Screeps was not promoted by Gamenova in any way.
Well, that might not be entirely accurate.
It should be said that it did not undergo any traditional form of publicity or promotion.
This time they didn't do a TV show production or publish any media articles.
The only thing that could be considered promotion was placing a direct link to it on the Nexus homepage.
but...
This is precisely the most accurate form of Google Ads targeting.
Who are the people who are capable of using the internet these days?
Aside from the geeks who are already passionate about tinkering, they were all guys who were interested in building websites.
Although the World Wide Web has made the internet much richer, the barriers to accessing the internet are still clearly there.
To put it bluntly, being able to correctly connect the phone line to the modem without accidentally disconnecting your own phone line already puts you ahead of many people.
Then you need to learn how to buy a genuine copy of the Nexus Browser from the correct channels. After all this trouble, it's already a huge funnel effect.
The netizens who were selected at least have basic operating habits.
What is the server load like?
Upon hearing this, Gerald checked several data points again before nodding and replying:
"It's okay so far. To be honest, the number of online users isn't as high as I expected. Thanks to the optimization algorithms you designed, it's surprisingly smooth."
"After all, it's still a niche game. How many people are online right now?"
"Let me see... If we don't consider private servers, the official servers only have a little over 20,000 users in total."
"Hmm, it's not bad."
Lin Lixin was not surprised by this result.
On the contrary, if it were to attract hundreds of thousands of online players like an MMORPG, he would wonder if people these days have all gone mad.
The true enjoyment of programming games can only be appreciated by those who are passionate about programming itself. For many, being a coder is just a job.
Why sit in front of your PC all day fumbling with those incomprehensible texts?
The answer, of course, is to have bread.
There are very few true geeks among them who are genuinely passionate about programming.
To have this number, there must also be a group of people who came specifically to learn new web technologies.
"Hilarious, this has broken our record for the lowest sales volume."
Lin Lixin laughed heartily.
Before this, Will Smith's SimCity had consistently been the worst-performing first-party game on Gamenova.
However, this work, with its terrifyingly long tail effect, continues to sell well even now.
SimCity is a slow-burning game that needs time to build up its momentum, so calling it the worst is a bit of an unfair criticism.
"However, the long-tail effect of 'Screeps' is also quite significant. Just watch, this is the foundation for our future."
Looking at the server load data on the screen, Lin Lixin nodded in satisfaction. Don't be fooled by the small number of players; these are all elites.
Novascript is derived from the N Language, although they are completely different in essence, their syntax is very similar to that of N Language.
Once this group has had their fill of messing with "Screeps," they can simply hand over the licenses for third-party development.
Of course, the final release will still have to Activision -approval process first.
If we really give up all distribution rights, the game market will probably be filled with a bunch of low-quality games again before long, just like Atari was back then.
The main task now is to ensure quality while expanding the roster as much as possible.
"Alright, in short, the main project for the Hardware Department this year is still the NPC handheld console. Report any problems immediately."
Lin Lixin nodded, got up and went downstairs.
The arcade division has now been completely dismantled and handed over to the new Gary, peripherals have been transferred to Thrustmaster, and server-side tasks have been placed under Nexus.
Gamenova's hardware is much lighter and more agile than before.
Back in the development department, Lin Lixin immediately noticed that the atmosphere seemed a bit off.
Carmack sat with his arms crossed, leaning back at his workstation, his brow furrowed, unconsciously biting his fingernails. This was a rare sight for him.
Lin Lixin moved closer to him and looked at the screen.
Turns out they were playing "Screeps".
He's truly a master; his base has been built up to a respectable standard.
Several specially constructed roads Fallout outwards from the base to the surrounding resource points.
These roads allow his units to move faster.
Carmack chose a good location, surrounded by mountains on three sides, so he only needed to defend against enemy attacks from one direction.
He had already built defensive fortifications there.
The city walls, towers, and associated defensive towers.
However, a group of enemy assault teams is currently attempting to break through the defenses.
Although the attack was destined to be futile against Carmack's rock-solid stronghold, it still greatly displeased him.
"What's wrong?" "Hmm..."
Carmack then noticed Lin Lixin behind him, and shook his head in slight frustration.
"I've run into a master."
Carmack continued only after the defensive towers eliminated the enemy squad:
"It seems to be the inflow from Finland; it's more severe than we expected."
He switched the view to the large map and located a base camp whose territory was no smaller than his own.
