A few seconds later, Kairos's excitement finally calmed down a bit.
Having plans and goals was important, but for his current self, achieving those goals required taking steady, deliberate steps forward—one at a time.
He quickly assessed his current situation.
"Pokémon: Emerald" had already been successfully released. Though it was just a test version, it was currently his most important game, as well as his starting point.
How quickly he could accumulate popularity and reputation, and increase his player base, depended on this game.
"Pokémon Emerald" had been published on a special website called "New Game Festival," operated by the League.
All newly developed games from the first half of this year will join this website to compete over a four-month period.
The first-place winner would receive the "Golden Globe Award" title and major official League promotion.
Like the previously popular "Angry Rocks," though it didn't participate in this New Game Festival, its rapid rise to internet fame also benefited from major League promotion.
—That game had participated in a League racing game competition and won the championship.
So if he wanted to build his reputation and gain more emotion points, "Pokémon: Emerald" had to win this New Game Festival championship!
This was no simple task.
On one hand, the competition had already been running for three months, with only one month left.
"Pokémon: Emerald" had just been created and officially launched, already behind others in terms of time.
Not to mention, Dream Factory had already announced they would release a new game in this final month, making their grand entrance in the last two weeks!
Some said this was for fairness, since if such a large company's game went online on the first day of the New Game Festival, it would absorb all the traffic, leaving other games with basically no chance.
Others said this showed Dream Factory's confidence—believing that no one could compete with their games, even with just two weeks to attract players.
Though they hadn't even released a trailer yet, everyone believed the final Golden Globe Award winner would definitely be Dream Factory.
Though Dream Factory was lazy and had poor attitudes, their team strength and solid funding were undeniable.
Their game quality naturally wasn't something small companies could compete with.
Kairos knew clearly that if he wanted to build his reputation going forward, even if he didn't face them this time, he'd definitely have to confront Dream Factory head-on eventually!
But honestly, he really didn't think Dream Factory could beat him.
One month—time was tight.
But on his system panel, hundreds of high-tech modules were waiting for him to unlock.
He glanced at the module panel, where there was one module he'd bookmarked.
After receiving the system, he discovered he could currently only unlock intermediate and basic modules—advanced ones were all locked.
But even intermediate modules were already impressive—
[Intermediate Module: Brain-Computer Interface - Virtual Reality Technology Module]
[Description: Can mass-produce virtual reality experience devices and apply virtual reality technology to games, allowing players to personally experience game content while greatly accelerating VR game production speed and quality.]
[Points required for purchase: 5000 points.]
That's right—virtual reality was considered just an intermediate module in the system panel!
Kairos didn't dare imagine what advanced modules would contain!
Closing the panel, his thoughts returned to the New Game Festival competition.
The "Golden Globe Award" was determined based on a game's comprehensive performance over the past months.
Besides game popularity, player ratings, and gameplay, game completion was also very important.
In other words, within this one month, Kairos not only needed to improve some content in "Pokémon: Emerald," but also had to fully finish developing the game.
So now, it was time to advance the game's main storyline.
With the system modules' assistance, in just one night, he'd already written the underlying code and programming, while creating maps up to the first gym—"Petalburg Gym's" entrance.
According to the plot, after successfully defeating their rival, players could officially begin their trainer journey and reach the nearest city, "Petalburg City."
But the gym in this city couldn't be battled initially, as it was the Normal-type gym run by the protagonist's father, "Norman," ranking later among all gyms—players didn't yet have sufficient strength to challenge it.
So, the first real gym battle actually took place in the next city, Rustboro City, at the Rock-type gym run by Roxanne!
In Ultimate Emerald, this marked the beginning of countless players' nightmares. Roxanne's several powerful Pokémon would teach every player who didn't know proper team-building a painful lesson.
When Kairos first played, he was successfully swept 3-0 by that Cradily, getting beaten so badly he questioned his existence.
Kairos's plan was naturally to further develop this gym.
