In March 1983, under the leadership of Liu Zhendong, Mark Cerney came to Lin Qi's office in a happy mood. Pen @ fun @ pavilion wWw. ｂｉｑUｇE。 ｉｎｆｏ

If there are no accidents, he will soon be responsible for the new arcade "1941" with an investment of 10 million Hong Kong dollars.

Mark Cerney already has a hunch that once this game is released, it will definitely be a hit, at least not inferior to the "Space Invaders" back then!

There are a lot of shooting game markets, but because the whole market is too homogeneous, they are not selling very well now. However, if there is an innovative work that can make the player's eyes shine, it will definitely ignite the passion of the player quickly!

"Tell me about your understanding of this type of game?" said Lin Qi with a smile.

"Yes, Mr. Lin...... "Mark Cerney thought for a moment, "first of all, it is fun, it can keep the player hooked, and in this regard, it deliberately motivates the player through sight, sound, and all aspects. Compared to Space Invaders, thanks to advances in hardware and software technology, players can be given better color and sound in terms of heaven. What's more important is creativity, the core play points of "1941" are all written in the creative manual provided by the boss, the graphics of this kind of games in the past are too simple, and the story background is also very rough, but "1941" is based on the real historical background, which makes it possible to give players more sense of substitution. But whether you can make a great game, the key is the details, the game must be tense and exciting, countless dangers, but still leave some loopholes, so that the player can do the 'impossible' to complete the thrilling action and level! The enemy barrage looks very dense, far more than the player. But the player is intelligent, and the enemies under the control of the computer attack according to certain rules. This pattern requires the player to use his eyes to discover and think with his head, and at the same time, to complete it with his hands, sometimes, even a mistake of less than 0.1 seconds, may cause a crash!"

Lin Qi nodded and said, "I understand it very well, but I still need other incentive mechanisms." For example, our other arcade machines have already introduced the ultimate move of rage and charge! Look, how about this idea?"

"Ultimate!" said Mark Serney, confused, "but...... Isn't it weird to release a big move under the game mechanics of machine warfare?"

"It's not weird at all!" Lin Qi said, "If a conventional weapon fires bullets through a machine gun cannon, then ...... There are also unconventionally powerful weapons. For example, the level boss with very thick blood of the nuclear bomb, sometimes, it takes a long time to fight with conventional weapons alone, but with the nuclear bomb, after the player has accumulated enough anger, he can start to release the nuclear bomb, a huge explosion, since it can clean up a large number of miscellaneous soldiers, it can also hit the boss hard. Boom, from cool survival to great power, this is a great incentive for players! In reality, there may not be a return on effort. But in the game, players will have a huge sense of accomplishment when they see that their hard work is rewarded, even if it is just a gorgeous special effect!"

"That's right!" Mark Cerney said excitedly, "the player approaches the enemy from the barrage of bullets, and in the end, a nuclear bomb, boom!"

"What other ideas do you think you could add to that?"

"This ...... It's already perfect, and I don't need to add any more gameplay, right?"

Lin Qi smiled and said, "No......! Suppose that when the player fights, there is an AI-controlled wingman by his side, which gives some fire support, and with the player's operation, the wingman will also echo in the front and back, which will undoubtedly increase some ornamentation and avoid the player's aesthetic fatigue. ”

"Does the wingman system complicate the operation?" says Mark Serny.

"No, the player doesn't need to operate the wingman, in fact, the wingman is surrounded by the player's plane, which is not very useful, but it avoids the boring game and adds some visual motivation. Lin Qi said, "At the same time, the ultimate move is launched by the wingman, so that the player will not feel that the wingman is a chicken rib!"

"That's right!" Mark Serney nodded, "The arcade needs a lot of repeat customers to become a bestseller. If, in a short period of time, the player has already mastered the game and completely lost interest, then this kind of arcade machine will definitely not be welcomed by the arcade operator. ”

1941 is a game that isn't complicated, and its main selling point is dodging and attacking. Dodge in a dense barrage of bullets while constantly beating levels to annihilate powerful enemies.

In order to give the player more incentives, it is possible to randomly obtain more powerful weapons and ammunition by destroying enemy aircraft, and after changing to a new weapon, the player's fighter can shoot a barrage of bullets of different power.

