WebNovels

Chapter 88 - Chapter 88: Road Test

The show "Craftsman Wood" was just over a week away from being released online. The game's modeling work was already done. After getting the "Character Modeling (Beginner)" skill, William's modeling improved a lot, and it sped up the game's development.

Still, they couldn't yet say the game was fully finished. The UI design and in-game transition animations still needed polishing. Angela and Zach were handling that part, each responsible for one section. The UI was simple since it was just improving on the base William had already made.

The transition animations were all small details, nothing major, and should be wrapped up in a day or two. After that Marcus would run bug tests, and if all was fine, the game would launch together with the show.

With that arranged, William went back to working on "Journey." The first task on the list was redoing character models.

Now that his modeling skills had leveled up, the old ones looked a bit rough to him and needed improvement.

The modeling part also involved animation, since the characters' movements in the game were all preset animations. Without an upgrade in animation skills, it was still pretty time-consuming to make.

At the current pace, "Journey" would be released after "Craftsman Wood." That was fine—it kept the two games from launching at the same time and fighting for attention.

It was a bit of a shame that William had bragged on social media earlier, saying his second game would shake up the whole market. In reality, he hadn't thought things through enough.

Luckily, players didn't take his words too seriously. In a way, "Happy Mahjong" really did shake the market. It was the first to bring in a pay-to-win system. Players might not have noticed how big of a deal that was yet, but in time, pay-to-win would definitely become the most common way games made money.

Games you sell don't really make money. Free-to-play games do.

Now that WeChat Games had gotten a taste of the profits, they would probably stick to it long-term. Just managing their Happy Universe games would eat up most of their energy, so they likely wouldn't look for new directions anytime soon.

When the last workday of the week was over, William invited everyone to a nearby restaurant for dinner. Starting next week, their team would welcome new members, so this was the last get-together for the old crew alone.

At the table, Claire, now comfortable with everyone, showed her chatty side. She kept talking with Marcus about new level designs. With level 100 introducing new mechanics, balancing the difficulty was the top concern.

Leon was listening to Tina's feedback and adjusting the existing characters, mostly to make their battle animations fit better. Tina had noticed some flaws in the designs while working on the models.

Outside of work talk, the group drifted back to "The Sims." As their first single-player game, its graphics, gameplay, and ideas had really drawn them in.

Right now, it could only run on Chris and William's computers, to prevent copies from leaking.

It was a finished game, but the market wasn't ready yet for this kind of release.

William didn't want it to be launched at the wrong time. After all, "The Sims" was a classic franchise. If handled well, it could become the studio's signature work.

After the dinner, Cynthia sent William two e-tickets for the front row of the upcoming show.

"You're not delivering these yourself?"

In the driver's seat, Cynthia hadn't started the car yet. She looked at William with a half-smile.

William froze, not getting her point.

"I already sent them to her."

Cynthia rubbed her forehead. "What a wasted chance. If you delivered them in person, she'd probably keep the door open for you tonight."

William finally understood and gave her a speechless look. "You're overthinking it."

"Really?" Cynthia looked doubtful. "It's not too late if you go now. Excuses are easy to come up with."

William kept a straight face. "Just drive."

"Tch, boring."

With that, Cynthia drove them home.

Before heading upstairs, she reminded William not to forget tomorrow's test. The road test for license step three was the hardest of all, not just because of driving skills, but also the mental pressure and unexpected things that could happen on the road.

William had wanted to practice with the company car, but without a license it wasn't possible. Tomorrow, he would have to rely on muscle memory and hope he passed on the first try.

He didn't watch TV in the living room that night. While waiting for midnight, he kept working on "Journey"—scenes, storyboards, and environment details.

At exactly twelve, the payment notification on his phone became his nightly bedtime alarm.

"Happy Match Mania": $27.873

"Happy Mahjong": $69.764

"Happy Landlord": $101.963

If the daily income could stay around like this, the company would definitely manage to keep running. But to do more, like setting up a research and development team, was still out of reach.

R&D burns money. Even if William could exchange reputation points for different engines, R&D was still needed. Motion capture, animation, 3D rendering, lighting effects… so many in-game technologies couldn't be done by engines alone.

So far to go!

The night passed, and morning came.

Since Cynthia had to meet Tiffany to sign the contract, William could only take a taxi to the driving test by himself. But Cynthia promised to rush over afterward, so they could celebrate his successful road test together at lunch.

"Have you ever driven before?"

As William was pushed into his name list of students, the coach was worried.

After all, his students' passing rate decided his performance bonus. The boss had said it wouldn't affect him, but if William messed around and failed, his reputation would still take a hit.

William patted his chest and promised, "Don't worry, I'll pass in one try."

The first time he had taken the road test, he passed on his first try. As long as he recalled that feeling, there would be no problem.

And sure enough, that's how it turned out. William did fine, and the coach finally relaxed. When William stepped out of the car, the coach didn't hold back his praise.

It wasn't surprising at all. But when William saw Cynthia standing there with Tiffany, he froze a little—he hadn't expected Tiffany to show up.

Cynthia explained, "I saw the timing worked out, so I invited Miss Tang to join us for lunch."

Ever since he had run out of Tiffany's house that night, William hadn't known how to face her. Now that they stood face to face again, neither of them mentioned that night, as if nothing had ever happened.

Tiffany said, "Your Aunt Lisa asked me to thank you for the tickets."

"You should thank Cynthia. She did most of the work," William quickly deflected.

Cynthia added, "She already thanked me."

"Come on, let's eat."

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