Chapter 327: Then I’ll Make a GOG Too
Chapter 327: Then I’ll Make a GOG Too
Seeing Pei Qian’s face turn pale, with no trace of approval or satisfaction on it, Ma Yang suddenly felt uneasy.
“Brother Qian… you’re not blaming me for spending too much money, are you?”
“Do you think a small foreign company isn’t worth investing that much in?”
Pei Qian: “……”
Looking at Old Ma’s sincere expression, Pei Qian was momentarily at a loss for words.
How was he supposed to put this…
The one who told Old Ma to act decisively and not hesitate was Pei Qian himself;
The one who told Old Ma to invest in whatever he liked was also Pei Qian.
Playing Divine Revelation was one of Old Ma’s few hobbies. Since he couldn’t invest in Divine Revelation, he had no choice but to settle for a foreign company making a similar game—and he dumped the entire twenty million into it in one go.
From every angle, Old Ma had followed Pei Qian’s instructions to the letter.
And on the surface, this looked like a highly unreliable deal, perfectly in line with Pei Qian’s original intentions.
But Pei Qian was suffering inside—the sense of déjà vu from this company was just too strong!
This IOI… wasn’t it basically this world version of League of Legends?
What made this so completely unexpected for Pei Qian was that he had actually searched for similar information online last year!
According to his original memories, Riot Games should have been founded around 2006 and raised 8 million USD in 2008, bringing in three investors.
As for Tencent later adding over 200 million USD to acquire it, that happened in 2011.
And according to memory, League of Legends launched in 2009.
The current time was already November 2010.
Logically speaking, that 8-million-dollar funding round should have been completed long ago, right?
Pei Qian had searched online for related news last year, but found nothing.
At the time, he didn’t think too much of it. He assumed it was just another manifestation of changes in this world—after all, even Bilibili had turned into “Aili Island.” It was perfectly normal for other companies to have changed as well.
He hadn’t taken it seriously, especially since the company was overseas and his information channels weren’t exactly comprehensive.
Now Pei Qian finally understood why he hadn’t found anything last year.
It was because both the company name and the game name had changed—from Riot Games to Fingertip Games, from LOL to IOI. Searching by the original names would of course turn up nothing.
On top of that, the entire timeline had been pushed back by a full two years. Last year, the company was probably just getting started—a brand-new startup. How could there have been much information online?
Pei Qian had always been curious about what MOBA games in this world would look like.
He never would have imagined that he’d finally get his answer today—and in such an absurd way.
However, when Pei Qian checked the system panel, he found that there were no obvious changes yet.
Shares worth over two million dollars should be similar in nature to that villa—special company assets—and should definitely be reflected on the system panel.
The likely reason was that the share acquisition was still in progress and the procedures weren’t fully completed yet, so it hadn’t officially appeared in the system.
Countless thoughts flashed rapidly through Pei Qian’s mind.
Facing Old Ma’s sincere gaze, he truly didn’t know what to say.
Criticize him? That didn’t make much sense. Old Ma had carried out his instructions exactly, without the slightest deviation.
Dumping twenty million into a small foreign company was completely in line with Dream Fulfillment Ventures’ style. It wouldn’t be appropriate to dump the blame on Ma Yang!
Praise him? Well, he probably should be praised. This was the kind of investment that could be bragged about for a lifetime.
But…
Pei Qian simply couldn’t bring himself to say it.
Pei Qian took a couple of deep breaths and forced himself to nod. “It’s fine. You did pretty well.”
“However, there probably won’t be any surplus funds in the near future. Old Ma, just have everyone do some casual work every day, play some games, and wait for my next instructions.”
Pei Qian stood up, preparing to leave.
He couldn’t bear to stay in this heartbreaking place for even one more second.
Ma Yang raised his hand. “Hey, Brother Qian, you really don’t want to experience a high-tier match? These are all 1900-rating gods on my side!”
Pei Qian: “……”
Ma Yang added, “As for that dinner on Saturday night, I’ll just contact Manager Lin directly. That okay?”
Pei Qian: “……”
You still have the nerve to eat my meal!
Unable to say a word, Pei Qian simply raised his hand behind his back and made an “OK” gesture, then walked off without turning his head.
…
…
Back at Tengda Games, Pei Qian sat down in his office.
He had already reflected on life; now it was time to think about how to deal with this sudden incident.
Having something like this blow up right at the start of a new cycle was completely beyond Pei Qian’s expectations.
Buying over 20% of the shares and obtaining the domestic exclusive agency rights for IOI—this matter was essentially set in stone. There was no way to terminate the investment, nor was it possible to transfer the newly acquired shares.
