Absolutely No Way! This Collaboration Is a No-Go!
Collaboration!
For a mobile game, it’s one of the great pleasures you can’t afford to miss.
There are basically two kinds of collabs.
Collaborating with another work.
Or teaming up with food, clothing brands, amusement parks, and the like!
And from that perspective, the collaboration proposal that had landed in my business email was firmly the latter.
Come to think of it, Galaxy Train had only just opened, so a collab with another work would’ve been a little awkward anyway, right?
“You’re not seriously telling me this was planned in earnest, are you?”
Anyway! The collaboration proposal I’d received yesterday had been so shocking that today I’d called Chief Secretary Lee Eunbyul over to my house to talk it through.
“We prepared it with the utmost care, Seah, young lady.”
“Th... this?”
I held up the proposal Elodie had printed so neatly for me and gave it a shake.
Honestly, I’m not some brilliant genius.
I’m freeloading off Kwon Seah’s life after originally being a man, so I really shouldn’t want to act like this...!
No, this is wrong. This is way too wrong! It’s way too awful!
“Is this for real? ‘Seré’s Crispy Potato Chips,’ ‘Brunhilde’s Sweet-and-Tangy Cola’?”
This is seriously such a shameless collab.
Can you even call this a collaboration in the first place?
They just took existing chips and cola and changed the outer packaging!
“If we put this out as-is, wouldn’t people treat it like a total joke and, like, three years from now it ends up in a YouTube Shorts video called ‘Top 3 Most Half-Assed Collabs in Gaming History’?”
“Er... I’m aware of that, yes.”
“Chief Secretary Lee Eunbyul... this just isn’t it. Look at this! Seré’s Crispy Potato Chips are just—this really is just an existing snack with different packaging, right? It even says so in the proposal.”
[No additional expenditure is expected beyond changes to the packaging design.]
[The anticipated increase in sales is 3%...]
If you’re doing a collab product, shouldn’t you at least try changing the seasoning on the chips or something?
Trying to get away with this by blatantly swapping only the packaging is just too much~~!
“And this design printed on the package. You just took the official art and slapped it on there, didn’t you? What is thissss? It’s not just lazy—it looks completely out of place.”
“I’m sorry, young lady.”
“And lastly, this cola... who even drinks plain carbonated soda these days? If you’re going to make it, shouldn’t it be zero sugar?”
“Ah, we were told zero-sugar drinks are still seeing rising sales, so there wasn’t much need for a collaboration there.”
Oh, my head.
And the cola didn’t even seem like it had changed in taste at all.
“If you release this as-is, people are going to call it a scam.”
“...I did expect that, but realistically there are so few companies that want to pursue a collaboration with the Galaxy Train IP that this proposal was the limit.”
“So this is it, then. The best of the best from the companies that want to do something with Galaxy Train?”
Chief Secretary Lee Eunbyul gave a bitter smile.
“No... but even though Galaxy Train hit number one in sales and has been spending money on ads like crazy, it’s still like that?”
“It seems that because it’s a new IP with no precedent, they’re taking a conservative approach.”
Was this really the best they could do?
Just slapping some packaging on trash chips and cola like that?
“Th...”
No wayyyy!
Who would like this kind of collab?!
This was even worse than those “anime collabs that nobody likes except middle-aged office guys in their thirties and forties”!
“Ah... no, no, no, no, no. Absolutely not! I can’t accept this kind of collaboration!”
I grabbed the proposal and tore it clean in half.
“Chief Secretary Lee Eunbyul! If I find a company that wants to collaborate with Galaxy Train, can you arrange everything accordingly?”
After all, I was Kwon Seah, the youngest daughter of a chaebol family.
If it was connections I needed, I had them.
“Pardon? Ah... of course, young lady. In fact, quite a variety of ideas came up in the early stages of the proposal.”
“So if I just find the company, it can be made real?”
“Of course. It would also be possible to commercialize your ideas exactly as they are.”
Good, good. So it was possible, then.
“Then, Chief Secretary Lee Eunbyul, what kind of companies do you think I could collaborate with?”
