This Game Is Absolutely Insane!

"Brothers, even if I die and am nailed inside a coffin, I'll still use this rotten voice to shout that this game is fucking insane!!!"

"No more nonsense—if this game doesn't blow up, I'll shit upside down!"

Early that morning, the group owner, "Fleeting Time," finally showed up in the Ox-Horse Club. His completely unexpected remarks blew quite a few lurkers out of hiding.

Quit Smoking: "Holy shit? The group owner lives?"

Ye Ao Nai Wo He: "What kind of normal-people schedule is this?!"

Spare Me: "Didn't see you dog admins all night. I thought you got arrested for doing something shady. (Smirk)"

④WhoEvenUnderstandsLove: "What game, what game?"

"Confused.JPG"

After a while, the dog admin "Long Days Ahead" also surfaced.

"It's that virtual reality game Brother Guang recommended in the group three days ago."

Quit Smoking: "Holy shit, you're already playing it?! For real?! You're not lying to me, right?!"

Long Days Ahead: "Why would I lie to you?"

Unfortunately, the device didn't support taking screenshots in-game.

Otherwise, he would have posted one directly.

Quit Smoking: "Then hurry up and tell us! What's a fully immersive virtual reality game actually like? Which VR headset can play it?"

Fleeting Time: "VR? Heh, how can those head-mounted screens even compare to Wasteland OL's game helmet? (Laugh)"

Quit Smoking: "What do you mean? Can Wasteland OL be played without VR goggles?"

Long Days Ahead: "I can tell you've never seen anything. They use a game helmet. Emmmm... how do I explain it? You've watched Sword Art Online, right? It's pretty much that kind of thing."

Quit Smoking: "Holy shit?!"

④WhoEvenUnderstandsLove: "A head-mounted microwave?! That's awesome!"

Ye Ao Nai Wo He: "Who are you trying to fool? Sword Art Online and all that... How come I've never heard of technology this badass?"

Spare Me: "Exactly!"

The vast majority of them didn't believe it.

It sounded far too absurd!

Logically speaking, when an unprecedented technology emerged, it had to go through a process from unfamiliarity to maturity. That buildup could be short, but it had to exist.

Fang Chang actually understood how they felt deep down.

After all, he had gone through the exact same stage—thinking that this so-called fully immersive virtual reality game was just a joke some dumbass group member was playing on everyone.

However—

It was real.

Long Days Ahead: "The device doesn't support photos, so I really can't prove it. Believe it or not. But after experiencing it for so long, I've summed up some intel about the game."

Quit Smoking: "Good brother! Hurry up and tell us!"

Long Days Ahead: "Group owner, mute the whole group. I type slowly."

Fleeting Time: "Sure thing!"

As a former top 200 player on PUBG's Asian server and a League of Legends Challenger, Long Days Ahead's talent for gaming was obvious to everyone in the group.

When it came to games, he had the most authority to speak.

This guy seemed like he never had to work. He played games every day.

Not just multiplayer games, either. His name could be found on the speedrun guide teams for quite a few single-player games.

There were plenty of blockbuster titles among them, and many of the old hands in the group had even used guides he personally wrote.

He could be called the king of useless people.

Therefore, regardless of whether they believed in the concept of a "fully immersive virtual online game," and regardless of whether they had obtained closed beta access, almost everyone waited curiously for him to type.

"Let's start with the game setting."

"The setting itself isn't anything special: classic post-apocalyptic lore plus a wasteland-punk style. The story takes place in a fictional world where a nuclear war destroyed everything two hundred years ago, and players take the role of shelter residents returning to the surface."

"At present, we—the closed beta players—are heading to the surface as an advance team to build an outpost. We haven't officially entered the main story yet. More clues will probably only be unlocked after the internal beta, or even the public beta, so I won't go into that."

"Next, the realism!"

"It's no exaggeration to say that this game's realism is the ceiling of every game I've ever seen, and it's foreseeable that this ceiling will be almost impossible to surpass even fifty years from now! As for why I say that, it's because this game is basically the wasteland DLC for 'Earth OL'!"

"Whether it's the lighting and shadow effects, the interaction of all five senses, or even the grainy feel of touching a material's surface... everything exists to make you believe that this is a real world. This immersive experience has undoubtedly reached one hundred percent. Yes, one hundred percent! At least, I haven't found any obvious bugs or flaws."

"Then there's the freedom."

"As a sandbox game, you can interact with almost everything you can touch. This interaction isn't just simple collision detection. You can alter their positions through your own will, and even change their shape or state within the limits of physical laws."

