Picasso Would Have to Call You Teacher

The speakers were none other than CEO Shen Miaomiao and Game Director Gu Sheng.

From a business perspective, Chu Qingzhou's proposal was perfectly sound.

And in this world, plenty of game developers did exactly that.

While a game was still hot, they hurriedly developed a sequel to rake in another round of profits.

However, Shen Miaomiao and Gu Sheng had different ideas.

Shen Miaomiao's reasoning was simple—she couldn't let Gu Sheng ride the hype again!

Mario Bros. was wildly popular now, with its momentum still soaring.

And the game had required little investment and had a short development cycle.

Releasing a sequel now would be like jumping into a fire pit herself. The system would definitely fail again.

So, she absolutely could not let Gu Sheng borrow this tailwind.

Gu Sheng's reasoning was not complicated either—he did not want to tarnish his reputation.

Finishing the first game and immediately making a second was the most common trick game developers in this world used to fleece players.

They feared that their next standalone title would flop, so they rushed to capitalize on the lingering heat of a hit game and quickly release a sequel that could reliably make money.

But Gu Sheng had no such concerns!

As a man who possessed a treasure trove of games,

as long as he had enough Emotion Points, the games at his disposal covered every genre imaginable!

He could casually pull out any one of them, and it would be an absolute trump card in this world!

Why ruin his own reputation and drag down the company's standing for the sake of a few tens of thousands?

After all, he was going to become the Game King!

Besides, emotions were remarkably resilient.

If someone remained immersed in one emotion for too long, they would quickly develop resistance to it.

And if another Mario Bros. game came out now, players could easily suffer from aesthetic fatigue or even become disgusted by it.

Personally, Gu Sheng worried that making a sequel would damage his reputation as a designer.

Professionally, he also felt that releasing a sequel would hurt the company's reputation and might even affect its profits.

So naturally, Gu Sheng was firmly opposed to making a sequel.

After all, it had not been easy for him to find a boss like Little Nezha—naive and loaded with money.

He had to cherish her, strive to make the company bigger and stronger, and create new glories.

Hearing both sides voice their objections at the same time, the two exchanged a glance.

Little Nezha raised a hand, signaling for Gu Sheng to explain himself.

Come on, she could hardly say she was afraid the company would make money and interfere with her plans to lose it, could she?

Gu Sheng nodded and began.

"From a business perspective, Secretary Chu's suggestion is completely correct, but that approach is meant for established game companies."

"They have massive operations and countless projects in hand, so of course they want to seize the greatest profits in the shortest amount of time."

"But we're different."

At that, Gu Sheng looked around at everyone present. "We're just a newly established game company."

"Now that we've taken this first step and only just begun to make a name for ourselves in the market, it would be unwise to rehash old material with a sequel and make ourselves look like we've run out of ideas."

As he spoke, Gu Sheng turned his gaze to Shen Miaomiao.

"So, CEO Shen, I would like to propose a brand-new project: developing a game completely different from Mario Bros."

"At the same time, we should increase our investment and make further attempts."

Excellent!!!

Now that's the spirit!!!

Shen Miaomiao, who had been listless just moments ago, perked up the instant she heard the words "increase investment"!

Increasing investment was great!

The bigger the investment, the better!

Ideally, the kind of investment that never came back!

At that, a flash of delight passed through Shen Miaomiao's large eyes.

"It seems Director Gu already has a plan. Very good!"

In Shen Miaomiao's eyes, eighty percent of Mario Bros.' success had come from sheer dumb luck.

But nobody could step in dog shit every day, right?

Besides, even Gu Sheng himself had said this success had merely been "fortunate"!

That meant he had no confidence at all in his next game!

This new project might even be nothing more than an experiment for Gu Sheng!

It sounded like a guaranteed loss!

Just what I wanted!

The Little Flame in Shen Miaomiao's heart ignited once more, and she nodded.

"So, what genre will Director Gu's new project be this time?"

"Uh... that's a little hard to say."

Faced with Shen Miaomiao's question, Gu Sheng paused to think.

"If I absolutely had to categorize it, it would probably count as an online competitive casual puzzle game with role-playing elements."

Holy shit!

Upon hearing that, it was not just Shen Miaomiao and Chu Qingzhou.

Even the finance girl was shaken to her core!

Were you stacking buffs here?

What kind of monstrosity was this game?!

Role-playing, online competitive, and fucking casual puzzle?

How did he even combine those genres?

And besides!

As far as she knew, there were only four mainstream game genres in the current gaming industry—ACT action games, MOBA multiplayer online battle arena games, FPS first-person shooters, and RCG racing games.

The first two, as mainstream genres, primarily targeted the PC market.

The latter two had completely taken over the immersive pod market.

But then look at Gu Sheng's game!

It had none of that!

For a moment, not only everyone else, but even Shen Miaomiao was a little hesitant!

"Ah... ah?"

Shen Miaomiao even thought she had misheard.

"Sorry, Director Gu, I... don't quite understand."

Of course you don't.

Gu Sheng sighed inwardly.

This game was simply too absurd. It was hard to describe with this world's level of gaming, and even in his previous life, it had been an utterly mind-blowing existence.

"To put it more specifically..."

Gu Sheng tried to describe the game in the simplest terms possible.

"One player acts as the father, while the other acts as a baby. The two sides compete against each other."

"The father's objective is to make sure the baby does not die before the game time runs out."

"And the baby's objective is to, as much as possible... get itself killed."

Silence...

The entire room fell silent...

Gu Sheng's description of the game instantly crashed the brains of those three women.

For a moment, they could not even find a suitable adjective to describe how absurd this game was!

The same question lingered in all three of their minds—

Was this fucking idea conceived by a carbon-based life-form???

The setup of one person playing the father and another playing the son had already been outrageous enough.

Yet Gu Sheng's design for determining victory and defeat was even more beyond the pale!

Especially that line: "The baby's objective is to get itself killed as much as possible"!

Was this some kind of hell game?

How could a thirty-seven-degree mouth say something so cold?

Was your mental state really stable?

Seeing the strange looks from the three women, Gu Sheng smiled somewhat awkwardly, like a bright and cheerful young man.

In the end, he turned his gaze toward Little Nezha, who was carrying out complicated calculations in her mind.

"So, CEO Shen, can my game... be approved?"

Shen Miaomiao remained silent for a full five seconds before slowly nodding.

It could.

More than that, it absolutely could.

With an idea this damn ridiculous, working at our game company is beneath you.

Go back a hundred years, and even Picasso would have to call you teacher.