Game Maker: Starting by Healing the Players

The two BioShock games brought us the incredibly artistic Sky-City and Sea-City.

They also gave a jolt to many indie game designers.

A string of games with character-slaughtering plotlines really put a lot of players through the wringer.

In this situation, Nebula Games, being a tall tree attracting wind, naturally became the prime target.

Many players online are discussing.

"Damn it, who started this trend of tragic games? I've beaten three games in a row – one with a dead female lead, one with a dead male lead, and one where both the male and female leads died!"

"+1. It feels like there have been a lot more games like this that break your heart recently! And some of them are actually pretty good, you get invested, and then it hurts even more at the end."

"Heh, who started this trend? Think about the tragic storylines in World of Warcraft, and BioShock, which just came out. Who do you think started it?"

"To be fair, Boss Lucas shouldn't bear the full blame for this. After all, Boss Lucas is a repeat offender, "slaughtering" us a couple of times every year. This time isn't a capital offense, maybe just life imprisonment at most."

"No way! This wave of trends came after BioShock. Who do you guys think is responsible?"

"But these are all small to medium-sized game studios and indie game designers. Realistically, the development cycles wouldn't match up, right?"

"Oh, why are you arguing? Boss Lucas, the leader of character-slaughtering, that's undisputed. Either way, blaming Boss Lucas is always the right move!"

"Exactly!"

Many players were joking around, which also caused Nebula Games and Lucas's names to trend on the hot search list once again.

.........

Inside Nebula Games, Lucas just smiled slightly as he looked at the players' discussions online.

If it were in the past, he might have felt something, but now, his mood was completely unfazed.

Well… perhaps not entirely unfazed.

He might even be a little happy.

After all, players filled with resentment meant that the game had brought them a stronger sense of immersion.

And what he could do now was to make Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice even better.

For example, subtly guiding players through the level design.

Looking at Lucas's level designs, everyone on the team shivered.

They all understood the sheer maliciousness intended to trick players to their doom without mercy!

Compared to Bloodborne and Dark Souls, if you really had to talk about it, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice could be considered the game with the most on-point guidance.

As long as you don't skip all the dialogue, you can gather a lot of useful information.

For instance, after defeating the second mini-boss, General Kawarada, players can talk to an addled old woman to get the Bell Charm that allows entry into a dream from three years prior.

At the same time, the thieving merchant before the Great Carp might sell you information revealing the Great Carp's weakness to fire.

If methods to "cheese" or bypass certain challenges in Dark Souls and Bloodborne still required players to figure things out on their own through contemplation and exploration.

Then, in Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, these "cheese" methods were actually presented to the players through guidance.

But that was the most cunning part.

It was just like in Monster Hunter: World, where the initial quests are very easy, and the first few monsters like Great Jagras and Kulu-Ya-Ku are incredibly weak.

But as you progress, the difficulty gradually increases. By the mid-game, monsters like Rathalos and Diablos start to deter players.

And by the late game, all sorts of cool elder dragons like Nergigante, Kushala Daora, and Teostra can teach players a lesson in minutes.

Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice was the same. You were happily bypassing challenges early on, right?

Just wait until you meet Lady Butterfly, and you'll understand why the sun shines so brightly. You think you can bypass Lady Butterfly with staged dodges too?

Don't even mention Genichiro of Ashina Castle; the guy on the second floor who uses the unsheathe attack can give you an hour or two of lessons.

Especially after the first demo version was released, and Lucas personally played it, he issued an order: Increase the difficulty.

This made many people secretly resolve that even if the game turned out amazing, they, as the core development team, would never play it themselves.

Because it was completely different from Dark Souls and Bloodborne.

Even if you knew the monsters' attack patterns, if your reaction speed wasn't fast enough, you wouldn't be able to execute the necessary moves.

It's easy to end up in a situation where your brain understands, but your hands don't cooperate.

Therefore, compared to other games on the market, this time Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice was particularly special: after testing, they removed brainwave input control and reverted to standard controllers.

And the reason for that?

Because pure brainwave control had a slight input delay, which actually made it more difficult for some players.

Relying purely on muscle memory turned out to be easier.

However, even with that said, as a Souls-like game.

There might still be many players cheering with joy.

After all, following the double trials of Dark Souls and Bloodborne, quite a few players have awakened their "M" tendencies.

.........

The development progress of Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice was rapid because the main workload was on the various monsters.

As for the construction of the entire environment, on one hand, there were many corresponding resources in the art asset library, making production much faster.

On the other hand, there weren't many map resources in Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, and much of it could be reused.

Moreover, in terms of action, players only used one Kusabimaru from start to finish.

Various other combat styles and secret techniques didn't require the same level of dedicated motion adaptation as in Bloodborne and Dark Souls.

These weren't technically demanding tasks; the difficult part was how to create that sword-clashing, sword-fight style.

Although the physics engine's performance was already excellent, there were still some minute details that needed fine-tuning.

On the other hand, the promotional materials for Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice were also being prepared simultaneously.

This time, the promotional materials would also highlight the game's biggest feature: the sword fighting.

.........

At the beginning of the month, many players were still online "denouncing" Lucas.

But on this day, many players found that Lucas had uncharacteristically popped out to post on the official Weibo account.

"To make up for everyone's feelings, this time we've brought you an exhilarating action game, and we believe the new game's ending will truly satisfy players."

As soon as players saw this Weibo post from Lucas, their outrage intensified.

"You actually remembered how deeply BioShock hurt us?"

"New game ending will satisfy players? Does that mean the main character troupe of Nebula Games is about to welcome another protagonist's death?"

"Holy crap, I'd have to be an idiot to believe you!"

Countless players complained.

Of course, complaints aside, many players' small hands couldn't help but instinctively click on the video attachment under this official Weibo post.

(End of chapter)

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