C106: Game Reviews and Dark Souls Progress

Many players and practitioners within the gaming industry are discussing Neon's new game Brave heart: World War. In sales, brave heart: World War couldn't hold a candle to games like Jelly Bean.

After being available for three days at 19 yuan, its sales have reached 310,000. That's more than last year's To the Moon. The price difference isn't significant. The main reason for the success of To the Moon last year was the perfect timing, players were paying attention to this game of Neon Games during that period.

But when Brave heart: World War launched, all attention was already sucked into various VR and our Dark Souls. Other than a mention from Chen Xu on the official blog, the game mainly relied on Nebula Games' own platform for promotion.

Having this many sales figures proves Neon Games' influence has grown much stronger compared to last year.

Some media outlets have also reported on Brave heart: World War, praising it as a unique anti-war game. At that time, among the anti-war-themed games that were released, it stood out by a big margin. Brave heart: World War managed to offer something different.

For many designers who are dedicated to this genre, it gave them mixed feelings. In several industry forums, designers who played the game voiced their frustrations:

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"Yeah, Yeah, I'm frustrated! I finally made a game, but Neon Game is stealing all the fame!"

"Exactly! For the expedition event, my game was almost ready, but then he released this!" 

"Who could have expected this? Dark Souls was in the spotlight, but then suddenly brave heart came out!" 

"Unbelievable!" 

"The key point is that brave heart: World War excels in terms of both content and story! I am having giddiness outbreak when I read news about this game" 

"Similar to last year's To the Moon, this game has a rich puzzle-solving aspect." 

"I don't think there's much suspense left about who's going to win this expedition!"

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Two weeks after its release, the expedition competition officially began, and unsurprisingly, brave heart: World War took first place. In the official game store, the game is prominently featured on the homepage, with an award-winning review from the game department:

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"As a World War game, this doesn't focus on grand battle scenes. Instead, it highlights the pain and suffering caused by war through the experiences of ordinary people caught up in it." 

"By depicting the struggles, joys, and sorrows of several individuals from different nationalities, ethnicities, and backgrounds, it paints a vivid picture of the tragedy of war and the profound suffering it brings to people."

"Without the pursuit of on-screen performance, the 2D horizontal cartoon graffiti style gives this game a deep, nostalgic feel—much like the historical story it reflects: old, but deeply rooted."

"Although it's a war-themed game, the depiction of battle scenes isn't bloody. Moments like cannonballs falling or stormtroopers being taken down are presented in a cartoonish, almost comical style. And isn't that the ultimate irony? A war with no sense of justice at all, and yet we laugh."

"This is a war-themed work that completely subverts tradition. It tells the story of an ordinary person sacrificed in an unjust war, making it one of the strongest indictments of war."

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While the game has been highly praised, especially for its core narrative achievements, the impact of winning the award this time was more significant among indie game fans and followers of Chen Xu.

For more casual players, it didn't stir much excitement. The context is different, unlike last year's game drought, this period saw the release of several highly anticipated titles.

The latest VR releases from domestic giants Net Dragon and Tenghua are being heavily promoted.

On the PC front, Neon's game, which made waves in the indie gaming scene last year, is heating up the market with its first major PC title, Dark Souls. Additionally, two other game developers are also rolling out new works around the same time.

So, while Brave heart: World War is excellent, it couldn't make a massive impact this year. It's like last year when I received the trophy from the game department.

Now, I've met again with leaders from the Shanghai city game division and submitted my application for senior game designer. Securing the senior title shouldn't be a problem.

Meanwhile, the official game engine has much more resources than previous versions, expanding the tools at my disposal.

[changing POV]

At Neon game,

I took the certificates and trophies from Chen Xu. Then I placed them in the wooden cabinet next to me.

Ruan Ningxue looked excited and said, "There's another certificate and trophy! I feel like we can open up an exhibition if we win tens of them more, just like those big companies. This will display the honors the company has earned."

"There will surely come a day like that!" I added, also filled up with longing.

"We can discuss this kind of thing later," Chen Xu smiled. After chatting with Yang Xin and Ruan Ningxue for a while, He stood up and prepared to head to the project team to check on the progress of Dark Souls.

At the same time, He needed to coordinate with the market operations team to determine the promotion strategy and timeline for the follow-up game. It's a big release, it is highly important.

In his experience, both in this life and past ones, numerous examples can serve as models for this. That's why he took this aspect seriously. He don't want a situation where the marketing team hypes the game to the sky and promises players grandiose features, only for the project team to be working on a semifinished product.

When I arrived at the Dark Souls project team, Qin Yi glanced at me while checking the game-related content, looking uncertain.

"Mr. Chen, are you sure we shouldn't lower the difficulty a bit? Or maybe add an optional difficulty setting for the players?" Qin Yi composed himself and finally spoke up after watching the design of the game map.

At this point, the combat system and various related mechanics of Dark Souls were mostly complete. The remaining task is to integrate everything into the game, including monsters placed in the environment. During this period, through a combination of values and core gameplay concepts, Qin Yi and several other developers on the team had already grasped the unique allure of Dark Souls.

It wasn't like a typical ARPG game. In Dark Souls, we don't let players ease their way into combat by gradually fighting weaker enemies and leveling up. It's more realistic.

In previous ARPGs, no matter how skilled the player is, they're limited by the numbers. You'll never see a level 1 player defeat the final boss.

But in Dark Souls, even though, there are numbers involved, if you're skilled enough—even if you're only at level 1, with no equipment, with rags and a small wooden stick—you can still defeat the final boss. These people are the true Gods of Dark Souls.

My skills weren't where they needed to be. Equipment, and levels—these are tools to assist my existence. But charm? Charm is something else entirely. The design of this map already is malicious enough, but now—what was I seeing?

In the early stages of the game, we had added so many powerful monsters. And in this small room, beneath the towering walls of Lothric and over the Flying Dragon Bridge, the first treasure chest I encountered was a monster! Not to mention the traps everywhere. Even the tips written on the ground to help players were half-truths with multiple meanings.

For example, near the drawbridge in the catacombs, there's a hint that says the suspension bridge will break, naturally making people think it would collapse once they reached the middle.

But in reality, they had to cut it themselves to make it fall. And if they tried to avoid the bridge, fearing it might break, and took another route, they'd be joined by countless skeleton jugglers playing Brazilian soccer.

They'd make it clear—no matter how strong you think you are, any so-called King of Wages is garbage. Their soldiers are the real deal!