I Just Want Players to Save Money, They Insist on Giving Me!

Chapter 80: Chapter 50: Ke Jin’s Ecstatic! Even Major Streamers Can’t Make This Abstract Game Popular!_2 Chapter 80: Chapter 50: Ke Jin’s Ecstatic! Even Major Streamers Can’t Make This Abstract Game Popular!_2 Hei moved forward, and after cresting the sand dune ahead, he saw a colossal mountain standing tall on the distant horizon.

A crack split the middle of the mountain, from which a light of utter sanctity gleamed.

The game’s name “Wind Traveler” slowly emerged at the mountain’s peak.

“Generally speaking, every action a game designer takes is meaningful; they include subtle hints within the game for players. If you don’t know where to go next, heading towards the highlighted areas is a safe bet. The same applies now; if a mountain appears on the screen, it indicates that we should head in the direction of the mountain,” Yin explained a couple more sentences, fearing the audience wouldn’t understand.

Soon, he slid down from the top of the sand dunes with Hei, quickly passing the tombstone cluster from the initial CG and arriving at the first level.

“You know, this sand sliding sensation is actually pretty cool.”

Sliding down a slope naturally generates a sense of thrill and pleasure, whether it’s surfing, skiing, or cycling downhill.

The game captured this detail superbly—be it the dynamic blur of vision when sliding or the sound effect of the wind whistling, down to the texture of scraping marks left on the ground.

All incredibly realistic, it gave the illusion that ‘I am the one sliding down the sand.’

And from that moment on, Yin felt his immersion in the game had intensified a bit.

The audience, who had been ready to sleep, began to pay more attention, though the bullet chat was still much less active compared to Yin’s live streams of other games.

Although the primary tone of the first level was still sand, unlike the tombstones, ruins of broken buildings were everywhere, half-buried in the dirt.

In the distance, some long ribbons of the same color as Hei’s red robe could be seen rooted in the buildings, fluttering vigorously in the wind.

Following the logic Yin had just mentioned.

In a scene, if the designer places something new that differed from before, it acts as a cue for players to approach the new element, essentially playing on human curiosity.

This wasn’t unusual; many Blue Star designers often used this tactic in their games.

When Hei approached the ribbon-like red sashes, they seemed to come to life, dancing more intensely in the wind.

“Alright, alright, no need to salute. I don’t have any tips for you,” Yin, as a joyous game streamer, mainly excelled at creating entertaining content.

However, the content revealed by the game so far was quite limited, and with the character under his control being all alone amid widespread sands, there was almost no interaction.

Left with no better option, Yin managed to make light-hearted remarks here and there.

It did not take long for Yin to understand the purpose of these red sashes.

The sashes were imprinted with runes resembling QR codes, which after the player held down the left mouse button to charge up, would all gather on the red scarf trailing behind Hei.

The scarf would temporarily grow longer, granting the player the ability to fly.

However, the flight consumed the energy bar, which was the length of the scarf behind.

When the scarf’s length was fully depleted, the character would fall back to the ground.

“Damn, scanning a code to enter! That’s pretty high-end.”

After unlocking the flying ability, Yin became truly joyful.

In the vast empty desert, one could see a figure constantly leaping and bounding around.

“Wuhu~”

He would fly whenever he could, then land and sprint when out of energy, touching the ribbon-like sashes along the way to recharge, and continue soaring into the wind.

The reason Yin played this way was mainly because the desolate scene combined with the sad background music at dead of night nearly drenched the screen with loneliness.

The entire game lacked any living thing, yet with its vastness and lack of interest, players had nothing to do but entertain themselves.

“The boss really loves games. He can even get so excited over this one… If it were me, I might have uninstalled it already.”

“I gotta say I almost fell asleep watching this game. So far, I still haven’t figured out what it’s about, but watching the boss have fun gives me a strangely serene feeling inside.”

“I’m not sure about other things, but this game is definitely great for helping with sleep. The scenes are exquisite, and the music is very soft and pleasant to listen to.”

“Guys, I’m off to bed first. Turn off the lights for me, thanks!”