"I know what you're thinking—Minecraft or The Forest, right? But it's completely different. It's a sandbox in the truest sense, not building blocks pieced together from pixels and textures! On that point alone, sandbox players absolutely won't regret getting this game!"

"Now for the most important part!"

"First of all, neither players nor monsters have HP bars or MP bars, and there are no visible stat panels either. At least not in the closed beta stage."

"However, in actual gameplay, different players do have different starting attributes. For example, some players have greater strength, while others have higher perception, agility, or other undiscovered hidden attributes. I speculate that once the internal beta version arrives, there should be a class system and weapon system, allowing players to develop their own playstyles based on their talents and attributes."

"Next are the NPCs. At the current closed beta stage, there are only two NPCs in the game. One is the administrator codenamed 'Dawn.' The other is his assistant, Xiao Qi, who's a robot!"

"At present, it can be confirmed that both NPCs have a high degree of intelligence and can communicate and interact normally with players. I estimate there may be a hidden favorability system involved, but that's only my personal guess and hasn't been confirmed."

"Besides that, what concerns me more is pain. Although it's a one-hundred-percent realistic game, making some things too realistic isn't good, especially since I'm pretty afraid of pain. But this game's design is very humane. Pain exists alongside touch, but there's a protection threshold."

"For example, I tried cutting my arm with a stone. It didn't hurt, but pinching myself did hurt a little. I estimate the game has some kind of protection mechanism that prevents 'excessive' pain from being detected by the brain's neural center... Of course, it could also be the human body's own self-protection mechanism. It's like how we can feel pain in dreams, but it never exceeds our limit of endurance."

"Actually, I think the game's developers could be even more humane, such as letting players adjust their own pain settings. Personally, I'm very satisfied with the current five-sense immersion and pain blocking, but maybe some players like that kind of feeling. (Laugh)"

"As for the game's resurrection mechanic, I haven't tried it yet. But I heard that every death deducts a certain number of contribution points, and the resurrection cooldown lasts a full three days! Contribution points are manageable since you can get them by completing quests, but the time penalty is way too long. Anyway, I don't want to try it. If any brave warrior is interested, go test it yourself. Maybe you'll unlock a different playstyle."

"Lastly, I want to complain about why all the characters are burly men??? Who the hell wants to see naked grown men!!! I strongly demand that the developers allow players to set their own gender!"

Long Days Ahead had typed out one or two thousand words in one go, and more and more people in the group gathered to lurk and watch.

That included the mastermind behind it all—"Guang."

Chu Guang had been looking over the medical examination reports scanned by the cultivation pods and hadn't noticed the group messages. When he logged onto the computer in the residents' hall and looked, damn, they had written this much?

But honestly, this guy called Long Days Ahead had summed things up very accurately. He had basically said everything Chu Guang wanted to say, and had even considered things Chu Guang hadn't thought of.

The group mute was lifted.

Group messages instantly flooded the screen.

"6666!"

"Damn, if this game is really that awesome, I'll buy ten copies!"

"I don't believe it."

"Don't believe it +1! Unless you give me closed beta access!"

Although many group members still didn't believe a game this incredible really existed, at least a dozen people switched sides on the spot.

As for how Chu Guang knew, it was because he could see the website backend on his end.

While Long Days Ahead had been rambling, the number of reservations had jumped from eleven to twenty-five.

Guang: "I was working just now and didn't pay attention to the group. Brother Long Days Ahead was basically right, so I'll just add a few things."

Quit Smoking: "Fuck! Brother Guang!!!"

(The whole group has been muted.)

("Guang" has been appointed as a group admin.)

Huh?

He became a dog admin?

Chu Guang was slightly surprised, but he didn't pay much attention to it and continued typing.

"First, regarding player characters and attributes, it really is as Brother Long Days Ahead said. The game does have character attributes and level settings, and every player has different initial talents. These can be checked at the respawn point—that is, the cultivation pod where players wake up—or on the official website."

"The death penalty isn't just a three-day resurrection cooldown and deducted contribution points. It also causes part of your progress before your last save to be lost. To save, you need to lie in a cultivation pod and undergo a scan and somatic cell sampling. It takes roughly one to two hours, and the process will automatically take place after the player logs off."

"We expect to implement a faster attribute-checking system before the internal beta stage, allowing players to keep track of their character's status in real time and improving gameplay."

"As for customizing character appearance and gender... I'm sorry, but that can't be done."

