A Horror Game Studio That Didn't Make Horror Games

The heavy rain was still falling. Gao Ming wasn't particularly frightened, but his feelings were complicated.

Day had broken, but after searching online, Gao Ming discovered that the torrential rain had blocked the roads and triggered flash floods. No vehicles could get anywhere near the tunnel at the Three-City Junction of Hanjiang, Xinhu, and Hanhai.

"I hope the flash floods don't block that tunnel completely."

Unable to figure out why his games had become reality for now, Gao Ming could only accept this absurd fact. "I wonder if there's still time to delete those game designs. Looks like I'll have to visit Nightlight Game Studio."

Back when he had worked part-time designing games, he had collaborated with Nightlight Game Studio many times, providing them with numerous Game Design Plans and ideas for murder mysteries. Now he wanted to go there and delete every Game Design Plan he had designed, to see whether he could salvage the situation.

After a simple breakfast, Gao Ming put the Posthumous Photograph in his backpack, pulled on a raincoat, and headed out. He was a man who acted decisively.

The downpour scoured the city, and dark clouds blanketed everything. Gao Ming took a taxi to Hanhai's North City District.

His original plan had actually been to interview at Nightlight Game Studio after quitting his job as a psychological counselor, and become a proper game designer.

His reason for entering the industry was simple: there were no Horror Games on the market that he enjoyed playing, so he wanted to design his own.

At nine that morning, with directions from a cleaning lady, Gao Ming found Nightlight Game Studio's office.

Nightlight Game Studio belonged to Motu Technology, the country's largest gaming platform. It was one of the many game studios under Motu Technology and specialized in suspense and thriller games. However, it was currently transitioning to a new direction, and things weren't going well.

"Are you out of your minds?! What the hell is wrong with you?!"

Even through the glass door, Gao Ming could hear the roaring inside the office. He peered in.

"The client asked for an innovative, interactive romance game! You spent two weeks making this?!" Manager Gou, the head of Nightlight Game Studio, stood beside a desk with a thunderous expression. He was so angry that his potbelly heaved, and the wig on his head was about to slip off.

"Didn't you want something different from the romance games already on the market?" The office wasn't large. Wei Dayou sat right by the door, looking ready to flee at any moment. He was the studio's game planner and Programmer, as well as a fitness fanatic. A few years earlier, driven to desperation by his boss, he had gone online to ask for innovative game proposals. That was how he had met Gao Ming.

He had only wanted to finish his assignment, but unexpectedly, the Game Design Plan Gao Ming gave him won that year's award for most creative newcomer in game design.

Wei Dayou was an honest man, too. He immediately explained the truth to the company, and the competition organizers changed the original creator's name to Gao Ming, formally bringing Gao Ming into the gaming industry.

"I told you to make it different from the romance games on the market! Not to go back to your old trade and make Horror Games!" Manager Gou grabbed his wig and flung it onto the desk. The few remaining strands of hair on his head were soaked with sweat.

"Everyone's already worked overtime for two weeks. We've all done our best." Xia Yang adjusted his nonprescription glasses and narrowed his eyes slightly, a smile remaining on his face, as though none of the world's troubles had anything to do with him. Perhaps it was precisely because of his easygoing attitude that, at thirty-seven, he looked barely into his twenties. He was the studio's lead artist and had won international art awards. His style was wild and bizarre, difficult for ordinary people to understand.

"Your best, my ass!" Manager Gou slammed the desk. "We barely have any clients as it is! Are you trying to wipe out the rest?"

"Innovation, strong interactivity, gradually deepening feelings, sweet romance, devotion until death. I designed it exactly to your specifications." Wei Dayou pulled up the message Manager Gou had sent him.

"Sweet romance, my ass—this is a goddamn massage from hell!" Manager Gou swept his gaze over the employees in the office and clutched his remaining hair with both hands. "Our company has forty-one game studios, and we're ranked forty-first. There's literally nowhere lower for us to go! If you keep slacking off, we'll be disbanded on the spot and kicked out of Motu Technology!"