In his wild, random wandering, Yin also encountered some solitary ‘QR codes’

Unlike the QR code runes on the sashes, absorbing these QR codes would permanently increase his scarf’s length, allowing for more extended flight.

It served as one of the few joys in the game—a nuanced way to subtly enhance the character’s abilities.

The first level hardly had many complex elements, basically just admiring the scenery, wandering around, collecting QR codes, and that was it.

Eventually, Yin guided his character to climb to the top of a ruin tower at the edge of sight.

A few back-and-forth leaps, he ascended swiftly to the peak of the tower.

He approached a small, oddly-shaped stele surrounded by six tombstones.

Without his control, Hei sat cross-legged in front of the stele, and the scarf behind him emitted waves of white light that flowed into the stele,

Soon, the entire screen was enveloped in white light.

In the image, Hei appeared bewildered in a space filled with nothing but white.

Before him stood a tall figure, shrouded in a misty blur, difficult to discern clearly, yet one could feel that it was a creature of the same kind as Hei, except it was dressed in a white robe.

The figure in the white robe did not turn around; Hei walked behind it and tilted his head up slightly to look at the figure.

The figure, however, was looking up at the mountain that had appeared at the start of the game.

From the crevices of the mountain, a mysterious white light burst forth, and then the scene transitioned to an ancient mural.

In the mural, the light bursting from the mountain turned into a sky full of QR codes, which spread out, and as they did, the mural gradually extended, revealing abstract illustrations of birds, fish, and trees.

And a group of white robes.

The white robes encircled a red ribbon, which seemed to be absorbing the energy of the QR codes, and then it began to lengthen.

At this point, the mural ended, and the game returned to the scene where Hei was sitting cross-legged.

Because of this overly stream-of-consciousness segment, it left the viewers’ comments completely baffled.

“????”

“Ke?”

“What is this mess? Was the plot written with their feet?”

“I can’t understand this with my elementary school level culture, someone explain please.”

“I have a post-doctorate, and even I didn’t get it.”

“Never mind post-doctorate, I’m a double-barrelled bulletin board Master, a master of idiots and grandmasters, and I still can’t understand it.”

“Alright, alright! So Ke Jin made a game just for himself to play, huh?”

“Even Da Vinci would call this abstract.”

“Could it be possible that the artist’s name is Picasso?”

“So what? Can’t Da Vinci find it abstract?”

“Fast forward to the boss slamming the table: ‘Can’t play this game for a minute! Roll out of my Ke Skin Oil Teng overnight!'”

…

Ke Jin kept an eye on the barrage of criticism flooding the live streaming room.

If the previous wave of players demanding refunds was just a conclusion of unpopularity,

then the actual comments in the streaming room now adequately demonstrated an unpopularity in process.

Having only a negative conclusion is manageable if you don’t know what state the players are in when playing the game, but Ke Jin still remembered his previous ‘painful’ lessons well.

But now, Ke Jin saw with his own eyes.

Throughout the entire gameplay, the players could not muster the slightest bit of interest, and that was truly enough to kill the competition.

It seemed as he had expected.

“Wind Traveler” might be a good game,

but for the players of Blue Star in this era, it was simply too ahead of its time.

Even a high-energy streamer like Yin couldn’t drum up interest, which was telling.

Ke Jin finally let go of the anxiety he was holding onto, his taut nerves suddenly relaxed, and drowsiness surged over him.

He took an eye mask emblazoned with Big Oupy from the table and put it on his head.

Addiction to sleep hit him, off to sleep he went!

He believed that when he woke up, it would be to a day filled with hope!

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Good news, brothers!

With everyone’s support, we successfully completed the PK challenge, and now we can use the loudspeaker! Thank you all for your love! A big kowtow to everyone before the launch!

Bang bang bang!!!

Also, I’m asking for first subscriptions! Launching at 12 noon tomorrow, I’ll release five big 4K-word chapters in one go! We’ll finish this game up! (P.S.: Might not be exactly 5 chapters, possibly three or four, since some places can’t be split without losing atmosphere, so a chapter might even have 6K words. But the total update will definitely be enough for 20,000 words, equivalent to what other authors would call ten chapters! Already have 12K words in reserve, reaching 20K won’t be a problem! Subscribe with confidence!)