"Just like how you can't decide your body when you're reincarnated, the body in the game is determined by preloaded DNA. If you're dissatisfied with your character's appearance, you can consider cosmetic surgery or even cybernetic modification. That feature will be added later in the game."

"Also, starting from the first round of testing, players can use a questionnaire on the reservation level page to set their preference among the five attributes of strength, agility, constitution, perception, and intelligence."

"If you choose strength, you'll have a higher chance of obtaining a strength-type talent, and your starting character will have greater strength. If you don't have a preference, you can choose a balanced type."

"As for gender, the character's gender matches the player's gender, and players cannot set it freely. This is mainly for safety reasons. Differences in physiological structure can lead to coordination issues. At the same time, the risk of gender identity disorders and social controversy caused by this is also something we are unwilling to bear."

Actually, this wasn't something Chu Guang had set.

It was the system's original setting.

There seemed to be an extremely complicated technical problem behind it. Chu Guang didn't understand the principles, only that this was how it worked.

Long Days Ahead: "Damn it! Don't do this! I'm already an adult, I can sign a risk acknowledgment form!!! T.T"

(Group admin "Long Days Ahead" has been muted by the group owner for 10 minutes.)

Fleeting Time: "Don't interrupt!"

Level 8 Gale: "Exactly, exactly."

Gets Up More Than Ten Times a Night: "Please just shut up first."

Chu Guang found it amusing, but he didn't get sidetracked. He continued typing.

"That is the result of the discussion from the meeting I just attended. Also, in the next stage of testing, we will add a 'favorability' system."

Gets Up More Than Ten Times a Night: "Favorability?! What does that mean? Can we date NPCs?!"

(Group admin "Gets Up More Than Ten Times a Night" has been muted by the group owner for 10 minutes.)

Damn.

Old White really was impartial. He muted him immediately without a second word.

That saved Chu Guang quite a bit of time.

Chu Guang shamelessly continued typing in a serious tone.

"Stop thinking about dating all day. Favorability refers to an NPC's evaluation of a player."

"Specifically, player behavior will affect how NPCs view players. Especially for certain key NPCs, once favorability is high enough, you can not only obtain extra rewards, but may even trigger hidden quests and unlock hidden class paths!"

Hidden quests!

Hidden classes!

Upon seeing those simple eight words, the eyes of the four closed beta players in front of their screens went wide.

A fire burned in their hearts.

Damn, this was encouraging them to become simps!

But—

They loved it!

What was wrong with being a simp?

It wasn't like they were simping for real people!

They were simping for NPCs, for artificial intelligence. Besides, there were huge benefits after simping.

Nothing embarrassing about that!

Chu Guang thought about it and felt there was nothing else he needed to add.

The shelter was too poor right now. As a bare commander with nothing but a large group of free laborers, he could only draw players in with promises as an online dog developer.

"Do you have anything you want to ask? Or anything you're particularly concerned about?" Chu Guang wanted to know whether the players themselves had any better ideas.

He was a very open-minded person.

If conditions allowed, he could consider adopting them. If conditions didn't allow, he could still make a promise and tell them they would have it later.

Level 8 Gale: "Yes! What exactly are those contribution points? Are they currency? Or something like experience? Points?"

Sure enough, they had asked about it.

Chu Guang thought for a moment and typed a reply.

"The game's economic system is still being designed. Our goal is to create a completely realistic economic system from production to circulation, allowing both life-class players and combat-class players to fully enjoy the game."

"As for contribution points, you can think of them as a special currency for the closed beta stage, mainly used to test the current quest system."

"Besides being used to purchase resurrection coins, our development team is also considering releasing some special rewards that can only be exchanged with contribution points as a return for closed beta players."

Anyway, he was just making promises.

As for what the rewards would be, Chu Guang hadn't decided yet. That depended on what useful things he could get from the system.

Yet in the players' eyes, those words meant something completely different.

Can only be exchanged with contribution points?!

In other words—

Closed beta-exclusive rewards!

The four players who had already obtained closed beta access were grinning from ear to ear.

Those who had already made reservations on the official website but hadn't gotten closed beta access were also left itching with anticipation.

As for the group members who had never believed in any "fully immersive virtual reality game" from the beginning, they naturally wouldn't change their minds because of a single sentence from him.

However.

That didn't matter.

As long as someone believed, it was enough.

"It's getting late. I worked overtime all night, so I need to sleep for a while. Oh, right, Fang Chang, your guide was pretty good. Why not post it on the official website? The website's forum system is open now. You can post after registering an account, and good posts will be featured when the admins see them."

That admin was naturally Chu Guang himself.