Unlike the other studio members, Manager Gou had been sent down from Motu Technology's head office. Rumor had it that he had offended someone and been forced to start over from scratch.

Although he was balding, greasy, and potbellied, he was the most fired-up person in the studio. Deep down, he refused to accept his situation and desperately wanted to prove himself again.

"Three days! I'm giving you three more days. Whatever it takes, you have to produce a normal romance game!" Manager Gou picked up his wig, angrily grabbed his oversized insulated mug full of goji berries, and strode toward the exit on his plump legs, only to run into Gao Ming at the door.

At the sight of Gao Ming, Manager Gou's eyelids twitched slightly. He had worked with Gao Ming many times and knew his design style and philosophy.

He still remembered the first time he had read one of Gao Ming's proposals. Its three-thousand-character synopsis contained seventeen instances of gore and horror, leaving Boss Gou deeply shaken.

"Gao Ming... morning. You didn't come to the interview the day before yesterday, so we hired someone new." Manager Gou's gaze shifted evasively. "She'll be coming in for work soon."

When the studio had made suspense games, Manager Gou and Gao Ming had worked very well together. But now that the studio was abandoning Horror Games, Gao Ming's arrival made things rather awkward.

"I'm not here for an interview." Gao Ming saw through Manager Gou's concerns at once. He was a considerate person who disliked causing trouble for others, so he took the initiative to explain. "I've run into some things I can't explain. I may need to take back all the Game Design Plans I gave you and destroy them."

"Destroy them? Every one of those proposals could become a classic if we made it!" Wei Dayou left his workstation and walked over to Gao Ming. "What happened to you?"

"I probably won't be making Horror Games anymore, either." Gao Ming patted Wei Dayou's shoulder. "And a word of advice: try not to go out at night over the next few days."

Hearing Gao Ming say he would no longer make Horror Games, Manager Gou warmed up again. "Gao, I heard from Dayou that you quit your job at the prison. Why not come work here for now? We can find something for you to do. We have complete faith in your abilities. You don't need an interview at all!"

"I think I'll pass."

After patiently discussing things with everyone, Gao Ming finally persuaded Wei Dayou to open the studio's filing cabinet and dig out all the Game Design Plans he had supplied over the years.

Game development involved a long production cycle and enormous upfront investment. Many game concepts couldn't attract funding, so they could only be shelved for the time being.

Frankly, if Nightlight Studio hadn't been preparing to change direction and abandon Horror Games, it would have been difficult for Gao Ming to get these concepts back.

Patiently sorting through the fruits of years of work, Gao Ming roughly divided his game designs into five tiers according to their danger: criminal, rumor, omen, ghostly words, and strange tale.

Criminal games were adapted from real cases. All danger came from humans, with an emphasis on deduction and gathering evidence, and everything followed real-world logic.

Rumor games were also based on murders, with some eerie, horrifying stories woven in. However, those stories were mostly false, and the real danger still came from humans.

Games in the omen tier were different. Signs of terrifying things began to appear, the world's underlying logic collapsed, and the danger came from various curses and anomalies.

In the fourth danger tier, ghostly words, ghosts actually appeared in the games.

The fifth tier was strange tale, which meant nowhere within a certain area was safe anymore. The rules had changed, anything could be a ghost, and the strange tale would keep expanding and growing, affecting more people.

There was actually a sixth danger tier as well—Uncontrolled Strange Tale. Gao Ming had designed games that were utterly hopeless, too. His main reason for coming here was to destroy those few most despair-inducing games, hoping they wouldn't become real.

"Thirty-six criminal games, twenty-five rumor games, five omen games, twenty-five ghostly words games, thirty-one strange tale games, and four uncontrolled strange tale games... I really have worked hard over the years."

(End of chapter)