Not only that, but the newly unlocked "AI Module" should also come in handy.
He took a deep breath, opened his desktop folder, and began operating rapidly.
One day passed in a flash.
The next morning.
On a streaming platform called "Bellibolt," numerous streaming rooms quietly went live.
In this world, though entertainment industries like games and movies weren't very developed, many people had taken to watching streams to pass the time, making streaming platforms thrive.
"Bellibolt" was one of the world's largest streaming platforms, comparable to the "Psyduck" platform, even showing signs of overtaking it in recent years.
At this moment, in a stream room called "Bringing Everyone Joy with Ten Million Volts," a girl wearing yellow, pink, black, and blue clothes with cute fangs and pink hair stretched, showing the screen a bright, energetic smile.
"Ciao~ Good morning, everyone in the stream! Did you miss me?"
The next moment, chat messages instantly filled the screen.
[Iono! Iono!]
[Ahhhhhh, I'm here, baby! Missed you so much!]
[What activity is today? Looking forward to it! owo]
[[Reborn as Bellibolt Next Life] sent gift: Heartfelt Rose X100!]
[[Iono Only Fan]: sent gift: Super Sports Car X10!]
That's right, this stream room's owner was none other than Iono, the Electric-type gym leader of Levincia City in the Paldea region!
Unlike Cynthia, she could be called a professional streamer. Levincia Gym's explosive popularity largely came from her streaming promotion!
On the entire "Bellibolt" platform, she was definitely a top streamer with incredible popularity!
Having been live for less than a minute, the stream's viewership had already broken 500,000!
At this moment, Iono smiled sweetly.
"Hehe, thank you all for your support and gifts~"
"Ah, according to the original plan, we were supposed to do an outdoor hiking stream today," she turned to look out the window, where dark clouds were gathering—clearly, outdoor hiking was impossible.
But this wasn't a problem for Iono.
She'd become a super popular streamer for a reason—she was best at stirring up audience emotions.
While streaming, if interaction with viewers wasn't meeting her expectations, she'd immediately adjust the stream's activity to heat up the atmosphere!
She leaned close to the screen with a mysterious smile.
"Since today's weather isn't suitable for hiking, how about we do a special activity instead?"
"Bellibolt, please bring me that thing~"
She gestured to a green-bodied Pokémon with a swollen brown belly beside her.
This was the Electric-type Pokémon Bellibolt, also one of Iono's best partners!
"Belli~"
Bellibolt swayed as it carried over a cardboard box and placed it on Iono's desk.
"Thanks~"
Iono picked up the box and shook it.
"Everyone! This box contains many interesting interactive game options. Next, I'll draw one from inside as today's special project activity~"
This cardboard box was an old friend in Iono's stream. Whenever she wasn't satisfied with stream interactions or something unexpected happened, she'd randomly draw a slip of paper from this box as the next activity for her viewers.
Each interaction also included drawing a lucky viewer to specify the activity's content—like requesting a song for Iono to sing or watching a movie together...
The stream atmosphere instantly heated up by Iono's actions, with viewers getting excited.
[Great! Another special activity!]
[Will there be any new projects this time? Looking forward to it.]
[Hope I get chosen!!]
"Then, I'm starting!"
She reached into the box, felt around a few times, pulled out a paper ball, and unfolded it in front of the screen.
[Fan-Recommended Video Games!]
"Eh! It's the game request segment!"
Iono smiled and operated on the screen.
"The lucky viewer who matches my wavelength this time is E5763. I'm initiating connection."
Chat appeared:
[Damn, why wasn't it me!]
[Let's congratulate this B-tier user.]
The next moment, a viewer named "Stardust" connected to the stream.
His voice was trembling, clearly very excited.
"Hi Iono, I... I've been your longtime fan for years. I never thought I'd actually connect with you! I want to say, you're really amazing! I love watching your streams!"
Iono smiled sweetly.