At present, he was the only person in the entire company. He played both an NPC and a dog developer, while also working part-time as the official website forum moderator.

"OK! I'm going right now!" Fang Chang, who had already been unmuted, left that message and immediately started scrolling through the chat history.

The group owner lifted the whole-group mute.

Messages in the group surged like floodwaters after a dam broke.

Chu Guang saw that quite a few people had added him as a friend. Some wanted to sweet-talk him for closed beta access, some wanted to ask him for game intel, and some even intended to teach him how to make games.

Unable to reply to them all, he simply replied to none of them and logged off.

Looking at the four medical examination reports on the computer, Chu Guang suddenly had an idea and asked.

"Xiao Qi."

"What is it, Master?"

"You mean... since the players can use the cultivation pods, could I also move around through a clone inside one of those pods?"

"Emmm... I don't know."

"What do you mean, you don't know???"

"Because I'm only your assistant. You basically know all the information I know. There are no records in my database regarding cultivation pods for your use. Maybe... the previous Administrator never designed a cultivation pod that you could use?"

Chu Guang had been about to ask why, but suddenly fell silent.

In truth, the reason was not difficult to guess.

If this shelter could withstand a strategic-level nuclear strike, then there surely was no means on this wasteland capable of forcibly breaching it.

Even if something happened to him, the one they had pinned their hopes on, all it had to do was hibernate a while longer and wait for the next Administrator to arrive.

Seeing Chu Guang fall silent, Xiao Qi let out a concerned chirp.

"Master?"

"It's nothing."

Coming back to himself, Chu Guang continued looking at the physical examination report on the computer screen.

Perhaps to make things easier for the players to understand, or perhaps due to the first Administrator's twisted sense of humor, more than 120 complex physical function metrics had all been reorganized into five concise categories.

Namely: Strength, Agility, Constitution, Perception, and Intelligence.

Strength represented the strength of bodily tissues such as muscles and bones. It determined a player's base carrying capacity, melee damage, throwing distance, and so on.

Agility corresponded to reflexes and was related to numerous physical metrics, including reaction speed and motor coordination. In practice, players with higher Agility were more nimble in combat and more likely to evade attacks proactively.

Constitution corresponded to a player's vitality and resilience. It was mainly reflected in health recovery after injury, as well as resistance and immunity to certain abnormal conditions.

Intelligence was not the same as IQ or logical reasoning ability. It mainly affected a character's learning ability and recovery speed from mental strain, while also affecting compatibility with neural interface devices. In practical terms, characters with high Intelligence could operate more neural interface devices simultaneously.

Perception represented intuition and insight. Characters with higher Perception had sharper instincts for danger and found it easier to notice hidden clues and traps.

It was also the most mysterious attribute!

The baseline value for all attributes was 5, fluctuating within a range of ±2 depending on genetic sequence and physical condition.

Although he did not have a cultivation pod of his own, Chu Guang still found a spare physical examination device on B1 of the shelter.

Just as he had guessed.

He also possessed a special genetic sequence that could be detected by the examination device.

Unfortunately, there was no related information about this genetic sequence in the database. It was like an existence outside the plan.

In gaming terms, this was a path that even the "game publisher" had never envisioned.

And that meant no one knew where following this path would ultimately lead, or what kind of outcome it would bring.

Realizing this, Chu Guang felt a faint trace of unease.

But more than that, he felt excitement.

Perhaps the word adventure had been carved into his bones.

Rather than following a path laid out by others step by step, he would rather walk his own road.

Based on the examination results and the attribute conversion formula left behind by the first Administrator, Chu Guang created his own attribute panel. Using it as a template, he also made one for the four closed-beta players.

ID: Chu Guang

Genetic Sequence: Administrator

Level: LV.5

--Basic Attributes--

Strength: 8

Agility: 6

Constitution: 6

Perception: 7

Intelligence: 6

"My five attributes are basically a whole tier above the players'."

"Does Level LV.5 mean the genetic sequence has been developed by 5%? Looks like the past five months weren't completely wasted."

The other four closed-beta players all had development progress of 0.

Though it was not entirely 0.

For example, Fleeting Time.

His genetic sequence was "Strength Type." Through frequently using brute force—namely, chopping down trees—his development progress had increased by 0.3% in a single day, while the other three closed-beta players had only increased by around 0.1%.

If he kept chopping trees over the next two days, Old White might become the first player to break through Level 0 and advance to LV1.

Thinking of this, Chu Guang made up his mind.

Sure enough, he had to make them do more work.

It was for their own good, too!