Chapter 73: The Contract and [Iron Reign]
Chapter 73: The Contract and [Iron Reign]
“Did anyone find anything?”
Insu looked around at the team members with slightly bloodshot eyes. The team members also silently rolled their eyes around nervously. Suppressing the urge for the corners of his mouth to rise, Insu asked again.
“We need to be absolutely sure! If we just gloss over things here, everything we’ve done until now could become meaningless! If it’s revealed later that someone found something and stayed quiet about it, that’s breach of trust! Breach of trust!”
Then he glared around at the team members once more.
But even then, everyone merely held their breath without stepping forward.
At that, Insu let out a long sigh and declared:
“Okay. Cleared. Good work, everyone!!”
“Awesome work, team. We made it!”
“Nice job!”
This was the test to confirm that no bugs reappeared after the beta test. They would play for roughly six hours while checking things over. This was not only to find anything they had missed, but also because errors introduced during bug fixing were extremely common, making this kind of review absolutely necessary.
But they had already repeated this process three times, so everyone was suffering from tremendous stress and fatigue.
“Alright. Once we get through the RC build, it’ll be the Gold Master. This is truly the last stretch, so let’s all focus on wrapping things up.”
“Yes!”
Still, just because the team was exhausted did not mean he could let them rest.
Especially since they had already informed the outside world of the development progress through magazines and other media, and the external testing had also revealed that the beta test—which was practically the final stage—was underway.
As a result, gamers were likely expecting the release to happen very soon, causing anticipation to rise to the limit.
Of course, forcing themselves too hard just to meet those expectations could instead become a foolish act that damaged the team’s health or caused burnout, lowering their development capability. Even so, they could not make the gamers wait too long either.
In the end, Insu had no choice but to keep whipping the team onward like an old man leading beginners up a mountain, constantly repeating that there was not much left.
Of course, that was only a metaphor. Insu absolutely did not treat his team members like slaves.
Of course not. They’re colleagues. What kind of slave gets paid this much?
In any case, after barely surviving several more weeks of the slave owner’s harsh exploitation, the team finally completed the Gold Master.
Once TLF2’s completion was announced, someone from Velocity immediately came running over.
“It’s wonderful to meet you again like this!”
For Robert, the mere fact that the sequel to the massive hit TLF had been completed was already good news. On top of that, the development period had not dragged on too long, and the game was releasing while recognition of the previous title was still vivid in people’s minds, making him even happier.
To be honest, Velocity had felt somewhat frustrated during this time.
After all, while they had formed a good relationship with Parallel Soft, they had not managed to make any investments at all. In crude terms, they had no leash whatsoever.
Velocity might have described it as a leash, but they had never intended to yank on it recklessly.
As a game-focused distributor, Velocity understood that games belonged to the realm of creative work, and that simply cracking the whip would not make a studio lay golden eggs on demand.
Still, they wanted to somehow feed it golden feed—or at least nurture it carefully from the sidelines—and cautiously exert influence in whatever way would maximize profits.
Yet despite receiving neither investment nor pressure, these people had faithfully produced golden eggs anyway.
It’d be nice if companies taking investment money worked this hard too.
But then again, perhaps it was precisely because they were a development studio thriving without outside investment that they could achieve these kinds of results.
“You can try it over here.”
“Ah! Yes. Then excuse me.”
In any case, now was the time to determine whether this golden egg was genuine or merely gold-plated on the outside.
[The Land Of Fantasy 2]
Slowly observing the title screen, Robert entered the game. Just like the previous title, after inputting a name, a monologue played. It felt almost identical, yet carried the nuance that this was a descendant of the previous story.
Then he spent some time enjoying the opening section of the game.
What he felt was that it was exactly right.
One of his concerns was that although Parallel Soft had risen to fame through RPGs, they had previously shown behavior such as suddenly releasing a turn-based strategy game. He worried they might make overly experimental attempts. To begin with, TLF1 itself had been filled with all kinds of experimental systems despite its huge success.
But this sequel initially gave clear differences in graphics, sound, characters, skills, and similar areas, while still remaining overall extremely similar to the previous title.
It demonstrated continuity that clearly made it feel like a sequel to TLF.
But if it’s too identical, there are gamers who get disappointed by that too.
Rather than rushing to conclusions, Robert examined the game more carefully.
And after quite some time, the impression that surfaced was that it was sufficiently fresh and experimental.
As expected of Parallel Soft.
It carried multiple meanings.
It was definitely a well-made and enjoyable game. But at the same time, he could not help thinking whether they really needed to include systems like these.
Especially the multiplayer.
It was certainly innovative and fun, but it also looked extremely risky.
It probably wasn’t easy to develop this either.
Even if they had already overcome the development-stage risks by successfully making it, he could still see the possibility of problems arising from needing to continuously maintain the service afterward.
There’ll be technical problems, and costs will keep piling up too. Why go this far?
Even without these systems, it was already a sufficiently fun game, and the previous title’s recognition was extremely strong. It was difficult to understand why they felt the need to take such risks.
Of course, many game developers were eccentrics who created all sorts of systems simply because they thought they would be fun, but from a distributor’s perspective, it naturally became something to worry about.
Still, he did not point it out.
After all, the game was already complete, and unless there was an immediate problem, it was difficult to criticize it merely because issues might appear someday when even Robert himself had enjoyed playing it.
More than anything, the fact that Velocity was not in an absolute superior position in this contract was another reason he had to act cautiously.
“It’s truly an excellent game!”