"Wow, such heartfelt praise. I'll definitely remember these words. It's because of support like yours that I can bring everyone better streams!"
"So, Stardust-kun, today you can specify a game for me to play for everyone! What game would you like to request?"
The voice hesitated for several seconds, then quickly responded.
"About that... yesterday, my friend told me he saw a game in Cynthia's stream that seemed very interesting."
"Even Cynthia was playing it very seriously, completely addicted."
"It was called something like... Pokémon... Emerald?"
"If possible, could you help me experience it, Iono?"
Hearing this, Iono was momentarily stunned.
"Pokémon Emerald? What a novel name."
She was also pondering internally.
—A game Cynthia streamed?
She naturally knew this Champion had her own stream room, but from her impression, aside from Battle Road, Cynthia shouldn't really like playing games, right?
This piqued her interest. She opened her browser and quickly found the "Pokémon: Emerald" page on the New Game Festival website.
The next moment, she was undoubtedly stunned.
5,927 yen?
Pixel game??
And it's still a test version?
Stream chat also responded:
[Holy crap, bro, what game did you pick? A 5,927 yen pixel game? That's really confident.]
[How does this look so unreliable? Are you sure your friend didn't trick you?]
[Iono-chan, shouldn't we switch games? Even playing Angry Rocks would be better than this, right?]
Facing these comments, the connected viewer "Stardust" also seemed to hesitate.
"Um... Iono, should we switch? I didn't expect this game to be so expensive..."
Just then, another batch of new comments emerged.
[Those who didn't watch yesterday's stream shouldn't talk nonsense. This game is way better than Angry Rocks, definitely worth the money.]
[Exactly, I watched Cynthia's entire stream yesterday. She was so focused on this game that she forgot to interact with chat. I guarantee this game is absolutely fun!]
These comments were few, so they were quickly buried by the previous ones.
[Ha, no matter how you hype it, how good can a pixel game be? Selling for 5,927 yen, aren't you shills hired by this developer?]
[Right, this kind of indie developer workshop game, still in test version—what good could it have? At least make your lies believable. Be careful when Cynthia finds out and comes after you!]
Seeing the chat atmosphere turning sour, Iono immediately made her decision, directly clicking to purchase the game and speaking:
"Though I see everyone's looking out for me and worried I'll get ripped off, I still hope everyone stays friendly and doesn't fight!"
"As for this game... I believe this fan called 'Stardust' also recommended it with good intentions. Besides, random game requests are within the rules anyway!"
"Next, I'll be the poison tester for everyone~"
"Let's see if this game is really worth the price, or if it's just after everyone's wallets!"
As she spoke, she clicked the download button while pondering internally.
A few hundred MB pixel game—if it was worth this price, she couldn't even imagine what would make it worthy.
—From this perspective, her fan was probably deceived, right?
But given the current situation, she had no choice but to play.
While thinking, the game finished starting up. As a professional gamer, she directly followed the prompt and double-clicked X to skip the opening animation.
But the next moment, a window suddenly popped up before her eyes.
[Update Notice]
[Current Game Version: 0.1]
[Latest Update Content:]
[1. Added "Skip Opening Animation" function]
[2. Implemented full AI intelligence coverage for Pokémon and NPCs. Players can interact intelligently with them through voice commands and text input, while "slightly" increasing NPCs' battle command abilities.]
[3. Updated the main story map to the first gym city: Rustboro City. Players can now engage in their first gym battle!]
At this moment, Iono's gaze was fixed on the second line of information.
Full AI coverage? Intelligent interaction???
Impossible!
Her reaction was understandable.
—Even Battle Road, with its hundreds of GBs of size and cutting-edge technology, had only achieved partial AI intelligence coverage and was still bug-ridden, claiming to be developing and improving with full effort.
Now, a few hundred MB pixel game dared to claim full AI coverage?!
A thought inevitably arose in Iono's mind.
Oh no.
This game... was probably really here to scam people for money, right?