Pete Molineux of Bullfrog is a geek with an almost endless flow of ideas in his head, and while these ideas seem to Yang Yun to be rotten street stuff, they were already remarkable innovations in the game world in 1991.

Yang Yun and the others sat on the sofa in the lounge full of sunshine with coffee, and talked happily.

Starting with the madness of God, Yang Yun was very interested: "Pete, how did you come up with the idea of the first 'God' game on Shijie?" ”

Pete proudly explains: "In the past, PC games were always influenced by home video games, either intense gunfights or people loved to play as heroes and fight villains through levels to rescue their princesses. So I wondered, is it too easy to play a one-person game? Is it possible to let the player control a group of people? So the rudiments of God's game were born. ”

Alexei agreed, saying: "And God is also crazy to innovate the game, using a more advanced concept than the orthodox SLG strategy game, RTS, RealTimeStrategyGame, the innovation is on this RealTime, not the pesky turn-based system that is common in Japanese games!" ”

Pete turned sideways, took the initiative to shake Alexey's hand, and said with a smile: "I feel the same way!" I really hate turn-based games! ”

Yang Yun smiled: "The SLG game Three Kingdoms produced by Longteng two years ago was also this common turn-based, but we quickly realized the shortcomings of this form. The game is now designed to add a charge system for some heroes, and some people attack quickly. Then you don't have to wait for the player's turn to control the turn, and you can control other actions in real time. Peter. Were you inspired and influenced by SimCity when you were doing this God game? ”

SimCity is another game published by EA. The developer is Maxis, a new company that was founded around the same time as Bullfrog.

Yang Yun knows that SimCity, The Sims and other simulation series are all from him, which is a game design company specializing in building simulation genres.

Pete was a little dismissive: "To be exact, they were inspired and influenced by me. Well, well, actually, they also innovated, solved some problems that I didn't take into account, and changed to the specific position of mayor from my God's point of view. Players who like management prefer them. All I can say is that these lads have caught up with a good time! ”

“hahahaha……”

Everyone daxiao,Everyone can hear the sourness in Pete's words,The founder of God Game is, of course, Bullfrog Company.,SimCity is borrowed from this idea.,Similar to God's crazy map restrictions and operations.,Players also need to plan residential and industrial land on a fixed range of land.。 Construction of roads, subways, seaports, airports. Police and fire departments are no different from a real city.

Players take on the role of the mayor and rack their brains for their own city-building plans. How to make people's lives better, how to design the tax system. How to allocate the expenditure on public facilities is to build more high-rise buildings. Whether to build more livelihood buildings such as hospitals, schools, stadiums, etc., it is all up to the player to decide.

Pete's sourness is here, after all, God and God are things that are difficult for ordinary people to touch, and more exist in the human spirit, and God is also crazy This game needs more people to be full of imagination.

SimCity, on the other hand, is different, and everyone can see a barren land transformed into a metropolis full of high-rise buildings under their own planning and design, and the excitement and satisfaction are indescribable.

Yang Yun said: "Pete, the sim city is still too big, the players are ordinary people, not real urban planners, the game has a lot of uncertainties, the vast majority of people play very poorly, and urban construction is not so simple and casual." Plus, not everyone loves these concrete buildings, and those damn tax settings are even more maddening! ”

Everyone understood and laughed.

In capitalist society, the most annoying thing is probably the tax system, many people don't know how to pay taxes all their lives, weishenme pays taxes like this, few people know how to reasonably avoid taxes, so in Europe and the United States, accountants who know how to teach people to avoid taxes reasonably are very popular professions.

"Yang, do you mean that we want to reduce the scope and narrow down a city to a specific industry?" Pete said thoughtfully, dancing with his hands, as if drawing a sketch in the void, and gradually his eyes lit up with excitement.

"Yes!" Yang Yun took a sip of coffee and prompted, "Narrow down to the industries that have the most frequent daily contact with players. People may not go to the police station once in their lives, call 911 once in their lives, or even go to ports and airports in their lives, but there are a few places that they must not go to, and it would be better for us to do these professionally themed games? ”

“Good！ Thank you Yang! I've got a new idea! Pete cheerfully put down his coffee, stood up and ran out of the lounge, definitely trying to jot down his creative ideas.

