Jing Yu understood perfectly well the mantra of the game industry: "Make music with your life, make CG with your heart, and make the game itself with your feet."
He knew that, when it came to technical game development, he couldn't possibly compete with Great Zhou's veteran studios that had been honing their craft for decades.
But honestly, even if the other companies had a "99 out of 100" in technical expertise, game development wasn't some unattainable high-tech field. With enough investment and budget, it wasn't hard to put together a combat system that scored an "85." For most players, those differences were imperceptible anyway. They mostly cared about frame rate and visuals.
So Jing Yu played to his strengths. Since the combat in his game would never be as smooth as the big studios', he focused instead on the music and CG.
The VFX companies collaborating with him weren't just working on 'Neon Genesis Evangelion' — many of the cutscenes (VGs) for 'Fate/Stay Night' were also produced by them.
As for the soundtrack? He simply used the original music. The Fate series had never been criticized for its music—in fact, in Jing Yu's previous life, all the Fate titles hailed as masterpieces had impeccable stories and soundtracks. The visuals might be nitpicked, but the writing and music? Untouchable. They weren't like the newer shallow anime that tricked fans with sparkly nonsense.
After clicking into the game, Chen Hang was greeted by the prologue of 'Fate/Stay Night'.
It opened with a flashback, told from the protagonist Shirou Emiya's point of view.
The very first scene showed a handsome, spear-wielding man with a deadly aura lunging at Shirou. Panicked, Shirou stumbled back into his home's shed.
As blood dripped onto the floor beneath him, glowing lines of a magic circle began to appear. A flash of blinding light later—
Standing before Chen Hang was a girl in pale blue knight armor, her voice as beautiful as silver chimes.
It was the figure he had been waiting to see for over half a year—Artoria.
"Even though it's not a live-action drama, the art style in this game is strangely pleasing to the eye," Chen Hang murmured as he straightened up in his chair.
At that moment, the fan group he was in was already buzzing—players were flooding the chat with screenshots as they started the game.
Those stuck at work were fuming. Suddenly, their once-beloved keyboard and mouse felt lifeless. Many who could get away with it were already sneaking game downloads onto portable hard drives using company PCs, hoping to save time when they got home.
As Artoria appeared, Chen Hang's inner DNA began to stir.
The background music [Deep Slumber] was played in a gentle remix.
Shirou and Artoria's first encounter ended, and the story transitioned.
The narrative jumped to a flashback—this time from Rin Tohsaka's perspective.
The prologue of 'Fate/Stay Night' was actually told through Rin's point of view.
With low blood sugar and morning grumpiness, Rin's daily life unfolded in the story, revealing the contrast between her normal routine and her secret identity.
As the eldest daughter of the distinguished Tohsaka mage family, she was preparing to participate in the Fifth Holy Grail War.
Her school life introduced a slew of familiar characters: Shirou Emiya, Sakura Matou, Shinji Matou, and Ryuudou Issei.
But since this wasn't a pure visual novel and had been adapted into an RPG, Jing Yu cut out a lot of the slice-of-life segments.
Visual novels often linger on mundane details—great for character development, sure, but way too slow for impatient players.
Jing Yu made some trade-offs here. Even if certain daily scenes were necessary, they could be presented later in the game.
After all, in the original, the prologue alone took nearly three hours—who could sit through that?
So the next scene quickly jumped to the servant summoning.
The beautiful and prideful Rin Tohsaka summoned Red Archer.
This was the first time players saw him—elegant, dashing.
And thanks to the anime-style visuals, his resemblance to Shirou made some players joke that the illustrator had just gotten lazy.
After a brief return to school-life sequences, the game quickly moved to the night of Day 2—the encounter between Red Archer and Lancer at the school.
At this point, the gameplay shifted—Chen Hang now controlled Red Archer instead of Rin.
Curious, Chen Hang used his mouse and keyboard to make Red Archer roam around.
His mission was simple: fend off Lancer and protect his Master, Rin Tohsaka.
But it was a game, after all...
So Chen Hang intentionally did nothing, just watching Lancer launch a brutal combo at Rin. Within thirty seconds, she was dead.
"GAME OVER" flashed across the screen.
The save point resets to just before the Red Archer vs. Lancer encounter.
Chen Hang smirked. "Okay, that was kinda fun."
Not because the combat was amazing, but because he knew full well—Rin was the daughter of Tokiomi Tohsaka from 'Fate/Zero', and going by her age, it had only been ten years since the Fourth Holy Grail War.
He hated Tokiomi when watching 'Fate/Zero'. So, by extension, he didn't care much for Rin either.
Just a spoiled rich girl. Let her get KO'd first—why not?
On the second try, Chen Hang followed the game prompts and began to fight properly.
Since it was now an RPG, some standard game mechanics had to be included.
For example, to restore health and mana, both Servants and Masters needed to use in-game items. So the game had a proper item system.
And of course, iconic abilities like Artoria's Excalibur or Red Archer's Unlimited Blade Works couldn't be available from the start. This meant there had to be a leveling system, too.
What set RPGs apart from visual novels was precisely that: weapon systems, leveling mechanics, and—yes—microtransactions.
And what were the most tempting microtransactions?
Skins.
From the beginning, Jing Yu had made sure to pack the game with skins—available via paid DLC.
Fan-favorite skins for Red Archer from his past life: the suit skin, denim skin, punk skin...
And for Artoria: wedding dress, swimsuit, black stockings—you name it.
Of course, none of this was available in the prologue. But it was all there waiting.
Buy if you want to dress up your waifu. Don't buy if you don't.
Either way, skins wouldn't affect combat stats.
After ten minutes, Chen Hang's Red Archer was defeated by Lancer.
With just a third of Lancer's HP remaining, Red Archer was slain.
Chen Hang fell silent.
He now understood the combat mechanics—if you learned Lancer's attack patterns and timing, a skilled player could likely beat him without taking damage.
But clearly, Chen Hang wasn't that skilled yet.
He couldn't read Lancer's pre-attack tells.
Plus, Lancer hit hard as hell.
Just four mistakes—and game over.
Still, he felt confident. He could probably beat him on the next try.
His overall impression? The game's difficulty was slightly above average.
New players might get stuck here for a while.
Jing Yu had balanced the difficulty decently—but no matter how balanced it was, some people were bound to struggle.
As expected, the rematch was easier. Chen Hang took Lancer down in a few moves.
The story continued.
Shirou, witnessing the battle between Rin, Red Archer, and Lancer from the sidelines, was noticed by Lancer.
The game now shifted control to Shirou.
Honestly, Shirou's setup in the game was weird. He was supposedly a regular human—yet had absurdly high HP and could somehow trade blows with top-tier Servants.
But the moment he faced a real mage? He was toast.
Basically, he couldn't beat anyone, but could survive a few hits from everyone.
In this scene, he was supposed to die anyway.
Even though Chen Hang dodged Lancer's attacks flawlessly, the cutscene still showed Shirou being killed.
He could only shake his head helplessly.