Raising Sim: Queen of Maryland Maker (1)
Investment and distribution: Riana. Scenario planning: Dante. Data analysis: Rin.
The production of Queen of Maryland Maker was greenlit after a meeting with our four key planners—myself included.
"Unlike last time, we won't need a ton of detail here. Just nail the NPC modeling, and we're good."
The space available in a miniaturized cube was about the size of a mid-sized village.
So instead of packing in dense buildings like Dead Wizard's City, we'd center everything around a "housing system"—starting with the protagonist and daughter's humble shack, then slowly expanding the home.
Limit movement to just the village, add in visitors dropping by, and implement only the essentials like the great hall in the palace for festivals or the ending. Use the space thriftily.
No need for massive volume.
We'd considered multiple playthroughs for Dead Wizard's City too, but for something like Queen of Maryland Maker, the standard was to build in failure for the first run from the get-go.
Everyone's botched a job ending because parameters got screwed, or raised their kid perfectly only for her to marry some random Village Youth A, right?
Even the pseudo-incest ending or becoming the demon lord—those are trickier to unlock than you'd think.
Time to dive into full planning.
"We can repurpose assets from the Philemon Academy and the outskirts of the sanctuary in Dead Wizard's City."
"Endings are the crux. What's your vision?"
"Fifteen job endings, five evaluation endings, and five marriage endings."
"Eugene, Dante—no bad endings this time. Got it!?"
"...But it's Princess Maker. You've gotta include the Night Queen and brothel endings."
"What kind of dad would accept his daughter heading into a brothel ending? Unless you wanna get lynched, drop it!"
"Hmm... Then how about just the Night Queen, Sir Eugene? She's still a queen, right?"
"You people and your bad-ending obsession..."
"Honestly, bad endings are a challenge in themselves. If it's all sunshine and rainbows, players have nothing to rage about."
The alpha and omega of Queen of Maryland Maker: endings and their cutscenes.
"For base stats, let's go with intelligence, stamina, charm, morality, affection, and stress."
"Wouldn't it be better to add faith separately from morality? You were planning religion endings, right?"
"Yeah, lumping morality and faith together could draw major complaints from the Holy Dominion. Even a toothless tiger's not worth poking."
"Religion's the scariest, for sure... Okay, faith it is!"
"Evaluation categories based on stats: combat skills, magic skills, alchemy, arts, monster slaying, and public reputation. Most intuitive."
"Rin, you’ve got a real knack for planning, huh...?"
"No, it's just Dante filling me in on everything..."
"Couple goals, boo hoo."
We wrapped up detailed stats and raising methods too.
But the hottest debate was over "characters."
The daughter would have the most interactions with the player, NPCs included.
No matter how solid the systems, if she wasn't charming enough, it was all for nothing.
"What if we use Mebitai tests to spawn different character models?"
"Ooh... That'd eat up a shitload of storage, though."
"Better to fix the modeling. Personality might not split opinions, but looks will. Then people'd fake their traits."
"Yeah, that'd make it more immersive anyway."
"What about the face?"
"Just grab the five hottest women in the empire, mash 'em together—boom, universal beauty."
"Hmm... Guess my face goes in too then."
"No Riana."
"Whaaat!?"
"No means no."
Having launched one game already, development went surprisingly smoothly.
Of course, we still needed a limited external combat system, so it wasn't whipped up in a few days. Compared to my past-life coding marathons, it was lightning-fast—but time was still required.
The first dimension game, Count Lancaster's Reaper, took about a month.
Next, Dementia: Lost Memories reused those assets and clocked in at two weeks.
The massive RPG Dead Wizard's City ate up three months plus a week.
For Queen of Maryland Maker, we budgeted a generous month.
As the council dragged on, mages flooded the library for Dead Wizard's City demos.
We fine-tuned the daughter's models and motions from infancy through adulthood—facial capture for realistic expressions—while grilling Eaton Charleston (a real dad) and item modeler Hinkel on childcare.
Before we knew it, launch day loomed.
"Eugene, here's the first batch production. We'll iterate on performance, so how's this for starters?"
Master Arkisiya's cube miniaturization wrapped up right on time: 150 Gaming Cubes ready for market.
"Perfect, Master! Let's launch for real starting tomorrow."
"Excellent. I'm looking forward to the reaction."
Time to make some money.
Hakon Barony Red Tower branch chief, 5-circle mage Naberone, bolted straight to the Central Magic Library the moment the Magic Council ended.
To try the still-red-hot Dead Wizard's City that had rocked the entire council.
But he'd overlooked one thing.
The insane line.
"Ah, Dead Wizard's City currently has a waitlist. About 210 ahead of you, Naberone sir—so roughly four days to play."
"What?! Four days?! I need to be back in two at latest...!!"
"Sorry, everyone else is waiting too. Even the capital Red Tower vice-master. We've maxed time-sync inside the cube—one real hour equals 24 hours in-game—and it's still like this."
"Gods, every mage in the world must be here... Any chance extra gold jumps the line?"
"No extras accepted. We're swamped just managing the current queue."
"Sigh..."
His despair was short-lived.
The black-haired librarian, Eugene Paltrow, flashed a grin and—
"Hmm... If you're that desperate, we've got a new magic tool fresh from development."
He pulled a tiny cube from under the shelf.
"What's this?"
"Officially, it's a Gaming Cube. Made solely for running 'games.'"
Smooth black surface, faintly pulsing mana.
No need for 6-circle to gauge it—even a 5-circle like him could tell its worth.
"Not Dead Wizard's City, but it packs a brand-new game never seen before."
Eugene whispered like a back-alley artifact dealer, low and grave.
"Never seen before... brand-new...!!!"
Disappointment flipped to excitement in a blink.
"Plus mana-imprint: only you can use it. A Gaming Cube just for Naberone sir. Interested...?"
"Sold. How much?"
He shoved a gold pouch over before Eugene finished.
Eugene grinned like a merchant, not a mage.
"Aigoo, Red Tower folk sure are generous. List price: 15 gold. Just infuse your mana to imprint."
"Cheaper than I thought. Thanks. What's the fancy box?"
"Carrying pouch, manual, game catalog. Full set, plus a two-year repair/upgrade warranty inside."
"Whoa... You give all this away? What's the library get?"
"Haha, you guys, obviously."
"Hohoho... A man who knows his business. I'll recommend this Gaming Cube to all my friends!"
"Please do. It's still a prototype—needs the word-of-mouth."
Naberone left beaming, cube and box tucked away.
Soon after...
Strange postings began appearing on the request bulletin boards at the base of every magic tower in the capital.