In addition to the player's own plane, there is also a "wingman" system. The "wingman" is not a two-player team-up, but rather a "wingman" around the player's plane firing at the same time as the player controls their own fighter to dodge and fire. The wingman's firepower is naturally a little weaker than the player's firepower, however, the wingman has a "charge" setting, which starts with 0 charge, and when the "charge" increases to 100 as it continues to hit enemy planes and gain damage points, it can release different ultimates, including "reinforcements", "nuclear explosions", "light cannons" and other special moves.

"Reinforcements" means that more than a dozen friendly planes appear on the screen in a short period of time, and fire at the same time on the screen, inflicting huge damage on enemy aircraft, but it can only last for 10 seconds.

"Nuclear explosion" is a miscellaneous aircraft that can clear half of the screen, and you can also rely on the ultimate to kill about one-third of the boss's blood.

The "light cannon" shoots a thick laser that can last for 15 seconds, which can not only deal high damage to enemy aircraft, but also melt away the ammunition of enemy aircraft that touches the laser.

The "Sacrificial" Wingman can explode on itself, dealing damage to enemy aircraft while also using the flames of the explosion to block enemy ammunition. However, in this way, the player will not have a new wingman for a long time, and he will not be able to release his ultimate. Until the next level, there is no hope of getting a new wingman replenishment.

These settings are based on real weapons, and at the same time, there are also parts of magic changes.

Anyway, the game is not a military industry or history, as long as the player feels cool, why bother with these weapons, whether they are in line with history?

……

The development of the game "1941" is not slow, it took about a month, and the preliminary development has been completed. Subsequently, after the internal game quality review team, it only took 100 days to complete the listing.

And with the arcade machine "1941", Mark Cerney successfully stood out from the new start-up electronics company. In the 80's, Mark Cerney was mainly involved in arcade projects, and it was not until the 90's that he began to move to consoles. Because the Pangu platform is different from other game console platforms, in the 90s, the Pangu console has begun to be regarded as the second only to the PC personal computer.

Later, Mark Cerney was interviewed by the media and recalled: "Compared with the experience of working in Atari for more than a year, the new venture electronics is the turning point of my fate...... The atmosphere inside this company is unimaginable to you. Many of the company's projects are not forced to do what you do. Rather, just like a bounty hunter, the bosses, including the boss, feel that they have some ideas, so they post a bounty and let the interested 'bounty hunters' take the task. When most of the world didn't know what the Internet was, our company's intranet was almost the same as the Internet now. Yes, many tasks are picked up through the Internet. The task publishers, there are probably dozens of people, all of whom are awesome people in the company. After the mid-80s, I was also able to launch some missions, and from then on, the list of bigwigs who were eligible to post tasks was limited to 50 people. Every year, the results of the boss who released the task will also be evaluated, and the overall profit and loss of the task released by him will be ranked, and the bottom 5 people will be fired, and the alternate senior employee will become the task publisher...... This bounty hunter-like mechanism can be so powerful within a startup that we keep coming up with great ideas! Of course, not all projects are high-quality and viable. In fact, at least half of the tasks don't yield returns. So, it's up to your luck, and if you're lucky, you get a job that you like and it's very promising, and congratulations, bounty hunter, you'll be making a name for yourself in no time. And some tasks that are not very good, from the time they are posted to the end, no one has signed up for the task. Of course, the company's creator, my boss Lin Qi, is clearly the most popular quest publisher for bounty hunters. The idea of the game "1941" is the idea of our boss Lin Qi, that is, this game changed my destiny ......"

Later, Mark Cerney has participated in more than 100 projects of the company, including more than 40 projects with sales of more than 100 million US dollars, and can be called a god-level game developer. Moreover, its games have been released on multiple platforms, not only for new startups.

Even so, Mark Cerney did not come up with the idea of an independent portal, but continued to be a "bounty hunter" within the new startup. When R&D projects are needed, raise funds and gather the necessary personnel within the company.

In fact, it is this system of bounty hunters that makes many game developers do not need to start their own companies on their own. After all, with independent portals, new project development, whether it is to raise funds or gather talent, is not as smooth as staying within a new start-up electronics company.

In addition, the dividend return of the new creative electronics project is a little less than the profit of owning a business, but the group company is a loss caused by the failure of the project. This is also an important reason why many talented developers cannot do without new startups.

Even if you are a god of game development, there will be failed works, and there have been many successes before, and if you fail one, you may have smashed all your savings in it.

But giants like start-ups have a lot of money-making games, so a lot of loss-making projects can be tolerated.