“Ah... ...”
The secretary gave a wry smile, looking truly trapped.
“Right, if our Chief Secretary Lee Eunbyul had thought of any companies, she would’ve made an extra page and shown me a list, wouldn’t she?”
After all, Chief Secretary Lee Eunbyul wasn’t really Kwon Seah’s secretary.
She had been my mother’s secretary.
Which meant she wasn’t someone who would know every last detail of Kwon Seah’s personal connections or all the resources available to her.
She hadn’t even been entrusted with that in the first place, so how would she know everything?
“How about Elodie?”
“Ah... I don’t know everyone the young lady meets, either personally or in business.”
That made sense too.
Honestly, it didn’t seem like Kwon Seah—who had even been taking antidepressants—would have calmly told Elodie every single thing she did, from dawn to dusk.
“Hmmmmm... I think this is the way.”
My mind immediately went to Kwon Siyoung.
Kwon Seah’s cousin older sister was an incredibly bright, bubbly person.
A perfect social butterfly, you could say. She was such a good sister that she even bought me bags and meat because she was worried I’d hole up at home and do something weird.
If it was her, she might not know all of Kwon Seah’s connections, but surely she knew at least some of them.
“I’ll make a phone call.”
I couldn’t let my favorite game get stuck with a garbage, half-assed collab.
* * *
The world really was all about school ties, local ties, and family ties.
Kwon Siyoung was thrilled that, for once, I’d called instead of texting.
We had to make small talk for a full hour, but the result was astonishing.
“Is this really okay, Siyoung unnie?”
“Of course it is. Jinsoo ajusshi is our sixth cousin, after all.”
“Uh...”
When I made a blank face, Kwon Siyoung snorted and poked my chest with her elbow.
“You really don’t remember anything, do you? You seriously don’t remember Jinsoo ajusshi? He’s our sixth cousin, twenty years older than us? The grandson of our great-grandfather’s older brother, remember?”
How would I know that?
“Ugh... I don’t remember anything at all, so what am I supposed to do?”
“It’s fine. We only ever saw him once in a while during Lunar New Year or Chuseok anyway.”
“Is it really okay to ask that kind of favor from someone like him?”
“Of course. You’re not here to ask him to lend you a billion won so you can suddenly start a business, are you?”
While we were chatting, the door to the room opened, and a man who looked to be in his mid-forties came in smiling, just as Kwon Siyoung had said he would.
“It’s been a while! Jinsoo ajusshi! How have you been?”
“Well, look who it is? Siyoung and Seah, right? I heard all about it. Come on in.”
Kwon Seah’s sixth-cousin uncle, Kwon Jinsoo, smiled with a warm, easygoing expression.
He was the president of Hanseong Foods.
“I’ve been so busy lately, I hadn’t even heard our Seah was looking to collaborate, hahaha!”
“Ah, no, it’s okay. I didn’t exactly reach out under my own name either—I made the proposal under the name of Hanseong Lifestyle, right?”
“Haha, right. Our secretary must not have recognized it, then.”
Jinsoo ajusshi actually seemed like a really nice guy.
And just as Kwon Siyoung had said, he also seemed interested in the collaboration business I wanted to do.
“I’m sorry to bring up work right after meeting you after so long.”
“Haha, Seah. What kind of family are we, anyway? We’re the kind that lives off work, aren’t we? You’re not asking to borrow money—you came with a decent business idea, so this old man welcomes you.”
“Then could you take a look at this proposal?”
The secretary standing behind Kwon Jinsoo quickly handed over his glasses and the documents I’d printed out.
“Hmm... collaboration? That’s the sort of thing that really sells these days.”
First impression: approved.
“Products... yes, convenience store bread? Low-end... premium... this is pretty good.”
“Th... you remember too, right, ajusshi? A long time ago, I mean. It was, like, over fifteen years ago now, but Pokémon bread got insanely popular and ended up all over the news, remember?”
