After lunch, Ayesha returned to the gym saying she was going to clean the place. After all, she had been injected with a genetic vaccine, and thus she was almost completely recovered at the moment.

Jiang Chen was sitting on the sofa while watching TV to pass the time. Yawning, he was about to get up and go back for a nap when his mobile phone suddenly rang.

He took out his mobile phone and read: Xia Shiyu.

He pressed the answer button and lazily put the phone to his ear.

“Hello? What’s up?”

“Mhm, I have something to tell you. It’s about a game,” Xia Shiyu’s excited voice came through which made Jiang Chen extremely surprised.

“I guess it’s a good news.” Jiang Chen laughed.

“That’s right,” Xia Shiyu leaned backed against the office chair with a rare proud smile appearing on her face. “After a period of marketing and beta testing, our company’s first mobile game ‘New Era’ is now officially live! According to the recent daily statistics that had just been released, its first day of downloads exceeded 15-million mark, setting a record for highest downloads for mobile games!”

After practicing in front of the mirror numerous times, when Xia Shiyu finally shared the good news with the boss, her voice still went off-key due to extreme excitement.

“What the fu*k!” The news practically made Jiang Chen jumped up from the sofa.

“Ahem, no cursing please,” Xia Shiyu admonished lightly before continuing, “According to the server’s data, the highest number of concurrent users broke through 5 million…it’s better for you to come to the company this afternoon, so I can show you the back end stats directly.”

“I’ll be there right away.” After saying that, Jiang Chen hung up the phone and was immediately out the door.

…

Wanghai University, men’s dormitory.

A guy with a pair of glasses was staring at the screen of his mobile phone, his fingers moving swiftly on the touchscreen. His spectacles reflected the fighting scene of a roleplaying game character.

“Four eyes, what are you playing? Or are you watching porn?” Tian Zhongjie, his bunkmate, moved his chair closer and stretched his neck to take a peek at his screen.

Tian Zhongjie had just finished playing ‘League of Legends’ and had almost smashed his keyboards because of those noobs. He was so angry that he didn’t want to play anymore. After 20 losses, he closed the game directly, and then opened the file, and uninstalled the game.

This was his tenth time of uninstalling this game.

Most online games were either filled with RMB players (1) or filled with cheats. Although a lot of noobs played ‘LOL’, the quality of the game itself was still quite good. At least, the RMB skins wouldn’t increase the user’s attack damage. Thus, after his anger had abated, he would find himself unable to stop from downloading the game again. Despite that, every time he finished uninstalling, he would swear that he would chop his hand off if he ever installed it again.

Chen Hong cast his friend a sidelong glance before returning his gaze back to the screen and then controlled his character to the direction of the main city.

“What are you being so mysterious about?” Tian Zhongjie had just AFKed, so he had nothing better to do. He then got up and stood behind him.

Chen Hong ignored him and continued to stare intently at the screen.

Just then, the dormitory door opened and Gao Fei, who had just finished playing basketball, walked in.

“Yo, four eyes, didn’t you say that only dumbass play mobile game? Then why are you playing it?” Gao Fei quipped. He curiously stood behind Chen Long trying to see what he was playing.

“What, no way! Is this truly a mobile game?”

As a result, Gao Fei was also unable to peel his eyes off the screen either.

The texture of the image, the detailed character design, as well as the spectacular gameplay, those 3D mobile games are nothing compared to this! No, not just mobile games, even ‘Skyrim’ on his desktop couldn’t compare to this game!

“That’s right, this is not a mobile game, and that’s why I’m playing it,” Chen Hongteng pushed his eyeglasses up and scowled at the completely stunned Tian Hongjie.

Gao Fei gulped and jeered, “The graphics is so good, the game content must be meh.”

Chen Hong glanced at him before continuing, “Open world and 2:1 continental-scale map. It combined the adventure element of an RPG and the management element of an SLG. Player can choose to roleplay as an adventurer or become a lord managing a piece of land. You can also open a business and become a merchant to fight pirates in the sea. Whether it’s the graphics or the content, even if it’s compared to PC games, it’s a 3A godly masterpiece” Chen Hong said with absolute certainty. Although he had always been extremely critical when it came to games, he had yet to find any flaws in ‘New Era’.

“Could your crappy phone even handle a map with a size of two continents?” Tian Zhongjie’s jaw was about to drop to the ground, he felt like his ‘LOL’ addiction was still not beyond redemption!

“The game is only 300 MB.”

“300 MB, you’re pulling my leg!” Gao Fei uttered in complete disbelief.

“The company stated that they used the newest data compression technology as well as cloud computing technology…Anyway, I don’t understand any of that stuff, I only can care about playing. O For a day, I consumed 10 MB of data, so it’s not very high.”

Chen Hong killed another monster and deftly picked up the loot of silver coins and equipment and then locked onto the next one.

“I can see that you have been killing monsters for a while now, don’t you find that boring?” Tian Zhongjie noticed that he had only been killing monsters after watching him play for a long time. Sure, the fighting scene and graphics were great, but wouldn’t it be too boring to be hacking monsters constantly?

“Would you still feel bored if there’s money involved?” Chen Hong responded to him as though he was talking to an idiot.

“Money?”

“RMB, you know that, don’t you?” he added, sighing.