"We've been going back and forth on this for days. Will even tried it; the code is cleverly designed."
"Yes, the code is very efficient and the functionality is complete."
Will nodded.
When Carmack told him about it, he immediately went to Boston Garrison to find out more.
The current situation is that the three families are in a three-way standoff, staring at each other helplessly, with none able to do anything about the others.
If it were One on One -one duel, and he couldn't win, that would be one thing. But the current situation is that the opponent is completely playing auto-play.
I don't know if it's due to the time difference, but Carmack's online time always seems to cleverly overlap with the other person's.
Their matches always occurred when one of them was offline.
In other words, he was perfectly defended against by the logic that the other party had designed in advance.
"Huh?"
Lin Lixin listened with great interest as the two chattered on about the battle situation over the past two days.
Finland is indeed a place of outstanding people and beautiful scenery, and its geographical location has given it a rich historical significance.
At the same time, thanks to its high-welfare environment and cultural atmosphere, there are quite a few well-known game companies.
Just like the Angry Birds game they prepared for handheld consoles before.
Its developer, Rovio, is Finland.
Supercell, the developer of IPs such as Clash of Clans and Clash Royale, is also headquartered in Helsinki Finland.
There's also Colossal Order, the developer of Cities: Skylines, and Fingersoft, the developer of Hill Climb Racing... It has to be said that Finland is indeed a major producer of video games.
Not to mention Linus Benedict Torvalds, a master of Linux-level expertise.
"Hiss... Huh?"
Lin Lixin was suddenly taken aback when he thought of Linus.
How old is this guy who f**k Nvidia?
Although Linus himself didn't seem very interested in video games, Lin Lixin really wanted something as valuable as the Linux kernel.
As we enter the 32-bit era, and with the gradual maturation of peripheral hardware technologies such as batteries and low-power chips, the usage habits of game consoles will inevitably begin to shift towards modernization.
This is what is known as "standby".
In this day and age, after playing games, whether it's a console or a handheld, you need to turn off the power.
This is naturally for the sake of battery life and energy saving.
Take handheld consoles for example; low-power 8-bit consoles like the NP are fine.
The novaswift's power consumption is indeed alarmingly high. With so many AA batteries crammed in, it would run out of power in just a few hours. It would be impossible to use it like a modern mobile phone, where you can just put it in your pocket and leave it alone, rarely turning it off throughout the year.
The most typical example, of course, is Lin Lixin's Motorola mobile phone.
This thing truly disgusted him.
Its battery life is only about two hours.
Most of the time during the day, this thing is actually unusable.
Normally, it can only be used in emergencies; most of the time, we still rely on landlines.
But in the future, whether it's 32-bit or later 64-bit, this situation will naturally be different.
A device that can standby for a long time, a device that basically doesn't need to be powered on, and only needs to be charged in a timely manner.
For such machines, an operating system gradually becomes somewhat necessary.
In the 1980s and 90s, various electronic devices simply did not have the extra performance to run a dedicated system; they could only run a bare machine.
It only includes the necessary BIOS and directly manages the hardware.
This situation continued until the early 2000s. It wasn't until the release of the GP32 in 2001 that handheld consoles finally had their own operating system.
"I remember Vivian has always wanted to develop her own operating system. Maybe when we have the resources to make it 32-bit, we'll actually have a chance to fulfill her dream."
With that in mind, Lin Lixin simply contacted Sam directly and sent a notification to Ubisoft, who was in France.
If I'm not mistaken, Linus is probably studying at the University of Helsinki right now.
The future of Linux and Git is nowhere to be seen right now.
Game consoles operate on a different system than PCs and smartphones; they tend to be more closed systems.
Of course, SteamOS and those Windows handheld consoles are an exception.
But no matter what the operating system is, it is ultimately a descendant of Unix.
As long as they can assemble a qualified team, they can take the lead in developing their own operating system.
This thing... could even be a crucial part of blocking Trip and his 3Do.
Lin Lixin has a lot of game projects to work on, so he definitely can't afford to bother with a new team.
Vivian had this idea, but Micronova was a huge operation, and they were already busy enough. After much thought, it seemed it was time to poach talent again.
Linus was the perfect choice.
Young and energetic, highly skilled, with a low-key and steady personality, and without the rigidity of being complacent and afraid of new technologies.
The only problem is where to find this guy who hasn't even debuted yet.
Lin Lixin glanced at the screen and sighed helplessly.
"I wish he were as high-profile as this Finland player."