Alexei was a little surprised, and after Pete disappeared, he asked nervously: "Yang, if you tell others about this kind of creativity, aren't you afraid that he will snatch it and make it yourself?" ”

Yang Yun said with a smile: "Theme games, SimCity, what are these game engines built on?" Of course God is crazy too! Although we don't have this kind of game engine, but you do, so what am I worried about? Alexey, it's up to you to compete with the bullfrog or develop together! ”

Alexey shrugged: "Pete is a genius designer, I don't want to go against him!" ”

Yang Yun nodded: "Then turn him into a colleague, I also have this tendency." And the theme and simulation games, the biggest competitor is Maxis, presumably Pete will have more headaches for this company! ”

Alexey smiled: "That's right, our KTT does not conflict with him, and the cooperation between the two is the best choice!" ”

While the two were laughing, Pete rushed in again and almost knocked over the table in front of the three of them.

He grabbed a blank manuscript paper in his hand, removed the coffee cup, spread the manuscript paper on the table, quickly drew a large frame on it with a pen, and said excitedly: "Yang! You just said that you want to choose a place that ordinary people can't live without, and this idea is really fantastic! Amusement park! Hospital! School! We have so much game content to do! ”

Ahem......

Alexei quickly captured this message, slapped it on the sketch of the manuscript paper, blocked Pete's pen, and said solemnly: "We have too much game content to do, Pete, did you just say that?" 'We'? ”

The deliberate emphasis on the pronunciation of the word "we", coupled with a serious and playful expression, Alexey's inquiry made Pete wake up instantly.

"Oh! Sorry Alexey, yes, we, we need to have a good talk, right? Pete put down his pen, sat on the soft sofa, looked at Yang Yun and Alexei with serious expressions, and couldn't help it after holding it for ten seconds.

"Please, two! Don't do that, okay? Pete couldn't help but grab his already little hair with both hands, and his face was depressed, it was like seeing a beautiful woman and thinking about it very much, but there were two big men standing next to him looking at him seriously, this feeling was really aggrieved!

Ha!

Yang Yun couldn't help laughing, and Alexei said with a smile: "Hey, hey, Pete, if you scratch your hair again, you'll really be bald!" ”

The atmosphere suddenly eased a lot, Pete breathed a sigh of relief, and was about to continue the topic, Yang Yun stopped him and said, "Pete, let's put the theme game series aside first." Why don't we talk about the power trading game? What did you think of when you designed it? I heard that it has been criticized, and players say that they don't want to play at all? ”

Pete was embarrassed: "I've been thinking about making a real war game, but both of the ones I designed were so offbeat that few people took them at first, and it wasn't until EA helped me promote the release that people started to appreciate me." Power Trades is my second God game, to be precise, an enhanced version of God Crazy 1, adding more soldiers to fight, storm towns, enlist sergeants, kill rival commanders, and more. ”

Yang added: "There are also maps in 3D, food gathering and looting, and city building. Pete, don't you think that in doing so, the game is too cluttered and has too much content? ”

Pete sighed: "This is also the most important reason why it has been criticized by players, it is really ...... It's so hard to play......"

Alexei agrees: "Even professional game makers like us find the game complicated, with too many action commands, a lot of icon buttons, too many side plots, too many things for players to consider, and it is a 3D map that is almost difficult for people to accept in a short period of time......

Pete held his head and was annoyed: "Oh my God, please, don't say it, it's my shame!" Did you know? We launched the game in less than 5 months, and we were so short on time that we were severely understaffed......"

Here's your chance!

Yang Yun patted Pete on the shoulder and comforted: "Pete, I can only say that this idea of yours is very interesting, and it is also one of the most professional real-time strategy games I have ever seen. Time is tight, manpower is short, these are all external factors, and there are many ways to solve them. Leave the rights trading aside, I have some new ideas for real-time strategy games right now, would you like to hear it? (To be continued......)