What he needed to think about now was how to avoid losing it while also preventing them from giving away too much equity.
And this time, they had no means of pressuring the other side at all, so the only option left was persuasion based on the other party’s rationality.
“These are the best terms we can offer from our side.”
It was the same forty percent as MFN.
In truth, raising it further was not completely impossible, but if they cut the headquarters’ profits any more than this, the contract would lose most of its value. So calling it their best offer was not entirely false.
Hyein considered it briefly.
By now, both she and Seongcheol roughly understood how distributors operated and how much profit they kept. Because of that, she also knew that the claim of this being their best offer was not entirely a lie.
There’s no point dragging this out further.
“...Please do your utmost with the marketing.”
“Of course!”
“Then we look forward to working with you.”
The two companies, now quite familiar with one another, finalized the contract very quickly.
Afterward, Hyein and Seongcheol signed contracts with the same distributors in Japan and Korea under similar conditions.
However, they decided to take more time with contracts for China and Europe.
In those two regions, MFN was still actively being distributed, and TLF1 also still felt current.
If this had been the internet era, information about TLF2’s release would have spread rapidly, making this kind of delay difficult. But this was still an age before the world was connected in real time.
“Everyone worked hard.”
Immediately after signing the contract with Velocity, Insu informed the team.
Although they could not completely relax until release, development itself was indeed finished.
Insu decided to send the team on paid vacation in groups of three.
Since Parallel Soft did not receive outside investment, there was not much pressure regarding deadlines, so they had never entered true crunch mode. Even so, they still had internal schedules. Thus, during the latter half of development, they had practically lived on overtime, squeezing themselves dry, so they needed time to recover from the accumulated fatigue.
(Translator’s Note: Crunch mode — A game development term referring to periods of excessive overtime before major milestones such as launch.)
“The remaining personnel will continue with the Gold Master Test until it’s their turn. There’s still a possibility we missed something, so please don’t relax completely.”
“Yes...”
The Korean team members, who had already experienced the Gold Master Test during MFN, answered casually, while the newly hired LA developers answered somewhat more nervously while gauging the atmosphere.
Rather than explaining further, Insu decided to let the two groups naturally understand the situation through conversation.
Normally, no matter how fun a game was, the developers who made it naturally found it difficult to immerse themselves in it.
It’s not impossible, at least.
During the alpha and beta versions before, he had still been able to focus on testing because there was desperation tied to development. But now that even the contract was complete, he simply could not bring himself to touch it anymore.
Even MFN wasn’t this bad.
Even while thinking that he himself had become spoiled, Insu increasingly left the Gold Master Test to the team members while doing other things.
Still, he did not completely stop working and continued staying at the development room. Instead, he often used PC communication, left TLF2 running in the background, or read magazines.
Huh? This...
He was only reading the magazine half out of casual interest, but then one game suddenly grabbed his full attention.
[Iron Reign]
At first, he thought it was simply another new game trying to stir up attention by borrowing names from MFN and Civilization while attaching the grandiose title of “a strategy game for a new era.”
But after reading the article carefully, that was not the case.
The setting itself was clichéd enough: in a sci-fi future during the age of space colonization, five megacorporations fought wars over a mineral called Vortexium.
But the systems implementing it were special.
It’s a real-time strategy simulation.
It was an RTS where units were controlled and fought in real time rather than through turns.
(Translator’s Notes: RTS — Real-Time Strategy, a strategy game genre where players gather resources, build bases, produce units, and command battles in real time.)
In truth, real-time strategy itself had existed for quite a while already.
However, those earlier systems were extremely simple and differed greatly from what gamers usually imagined when they thought of RTS games.
Originally, what imprinted a genre into people’s minds was not the first example, but the greatest one that followed. For the RTS genre most people knew, it would probably be StarCraft.
Before that came Warcraft,Command & Conquer, and Age of Empires.
(Translator’s Notes: Command & Conquer — Real-world RTS game developed by Westwood Studios and released in 1995. It became one of the genre’s first major commercial mega hits and helped popularize live-action video cutscenes in PC strategy games.)
(Translator’s Note: Age of Empires — A historical real-time strategy game series developed by Ensemble Studios, centered on civilization building, warfare, and technological progression across different historical eras.)
(Translator’s Note: Warcraft — A fantasy strategy game franchise developed by Blizzard Entertainment, known for its large-scale faction warfare and influential role in PC gaming and esports.)
And most of those games’ systems had been established by a game called Dune II.
(Translator’s Notes: Dune II — Foundational real-world RTS title that established many conventions of the genre.)
Building structures, gathering resources, producing units, and moving them into battle—that entire sequence of systems.
And in this world, it seemed this game might take on that role instead.
Will this become the Dune II of this world?
In Insu’s previous life, Dune II had not failed completely, but commercially, it also had not achieved overwhelming success.
The developer behind the next game, Warcraft, was the famous Blizzard, but even Warcraft 1 had not achieved truly tremendous success either.
RTS only reached massive commercial success with the next title after that: Command & Conquer (C&C).
(Translator’s Note: Command & Conquer (C&C) — A popular real-time strategy game franchise developed by Westwood Studios, known for its large-scale military warfare and resource management gameplay.)
Insu had no idea how successful this game called Iron Reign would become.
No, he was not even certain whether RTS in this world would solidify around systems like these the same way they had in his previous life, or whether the genre itself could even become popular.
Because this is a different world.
The reason Insu showed such strong interest in this game was partly because it looked like the origin point of RTS in this world, but even more because one of the studios that created the early RTS boom had been Blizzard itself.