The Howling Wind and Rain Never Ceased

At a glance, games in this era were full of equipment, top-ups, and skins.

For most people, it was their first time playing a game like This War of Mine.

After shutting down the computer, Yinzi felt hollow inside. He stared straight at a corner of the house, his head feeling as though it had been struck by a heavy hammer.

He had played many games, including no small number of war games. In other war games, you wielded weapons and killed enemies to defend your country.

Those games offered all kinds of powerful weapons. Enemies were like lifeless ants, mere strings of data that could respawn after dying. Killing them brought no guilt whatsoever.

But what about this game?

Here, all you could do was die meaninglessly like a dog.

In the game, you could choose whether to help other survivors, and those survivors were not necessarily good people.

You could kill those survivors and loot their resources. The only thing restraining you—was the morality in your heart.

This game could be called the simplest game everyone had ever played in terms of controls.

Yet very few people cleared it.

[You've been playing for a long time! Come rate this game!]

When players exited the game, the system automatically popped up a message.

Seeing those words, everyone found them painfully glaring. Was the game simple?

It was extremely simple. The gap between it and action games was simply enormous.

But whenever it came time to make a choice in the game, the mouse seemed especially heavy.

The game had a high number of downloads, higher than Song Shan had expected, but its completion rate was very low.

"Do you know how low this game's rating is?" Song Shan sat across from Ethan Vale. During this period, the atmosphere in the studio had been extremely oppressive.

Song Shan still remembered that while they had been making the game, every employee's eyes had been bloodshot. Whenever they looked at Ethan Vale, their eyes were filled with resentment.

"How low?" Ethan Vale raised a brow at Song Shan. In his previous life, this game had even been taken down for a while. It was said to be due to cultural review issues; because of its content, the game had to be submitted for review again, so it was urgently removed.

That reason alone showed just how severe the issues raised by this game were.

It laid bare the torture of players' hearts.

The game was divided into daytime and nighttime modes. During the day, players built furniture in the safehouse, cooked food, made cigarettes, and brewed alcohol.

At night, they could head out to scavenge or loot, exploring other areas ravaged by war.

As they dealt with people of every sort, relationships between people changed amid the war. There was now an added layer of wariness between them.

At all times, they had to worry that someone might be tempted by wealth and attack them.

Most importantly, the game gave players weapons—crowbars, axes, daggers, sharp tools, or guns and bullets they found some way to obtain. All of them could be used to hurt others.

Yet buried among them were moral choices that might be reached.

It gave you the ability to hurt others, but every act of violence you committed could have been avoided.

After violence, your characters would feel sad, blame themselves, and repent...

And if one of your characters died in the game because of your decision, the game could still continue. It was simply that this character was dead forever.

The game did not allow save-scumming. Just like reality, there was no starting over.

Once dead, they were dead.

"Only 2.3 points. The rating has been falling the whole time. Before long, it might just drop to the lowest on the platform." Song Shan's eyes were filled with conflicted emotions. The game had a high number of downloads, yet an extremely low rating.

Moreover, this was the first game he had ever seen where a low rating did not drive players away.

Without changing expression, Ethan Vale opened his phone and looked through the comments beneath the game.

Among all those comments, he saw only one Super Difficult rating. It had been posted by the player called Dumpling.

[This is the hardest game I've ever played. I didn't even make it to the ending. Everyone was already dead before winter arrived, yet people still said I got one of the best endings.

The game constantly tests your kind heart, while hurting you at the same time.

There are things in the game that you have no choice but to do. A single day of inaction will leave you unable to survive in the war.

You all play it. I'm too bad at this. I can't play it.]

System: Super Difficult ratings obtained (1/1000)

The other players still stubbornly clicked "Very Easy." If they had previously been doing it to mock the designer, then now they were venting the anger in their hearts.

[Before playing the game, I had heard about the forbidden area of the game. After the game ended, I still remembered one scene: the old couple in the Quiet House. I also understood why it was called the Quiet House. Before the player arrived, it was quiet and warm. After the player arrived, it was also deathly quiet.

Looking through the crack in the door, they sat facing each other beside the heater, reminiscing about the past. It was so warm that it felt like heaven in hell.

The door could not stop me, nor could the two old people. Their house had a huge amount of materials, plenty of food, and medicine.

What a—Quiet House!

The old man said to me, "Are you going to kill us?"

I said nothing. I merely looked here and rummaged there.

The old man grew frightened and said, "Please, spare my wife."

I didn't take anything.

The old man followed me, saying over and over, "Please, please..."

Then I walked to the door again and closed it.

That night was the only time I returned home empty-handed.

Maybe I gained something after all. Who knows.]

[If war really broke out, I wouldn't know how to build a bed, a radio, or a water purifier. I wouldn't know how to make bandages, produce alcohol, or craft guns...

I wouldn't take a knife and go rob soldiers and terrorists.

I wouldn't know where was safe, where was dangerous, where supplies were plentiful, where they were scarce, or where there were hidden caches...

I wouldn't know that gunfire would run through day and night, that the howling wind and rain would never cease, or that getting a good night's sleep could be so difficult.

I wouldn't know what could be made from the materials in my hands. I wouldn't know that even with careful planning, things would grow harder by the day.

I wouldn't know that an ordinary winter could freeze people to death. I wouldn't know that snipers could pick you off at night.]

[While playing, I kept telling myself and comforting myself: this was war, I had no choice, and I didn't want to kill anyone. But when my companions died one after another too, I finally understood the pain of having life taken away.]

[This is the best game I've ever played, and also the worst.]

[I think Katia wants a drink, but I have no companions left, and no alcohol either.]

[This game let me see myself.]