There was simply no legitimate reason to do so.
What about selling them after some time?
By then, Fingertip Games’ valuation would almost certainly skyrocket. Selling at that point would inevitably mean making a huge profit anyway.
What’s more, after thinking it through carefully, Pei Qian realized that no matter what, these shares absolutely could not be sold.
Selling midway would be too stupid!
If Fingertip Games really grew to the scale Pei Qian imagined, then even putting the shares aside, the domestic exclusive agency rights alone would be a veritable money-printing machine.
He might regard making money as dirt—but if there was too much dirt, it would be impossible to ignore.
If IOI could earn ten or twenty billion dollars a year in the future, then no matter how the wealth-conversion ratio was adjusted, the converted Personal Funds would still be an enormous sum.
If it were just a few million in small profits, it really wouldn’t mean much to Pei Qian. But if it were tens of billions—that would be a completely different story.
And if he let his imagination run a little wild—could there be heroes named after him, or exclusive skins with his name on them in the future?
Thinking about it like that… it was actually pretty exciting!
If that situation really came to pass, then for Pei Qian, doing nothing and lying back while making money didn’t seem like such a bad strategy either.
The massive System Funds earned could then be used to develop logistics, open physical stores, and give back to society.
Of course, that said, none of this was set in stone.
The world was already different, and both the company name and the game name were different from what Pei Qian remembered. Who could guarantee that IOI would definitely succeed the way LOL did?
And even if it did succeed, that would still be three or four years down the line.
In the meantime, it would have to go through many rounds of promotion and the joint efforts of countless people. Only with the convergence of timing, location, and people could it possibly achieve dominance in the global gaming market.
What things would look like three or four years from now—who could say for sure?
Distant water can’t quench immediate thirst. Even if he really could lie back and make money three or four years later, it wouldn’t affect Pei Qian’s current development strategy.
In short, from a long-term perspective, these shares and the exclusive agency rights definitely had to be kept.
If the short-term profits were too much of a concern, then he could always find ways to spend the money aggressively—logistics, warehousing, public welfare projects… just keep finding different ways to spend it. In the end, it would still count as benefiting society.
Thinking about it this way, the situation didn’t seem quite so bad after all.
The hope of losing money hadn’t been completely extinguished.
And as Pei Qian kept thinking, a sudden flash of inspiration struck him—he came up with a great idea.
“Perfect. I can use this opportunity to hedge my risks!”
“Since this world already has IOI, doesn’t that mean the future winner is basically decided?”
“If I make another MOBA game myself, wouldn’t it be guaranteed to flop?”
“Wouldn’t that just turn into a bottomless pit where I can pour in as much money as I want?”
Pei Qian felt as though he had discovered a whole new continent—just when things seemed bleak, a new path opened up.
If IOI was destined to sweep the globe in the future, then even a high-quality game like Divine Revelation might be able to hold its ground, but other PC MOBA games would probably be wiped out quickly, reduced to mere cannon fodder.
In that case, if Tengda also made a MOBA game, wouldn’t failure be practically guaranteed?
First smash in fifty million. If things still look bad, smash in another fifty million. In the end, the game collapses because it can’t withstand the IOI tide, and all that R&D funding goes straight down the drain.
Wouldn’t that be wonderful?
The more Pei Qian thought about it, the more feasible it seemed.
He had already reserved a fifty-million budget for Tengda’s game department and had been worrying about how to spend it.
Now there was no need to worry anymore—he had a clear target!
Thinking of this, Pei Qian quickly summoned Li Yada.
“The new game is decided. Write this down real quick.”
Li Yada hurriedly took out a small notebook from her pocket. “Okay, President Pei, go ahead.”
Pei Qian thought for a moment. “You’ve played Divine Revelation, right? Just make something like that—same genre.”
“As for the name… let’s call it GOG. Glory of Gods.”
Pei Qian felt that LOL, IOI, COC, and WOW already existed, and there really weren’t many usable acronyms left.
Since that was the case, GOG would do. It didn’t really have any special meaning—he just hoped the game could strive to reach GG as soon as possible.
Li Yada continued waiting.
After a full minute, she asked in confusion, “That’s it?”
Pei Qian nodded. “Yep.”
After all, it was just something to burn money casually—let them mess around however they wanted.
Li Yada thought about it. “But if we directly copy Divine Revelation, wouldn’t that be… a bit inappropriate?”
“Even though the law doesn’t protect gameplay mechanics, if it’s too similar, we’ll definitely get criticized.”
Pei Qian nodded. “Mm, that’s a fair point.”
