To ascend, I had no choice but to create games

330 AM.

Kongkong Studio.

Chief Planner Huang Ping, dragging his tired body, walked out of the meeting room.?? ^&

By his side, four systems planners, one copywriter, and one data planner had become like zombies, speaking without strength.

Walking on the thick carpet, Huang Ping felt like a ghost, aimlessly wandering on the river of life and death.

Even inside the office, he could hear the sound of crying from the bathroom outside, like a widow weeping by a grave, or like a wronged soul claiming lives. The spacious office was now filled with colleagues from the studio.

They lay scattered on the floor, their snoring loud and continuous, deafening. Although he couldn’t smell it, Huang Ping believed that they, who hadn’t bathed in over ten days, definitely reeked.

Now it was summer, and every day the buildup of sweat made Huang Ping constantly feel that sticky, greasy sensation, but he endured it all to launch the PVP system as soon as possible.

Kongkong jokingly called this ‘saturation-level rush work.’ Regardless of whether you have something to do or not, you must stay at your workstation for 24 hours, otherwise, you’re a dog that eats shit, a pig that ruins the team’s spirit.

Saturation my ass!

We work overtime, yet you can rest and sleep in your private office, and even take a bath occasionally. It’s an open secret to everyone, just that no one has the courage to call it out.

After all, this is Kongkong Studio, and as a famous producer under Tianyi, Kongkong has the capital to enjoy all this.

Yawning, Huang Ping told the others to go to sleep first while he returned to his computer desk, summarized the meeting into a document, and then sent it to each person.

The only person he couldn’t send it to was Tianyi’s President Zhang Ping. Because Kongkong would send it personally, to demonstrate his exemplary work ethic.

By the time everything was in order, it was already 4. AM.

After sending the email cc’d to everyone, he wanted to brush his teeth and get some sleep, but in the end, he couldn’t resist the temptation of the stairway and fumbled out a shriveled pack of cigarettes, pulling out a crumpled one.

He didn’t used to smoke, but the pressure of these times was too great, leaving him no other outlet but this.

Sitting down on the stairs, Huang Ping held his cigarette, took out his phone, wanting to talk to someone, but he didn’t know whom to reach out to.

Girlfriend?

They had met through a blind date, and it had been less than half a year; it was the time to consolidate their relationship, so he shouldn’t burden her with his negative emotions.

Parents?

They would have been asleep at this hour, and even if they weren’t, it wouldn’t be right to disturb them, better let the elderly rest properly.

Friends?

He had come to Tianyi right after university graduation and already it had been nine years. Frequent overtime left him with no energy for socializing, and the few acquaintances he had hadn’t been in touch for a long time.

Looking at his phone, he became lost in a daze, only able to spread his legs and weakly puff on his cigarette.

The overhead motion-sensing light had already turned off, and in the darkness, only a middle-aged man powerlessly clung to the cigarette butt, trying to get a meager consolation from the nicotine.

That’s the game industry for you. It looks glamorous, but behind it, there’s always a mess.

Standing up, he looked across the stairwell.

Through the glass of the stairwell, he saw that Fang Cheng Studio across the street had already closed for the night.

He had never seen overtime work over there; as soon as the clock struck the hour, the boss would start herding people out the door.

Even though there was an attendance machine at the entrance, the three members seemed to rarely use it, and the boss didn’t seem to care either.

“This must be the leisure of geniuses, confident that they can still churn out great games in a relaxed manner. I wonder what big move they’re brewing up now, don’t tell me…”

He initially thought of saying perhaps it was an optimization for “Princess Dungeon,” but when the words reached his mouth, he couldn’t say them.

He knew that the game he made was crap, Skinner boxes and leaderboards fully exploited the greed of the players, and negative emotions like competition and failure prompted players to spend money, then after a few hours of pleasure would come the next wave of negative emotions.

This cycle would repeat for a long time, unless some real big spender showed up, otherwise the outcome was invariably a breakdown followed by abandonment.

But “Princess Dungeon” was different.

It was truly the pride of national production, the pride of domestic game developers. When accused of being incapable of making good games to their faces, they could stand tall and retort, “At least we have ‘Princess Dungeon.’ ” With a long sigh, Huang Ping once again had thoughts of resigning.

But then he thought of his mortgage, his car loan, the betrothal gifts, and the wedding expenses, and he didn’t dare go through with it.

Not to mention, at KongKong they at least paid salaries on the 10th every month without fail, which was commendable.

Dismissing this thought, Huang Ping hadn’t yet finished smoking half a cigarette when his phone lit up, and a call from KongKong came through like a death knell.

Seeing who the caller was made Huang Ping’s blood pressure soar, but he still answered the phone immediately, only to hear KongKong’s angry roar on the other end: “Where the hell are you? Get your ass back here!”

Clenching his fists, Huang Ping stared at the phone that had already been hung up, counted to ten silently in his mind, extinguished the half-smoked cigarette on the ground, and then rushed back to the studio.

There, the studio lights were on, and his half-dead colleagues were gathered around KongKong.

KongKong gave Huang Ping a disapproving glance, clapped his hands, and then said, “I’ve just talked with the CEO, and we need to tweak the arena. We previously discussed having a fair arena where players’ equipment would be identical to increase competitiveness. But President Zhang said no, revenues from ‘King’s Dungeon’ are declining, we have to incorporate payments into it.” Huang Ping felt as if he had been hit over the head with a hammer, his mind buzzing.

Not worrying about possibly angering KongKong, he immediately said, “That’s not what you said at first! Look at the example of ‘Princess Dungeon’; PVP in these kinds of games is naturally resistant to pay-to-win! Haven’t I analyzed this before? Our game’s other monetization aspects are already a bit heavy, adding more here is a dead end!”

KongKong stared at Huang Ping and asked coldly, “Are you the producer, or am

I the producer? What are you, telling me how to do things?”

Huang Ping felt as though a bucket of cold water had been poured over him, rendering him speechless.

Ignoring Huang Ping’s objections, KongKong continued, “Alright, let’s revisit this using the paid charging model. We have a template for it already, the company has done it before, we just have to follow the example.” After assigning tasks to the programmers and the art team, KongKong got everyone up working and then turned to Huang Ping, saying, “Huang Ping, I’ll temporarily take over your job. You just help out with the spreadsheet and put together the UI. Reflect on your work attitude, got it?”

Huang Ping clenched his fists again and it took him a long while to nod and say “Yes.”

“Fine, go run the game, see if there are any bugs.”

“…Okay.”

As KongKong left, the planners patted Huang Ping on the shoulder, silently consoling him.

And Huang Ping acted as if it was nothing.

Patting his pocket, he realized that his last cigarette was gone, so he went back to pick up the half-smoked one he had extinguished on the ground and put it in his mouth.

Lighting it, he drew a deep breath, sucking hard until the half-cigarette was completely burned out, then he exhaled a dense cloud of smoke and suddenly started to laugh.

KongKong oh KongKong…

You’re diggingyour own grave.