“Haha, yes, it did. It was wildly popular. My father laughed so hard he nearly split his face in two. People were so worked up about collecting stickers without even eating the bread.”
The proposal I’d made with Chief Secretary Lee Eunbyul seemed to be landing better than I expected.
“It’s a better idea than I thought. Though there do seem to be a few things to revise.”
“Ah, please tell me!”
“First, while we can release four new convenience store breads as you want, we can’t make all of them taste completely different.”
“Then how far can we go?”
Kwon Jinsoo stroked his chin.
“I think we’d have to actually move into development before I could give you a definite answer on that.”
“In that case, if things are difficult, could we at least change the flavor of the cream?”
“Haha! That much would be possible.”
Something tasting exactly the same and a strawberry-flavored product changing into melon or chocolate flavor were worlds apart.
Still, it would be enough if people could at least say, Hey, they did something.
“You go ahead and come up with ideas for the bread.”
“Oh, so I can participate directly and help out?”
“Haha, of course. After all, if there are no new ideas, the market will eventually be left behind, so I welcome it.”
Oh, nice, nice. So the bread side was covered, then?
“And this bread is also a problem, I suppose. The premium bread product you planned.”
“Ah... is there an issue?”
“Seah, you know this too, but consumers are picky about price. No matter how much more upscale you make it, there’s still a part of them that thinks bread is bread.”
The premium bread in question was Galaxy Train’s Fruit Cake.
This cake was the one Seré and Brunhilde shared in the main quest.
Its appearance was rather shabby, and there wasn’t much fruit on top, but it was a cake that carried the story of spring finally arriving on a planet where winter always came.
“You’re saying that because the price is high, right?”
“Normally, a slice of cake like this sells for around six to seven thousand won.”
“But it’s ten thousand won, so you think that’s too expensive?”
“Exactly. Since there’s fruit planned for the top, it seems they factored in the increased cost and set the price that way, but if it doesn’t sell, it’s meaningless.”
“This’ll be fine.”
I put on a confident look.
“I’m curious why you’d say that.”
“For these collaboration products, we’re planning to include the ‘stickers’ I mentioned earlier. And for this slice cake, we’re going to include stickers that can only be collected by buying and eating it.”
“Hmm... that is a good idea. Though this old man doesn’t know much about this game called... Galaxy Train.”
Kwon Jinsoo’s eyes flashed sharply.
“I’m not sure whether the IP has enough power to back up the promise you’re making.”
“Don’t worry. It’ll definitely work. People who spend money on this game really spend money, you know?”
“That’s right, Jinsoo ajusshi. These days, collabs with games or anime have a lot of impact. It feels different because people who weren’t even buyers to begin with are coming in.”
With Kwon Siyoung’s help, I quickly showed him the other documents.
An article about how Galaxy Train hit number one in the app store every time a new character was released...
And I showed him how much the usual packs in Galaxy Train cost, and how much a one truck purchase was worth.
“For people who enjoy this game, a ten-thousand-won cake or convenience store bread really is nothing, huh.”
“Yes, this may be our first outside collaboration, but I promise you’ll make really solid sales!”
“Haha, even if this collab goes wrong, I have no intention of blaming you, so don’t worry. All right?”
Kwon Jinsoo nodded and accepted a cup of coffee from his secretary.
“But, Seah. Looking over this proposal, I don’t see the illustrations needed for the stickers or the packaging. How do you plan to handle that?”
“Ah, for that part, we’re planning to get a few pieces from the Chinese headquarters.”
The Galaxy Train developers didn’t dislike this collab; if anything, they seemed to like it.
They were planning a food collaboration anyway, so they agreed to send a few cute SD illustrations of characters eating bread.
“We’re going to secure the illustrations for the stickers ourselves.”
“That sounds like it’ll take quite a bit of legwork.”
“I have my ways.”
Where in the world would I find someone willing to draw more than twenty pictures?
By an utterly absurd coincidence, I knew exactly one person who was perfect for that sort of job.
A person who could draw at insane speed if you gave them a proper whipping...!
A person who even had a decent reputation as an artist!