"Hahaha, literacy failure exposed!"
"Golden Wind Jade Dew when they first meet, better than countless encounters in the mortal realm. This is Magpie Bridge Immortal! Magpie Bridge! Double Seventh Festival!"
"I wanted to laugh just now, what a nine-year-compulsory-education failure with a brain full of yellow waste."
Chatters laughed uproariously, leaving Qi Huahua entirely speechless.
Yet what a loss, the loli cat girl on screen raised her head and chest proudly once more. "Hmph! I'm a cat!"
"Cats don't read books, I don't understand these complicated human things of yours."
"But cats can listen to big sister play the guqin!"
Qi Huahua raised the in-game volume, and chatters finally noticed that Tong Que wasn't simply striking a pose, she was genuinely playing the guqin.
Though limited by work-hour constraints, the developers couldn't make every single finger independently pluck the guqin strings, the movement of both hands across the strings and the music played corresponded perfectly.
Qi Huahua controlled the mouse, which had transformed into a palm shape, and clicked on the playing Tong Que.
Thus the camera elevated, bypassing the square table to approach Tong Que, and the view grew much closer.
Tong Que looked up with perfect timing, flashing a smile at the camera. "Don't you like this song?"
Options appeared:
[No, I love it, keep going.][Play another one.][I want to go for a walk with you.][Your clothes are messy, let me help you tidy them up.]--"Your clothes are messy! Let me help you tidy them up!!" Qi Huahua completed her selection instantly.
Consequently the camera zoomed in further, arriving at Tong Que's side.
Tong Que tilted her head to look at Qi Huahua, revealing her slender neck.
Qi Huahua tried touching Tong Que's smooth shoulder with her palm, but little did she expect that this gentle touch would shove Tong Que straight down onto the bench!
VaultChain scattered, jade stones tumbled, and the soft moonlight struck Tong Que's fair skin, as though draping her in a layer of Weiguang, truly resembling a celestial maiden descending to earth.
Tong Que, whose character design and art style were that of a cold and breathtaking big sister, now appeared frail and delicate, reclining limply on the wooden stool with slightly flushed cheeks as she looked at the camera and spoke softly:
"It seems... my clothes really are a bit messy."
"Then I'll have to trouble the investigator to help me pro-per-ly tidy them up."
"Ngh!" Qi Huahua let out an obvious nasal sound. "I'm going to have a nosebleed!"
"Big sister, you're way too lewd!"
"Leave it to me, my family's ancestral skill of three generations is the absolute best at tidying people's clothes."
Operating the mouse transformed into a small hand, Qi Huahua probed and clicked all over Tong Que, who was ripe for the picking.
She quickly discovered that Dream Builder had spared no expense in designing this interactive scene! The sheer number of interactive actions and the richness of Tong Que's voice lines far exceeded the expectations of both her and the chatters.
Touching Tong Que's head, arms, shoulders, clothes, small belly, waist and hips, thighs, calves, feet...
Every single one had distinct animations and voice feedback! Some gentle, some shy, some teasing, some encouraging...
What absolute richness and variety! As one of the first two interactive scenes ever released, Xu Meng's only requirement was--
Spare no cost, max out the playability! It had to make a massive splash among players, ideally forming a word-of-mouth reputation that "Dream Builder's interactive scenes are worth every penny you buy them for."
Only then would future interactive scenes sell better.
Being able to earn more money would grant him much more abundant capital when leading his team to transition into making other games.
Under this guiding ideology, the final product of the modeling and animation far exceeded player expectations, and even surpassed Xu Meng's expectations.
--Even this little pavilion was merely a part of the interactive scene.
The covered corridor connecting to the pavilion and the tiny circular platform in the lotus pond surrounded by lanterns could both be approached to trigger interactions! Not to mention the covered corridor for walking, picking lotus seedpods, and feeding each other lotus seeds, that small circular platform surrounded by lanterns was actually a tiny stage.
As long as players raised Tong Que's favorability high enough, they could have Tong Que dance for them on this little platform.
This dance was completed by Dream Builder using motion capture technology combined with manual keyframing, inviting a professional dancer to record it.
--It's just that the employees didn't quite understand why, after the dancer finished recording, the boss insisted on wearing the motion capture equipment and dancing a round himself...
Back in the livestream room, the more Qi Huahua played, the more engrossed she became, finally unable to help extending her sinful little hand toward Tong Que's chest.
Thus the peaks on Tong Que's chest heaved, and the VaultChain swayed, emitting a crisp clatter.
Tong Que raised a hand to guard her chest while simultaneously lifting a long, slender leg to thrust her foot forward, bracing it slightly lower down on the screen as if using her foot to block the investigator who was leaning in to commit misdeeds.
While Tong Que's actions signaled refusal, her words were: "You can't do that here~ Mr. Investigator."
The gazes of Qi Huahua and the chatters swept past Tong Que's plump, rounded toes and smooth instep, traveling all the way down her straight, slender legs...
"Pfft--"
Qi Huahua's virtual avatar sprayed a geyser of nosebleeds, letting out excited hamster squeaks: "Ah!!! Ahhhh!!!"
The next instant, with a click.
The livestream room went dark.
Over sixty thousand viewers in the entire livestream room were all kicked out.
The chatters were all dumbfounded, temporarily unable to tell whether the visuals were too lewd and the livestream room had been censored by the platform.
Or whether Qi Huahua had been too excited and kicked the internet cable loose.
As for Qi Huahua, her entire body froze.
Her heart ached to the point where she could barely breathe! Don't let her 770,000 followers fool you; during her regular streams, her viewership hovered around just over 10,000, sometimes even falling short of 10,000.
It was only by riding the popularity of Frost Snow Project creating a new ACG Game scale that she attained this explosive traffic.
Yet she ended up banned by P Station...
Qi Huahua stamped her feet in rage, but was utterly helpless.
Qi Huahua was clearly neither the first streamer to fall victim, nor would she be the last.
Victim streamers continued to emerge in a steady stream.
And it wasn't just P Station streamers who fell victim; streamers on other platforms met the same fate, though owing to differing moderation standards, their situations weren't quite as severe as P Station's.
Dream Builder's employees watched with agonizing anxiety.
Xu Meng felt troubled as well.
Yet all he had to do was glance down at the players' microtransactions, and his mood would improve immensely!--Ever since the game update finished and login opened, the revenue had been skyrocketing every single moment! Yesterday's trailer release had generated a single day's revenue that surpassed the first thirty days of May, and the revenue curve back then had already been quite astonishing.
Yet looking at today, even yesterday's nearly vertical curve had turned into a tiny step.
It immediately ceased to look so prominent! Two hours after the servers opened, the total player microtransactions broke 12 million! Such velocity made one practically suspect that all players were passionately spending money! The entire Dream Builder company had worked themselves to the bone for a month, with the creative department draining their inspiration and the execution department squeezing out their blood and sweat, and these 8 remastered characters finally presented to the players lived up to everyone's expectations in response.
They didn't merely respond—they multiplied the response tenfold!
From the average ACG Game standard, player willingness to pay was simply shockingly high! There had always been a rumor in the industry: mobile game user payment rates roughly hovered around 5% or so.
And that already factored in many six-yuan first-top-up bundles, one-yuan beginner gifts, and similar items.
The actual payment rate might be even lower.
Yet right now in Frost Snow Project, that figure was a startling 16%!
Monthly pass requested, readership requested, recommendations requested.
Thanks to Defan Dangzuole for the 500-point tip.
Before you continue