President Pei’s goal was just to lose money, not to ruin his or the company’s reputation. Inviting that kind of backlash was completely unnecessary.
“In that case, just change it however you want,” he said.
“As long as it’s changed beyond recognition, so players won’t think we’re copying.”
“For the first version, release twenty-plus heroes for people to mess around with. Development cycle: four months.”
“The budget is fifty million. Go all out. If it’s not enough, we can add more later.”
Li Yada froze. “Huh? That much? …I’m afraid we won’t be able to spend it all.”
Can’t spend it all?
Pei Qian was a little displeased. His employees really didn’t know how to use their initiative.
With a tone of disappointment, he said, “Do I really have to teach you how to spend money?”
“Dump more into art assets—models, animations, lore, background stories, details.”
Li Yada lowered her head awkwardly and looked at her notebook. “But… President Pei, if it’s just one map and a bit over twenty heroes, the art budget really can’t reach that high…”
Pei Qian: “…”
Thinking it over carefully, that really was the case.
Because of the existence of the RSRO official resource platform, the cost of game development in this world had dropped quite a bit.
Trying to burn through a fifty-million budget in just four months with only a single map and a bit over twenty heroes was indeed somewhat difficult.
So what to do?
Pei Qian thought about it—were there any other MOBA development experiences he could draw on?
There were plenty of failed MOBA games, but when those games failed, was it because the gameplay was bad, because there were too many bugs, or because the marketing was inadequate?
That was actually hard to say.
After mulling it over, Pei Qian arrived at a promising direction.
A certain game that, after being developed, had stayed in testing forever and never dared to officially launch.
Because the moment it officially launched, it would immediately be sued into bankruptcy.
Pei Qian felt that he could learn from this kind of “advanced experience” as well!
Of course, he definitely couldn’t just freeload on the copyrights.
If he freeloaded on copyrights and couldn’t officially operate the game, and two settlement cycles passed without being able to settle, the system would cut President Pei off.
But what if he bought all those copyrights instead?
How much would that cost?!
There’d be no need to worry about not being able to spend the money!
As long as he kept buying copyrights, no matter how much he invested, it would never be enough.
Pei Qian thought this was a great idea. “Then we’ll buy IPs!”
“Domestic or overseas—it doesn’t matter. If there are any character IPs that look usable, buy some. Cheap or expensive, as long as they can be put into the game, put them in.”
“Oh, but forget those super-hot IPs that cost millions of dollars. Just buy more cheap IPs.”
Buying big-name IP characters and putting them into the game would certainly cost a lot of money, and for some especially huge IPs, even having money wouldn’t guarantee you could buy them.
But buying big IPs also carried major hidden risks—for example… what if it attracted a massive fanbase and gave the game absurdly high visibility?
And the bigger the IP, the more messy affairs the parent company had. Pei Qian didn’t want to spend all day haggling over contract details with foreign megacorporations just to buy an IP. It wasn’t worth the trouble.
So Pei Qian’s idea was to go all-in on dumpster diving.
Whether domestic or foreign, he would look for those IP characters that were already past their prime or completely ignored. With a “picking through trash” mentality, he’d buy them all, put them into the game, and then design skills based on each character’s traits.
For some that didn’t fit the game’s style, he’d agree in advance with the copyright holders and then hire top-tier artists for secondary re-creations—burning through another round of money.
That way, wouldn’t the money be spent quickly?
And these trash IPs would be about the same whether they were bought or not. They wouldn’t drive any meaningful traffic, with a cost-performance ratio so low it was off the charts.
Li Yada still had doubts. After all, this was effectively the first project she was truly leading after becoming lead executive designer.
However, Pei Qian waved his hand. “Alright, let’s leave it at that for now. Go and sketch out some ideas on your own first. Don’t ask me about everything—I’m afraid I’ll interfere with your own thinking.”
Li Yada twisted her fingers nervously. “O-okay, President Pei.”
Turning and leaving President Pei’s office, Li Yada thought to herself that this task was a bit too heavy—especially since she herself wasn’t good at games like Divine Revelation.
No matter how she thought about it, improving her Divine Revelation-style game design skills in the short term was impossible.
It seemed that the only option was to quietly ask Bao Xu for help.
If you want to see more chapter of this story and don't mind spending $5 monthly to see till the latest chapter, please go to my Patreon.
Latest Chapter in Patreon: Chapter 375: Whoever Makes the Money, Spends the Money
Link to the latest chapter: https://www.patreon.com/posts/151175047?collection=1399284
https://www.patreon.com/collection/1399284?view=expanded
Comments (0)
Please login or sign up to post a comment.