“What the fu*k, the in-game currency can be exchanged for RMB?” Gao Fei asked in disbelief, his eyes almost popping out.

“The game operator doesn’t exchange gold coins, but they offer a platform similar to ‘Diablo 3’s’ auction house. Players are free to price and sell gold coins on a consignment basis. This system is somewhat similar to the stock price, where the lower price is given preference. The game operator will only collect 5% commission fee, and they only take 10% commission for the equipment auction.”

While speaking, Chen Hong’s eyes were burning with passion like crazy.

“During beta testing, Future 1.0 distributed a high amount of activation code to VIP members. There’s quite a number of wealthy players playing this game according to the official data collected during the beta phase.”

“That’s to say, there is a high probability that RMB players would beat your sorry ass.” Gao Fei said in derision.

“That’s how an average person would think.” Chen Hong cast him a haughty look. “‘New Era’ didn’t create an item mall. The purchased points can only be used to expand the warehouse or purchase skins that don’t affect the balance of the game.”

“In other words, it’s s similar to LOL’s store?” Tian Zhongjie’s eyes lit up, and he suddenly felt an urge to download and play the game.

Chen Hong ignored his friend’s question and muttered, “Do you remember what I said before? There are many ways to play this game. You can be an adventurer, a lord and so on.”

“Does it has anything to do with those RMB players?” Gao Fei asked, frowning.

“Of course!” Chen Hong’s eyes were practically indistinguishable from gold coins. He licked his cracked lips before continuing, “The condition to become a lord is one has to buy a city lease for 100,000 gold coins and then get the city qualification. Imagine if you were a rich player, would you rather hunt monsters like what I’m doing, or would you rather become the lord of a city with countless followers?”

“That’s nonsense!” Gao Fei scoffed, but he seemed to have suddenly thought of something as his eyes widened, “Wait, if the city lease costs 100,000 gold, the auction house…”

“That’s right, if you play the game normally, it would be impossible to obtain 100,000 gold coins in such a short amount time. Killing a single boar would only drop 2 silver coins and killing 50 would barely give you 1 gold coin. So to become a lord, the only way to acquire gold coins is through the auction house!”

“But would there be that many people willing to buy a city lease?” Tian Zhongjie asked.

“Let me give you a straightforward data. At present, the price of a single gold coin in the auction house is set to 5 RMB. So for every 10 boars I kill, I would make 1 RMB.” The more Chen Hong talked, the more motivated he became.

“What the fu*k, a land lease will cost half a million RMB? That is insane!” Gao Fei uttered in disbelief.

“You noob, there are rich people who are not afraid to squander 1 million while playing ‘Plants vs. Zombies’. Don’t you know building a territory is similar to “farming”? Moreover, through taxation, production of materials and other ways to earn money, would you still be worried about not making a return?”

“I’ll tell you a rumor that I heard from one of my friends. Have you heard about Blood Sea guild of ‘Sword 4’? Because of the popularity of ‘New Era’, they are planning to switch to this game. They are also currently raising funds in preparation for something big. Not only wealthy people, a lot of game workshops are also eyeing this city lease, so you can just imagine the future of this game.”

“Isn’t ‘Sword 4’ a PC game?” Tian Zhongjie could not help but ask out loud.

“If the mobile game is more fun than PC game, would you rather play a PC or a mobile game? The future belongs to the mobile platform!” Chen Hong himself was becoming passionate about the future.

“Not only that, it can also be said that city building is the biggest feature of the game. The sandbox-like settings would allow the players to design their city based on their own preference. The city can be built anywhere from a certain distance from another city. And depending on the terrain and the map itself, the established city will receive a corresponding reward that would allow recruitment of special NPCs to attract other solo players.

“Do you know what this means? This means the earlier the city is established, the higher your advantage will be! You can get mines that produce iron ore, coastal areas fit for ships to dock, as well as unique NPCs roaming on the map…All major guilds are buying gold coins in order to seize those good spots!

“My plan right now is to kill monsters to gain gold coins and then sell the gold for money. Once I leveled up, I will explore the deeper parts of the continents. It’ll be great if I can trigger some hidden mission. That would be really crazy!” An ambitious expression appeared on Chen Hong’s face.

“But wouldn’t the value of gold depreciate after a while if everyone purchased the city lease?” Gao Fei asked anxiously.

The reason why he was asking was because he suddenly had the idea of making money from the game. Just killing ten monsters would earn him 1 RMB. This was something really enticing for someone who doesn’t have much pocket money.

“You’re overthinking it. Wouldn’t you need to build establishments after building a city? Wall, city hall, residential buildings, farm, ect., all of which cost money. In addition to city lords, there are sea explorers! Although putting up a shop would not cost 100,000 gold, a small shop would at least be 500. As for the mega vessel, it costs 1,000 gold and above.”

The auction house wouldn’t interfere with game content, and the difference between the demand for gold and RMB would prompt frequent trading between the players. As long as the operator continued to push new game contents which would prevent the value of gold from depreciating, the game would continue to survive.

Considering the impeccable game quality, the number of users, as well as the continued growth of Future 1.0…

Gao Fei’s eyes turned brighter and brighter the more he thought about it.

“Four eyes, I have an idea. Why don’t we, of dorm 101, start a game workshop…”

(1) RMB players: the equivalent of pay to win players.