amount, after taxes and the costs of operating the development team were deducted, well over ten million won disappeared immediately in large chunks.
Of course, there was still a lot left over, but no matter how successful a game was, this kind of revenue could not realistically continue for many more months.
Meanwhile, nearly five million won per month would continue going out just to maintain the development team.
So rather than feeling like he became rich, it felt more accurate to say he secured operating funds for the development team.
Well, things would change if overseas money starts coming in.
That was still months away and remained an uncertain future, so for now he decided to focus only on what was certain.
And from another perspective, domestic sales alone were already enough to keep the development team running stably until the release of the next game, which was reason enough for Insu to feel relieved.
Insu looked once more at the money displayed in the bank account.
Part of it was probably because The Land Of Fantasy became popular, but it was also likely due to the rapidly increasing spread of computers across the country.
Even in Insu’s own classroom at school, he heard kids talking about buying computers.
It still seemed like a very small minority, but if parents were willing to buy computers even for children who probably couldn’t properly use them yet, the actual rate of computer adoption was likely far more dramatic.
It felt as though the era itself was moving forward.
Insu felt his motivation burn even stronger.
What Insu hadn’t realized, however, was that another major reason The Land Of Fantasy continued retaining its popularity was that no competing game had yet appeared to replace it.
A game that combined advanced future-era systems, polished completion quality, and Insu’s creativity was overwhelmingly unique by contemporary standards.
Of course, when something good appeared, people inevitably tried to imitate it.
But because the quality was so high and the systems were so sophisticated, even copying it required time.
Most likely, The Land Of Fantasy would maintain its position for at least another year.
And in reality, even two months later, by June, the sales figures still held steady.