Tokyo: Being coveted by my wife, I just want to play games

Chapter 410 E-Sports
Gunma Prefecture, Kamurocho, [PH·Holy Light: Home of Games].

Sayuri Sato, wearing a cute orange sweatshirt, operated the mouse to open the "World of Warcraft" icon on the computer, while casually turning her head to look around, looking at the bustling crowd in the store and the long queue at the door.

“The game has been on sale for almost two months, but there are still so many people coming to the offline store to join in the fun.”

"What's in the book about [Japanese adults are lonely and withdrawn]? It turns out that these are all lies."

"No, no, it's mainly because the games my brother-in-law made are so fun. I heard that there was a teacher in the senior year who played games all night long and ended up falling asleep during class the next day. What a sinful brother-in-law."

Sayuri Sato moved the mouse meaninglessly with her right hand and supported her cheek with her left hand. The loading interface of "World of Warcraft" was reflected in her big black crystal-like eyes. At the same time, some of what she had seen and heard in school and on the Internet during this period emerged in her mind.

The craze for World of Warcraft comes in waves.

In the early days of the server, it became popular thanks to the [Thunder Bluff Bloody Battle Incident].

At that time, players from the Alliance and the Horde fought a bloody battle in Thunder Bluff for three days and three nights. The number of participants from each camp exceeded 200,000. From Thunder Bluff all the way to Stranglethorn Vale, the ground was littered with corpses and tombstones.

Thousands of groups fought each other, and the whole Azeroth became a mess.

This incident caused a big stir, not only boosting the popularity of World of Warcraft in the gaming community and attracting a large number of players, but also even mainstream media such as the Asahi Shimbun followed up on it for three days. Now, the game World of Warcraft is known to everyone.

Moreover, this [Thunder Bluff Bloody Battle Incident].
This can only be regarded as the beginning of the explosion of "World of Warcraft". In the second week of the game's release, Dongchuan Che announced on the official website of the Holy Light Society that the live-action drama of "World of Warcraft" had entered the casting stage, and the cost investment for each episode of the drama would reach 20 million US dollars!

Twenty million dollars per episode!
When the cost of this super-large-scale production came out, the entire Japanese industry was stunned!

To be honest, Japanese movies and TV series are actually quite well-known.

"Seven Samurai" directed by Akira Kurosawa, "Kikujiro's Summer" directed by Takeshi Kitano, the first "Godzilla" directed by Ishiro Honda, Ryuichi Sakamoto who participated in the soundtrack of "The Last Emperor", etc.

In terms of film and television dramas, works such as "Tokyo Love Story", "White Tower", "The Solitary Gourmet", "Doctor", "Hagane Naoki", "Long Vacation" and so on are also world-renowned.
Compared with European and American TV dramas and movies, Japan cannot compare with them in terms of the scale of film and television production.

As early as around the millennium (2000), the production cost of "Titanic" reached 20 million US dollars, and the most expensive films in the world are all works of Hollywood in the United States.

Not to mention film and television dramas. Japan cannot produce a work with the scale of "A Song of Ice and Fire" and "The Mandalorian".

Of course, for film and television works, high production costs do not mean good quality.

There are too many Hollywood movies that spend a lot of money on special effects but end up with a bad plot. However, if the investment scale is not in place, some themes really cannot be touched.

For example, science fiction and fantasy.

These themes are very difficult to produce without large-scale investment, because special effects require a lot of money. And the interesting thing is.
It is said that Japan lost thirty years and its economy was sluggish. But in fact, Japan has never lacked rich people. Japan's GDP has always been among the top five in the world in the past thirty years. It has even remained the third in the world for most of the time, second only to China and the United States.

But, this is just like why Japan's GDP is so high, but some people still say that Japan's economy is failing. Japan's rich people are not short of money, but Japan's film and television industry has never had any large-scale productions.

The reason is simple - lack of market expectations.

After the economic bubble burst, few big capitals can make huge fortunes in Japan again. Therefore, big capitals that do not see a bright future are unwilling to make large-scale investments in Japan's manufacturing industry even if they have money, because they cannot see a bright future and the risks are uncontrollable.

By the same token, Japan has never produced a film or TV production that costs hundreds of millions of dollars to invest and still makes a profit.

Of course, if it were just that, there would always be someone who would be the first to try something new. But the problem is that the American film and television industry is developing too well.

It's like someone going to a bank to deposit money.

The interest rate of Bank A is 3%, and the interest rate of Bank B is 10%, but Bank A is a century-old state-controlled bank, and Bank B is a private bank that has only been established for a few years. So even if the interest rate of Bank B is higher, because the risks are uncontrollable and the prospects are unclear, most people will still keep their money in Bank A.

The same is true.

If there were no American film and television industry, those wealthy big investors who wanted to enter the film and television industry might still take a gamble in Japan, but with the existence of Hollywood, these profit-seeking and risk-averse capitals would normally only flow into the United States. Because whether it is a TV series or a movie, the United States has the most successful cases of big-budget productions in the world.

What's more, because of the difference in market size, the interest in the American film and television market is much greater than that in Japan.

In this environment, the investment in Japanese film and television works is generally not too large. But Dongchuan Che is now investing in a 10-episode TV series with a production cost of nearly 200 million US dollars!

One stone caused a thousand waves!

Needless to say, when the news that Dongchuan Che was going to spend 200 million US dollars to produce a live-action drama of "World of Warcraft" was released, the entire industry was shocked! Various news reports were flying around every day. And this also further boosted the popularity of the "World of Warcraft" game!
And it’s not over yet!

Dongchuan Che's plan to make a live-action drama of "World of Warcraft" is not just hype, he really wants to do it. Therefore, on the afternoon of the day when the news was released, a voting link appeared on the homepage of the GOGO game platform.

Yes, voting link!
From the beginning of last year to now, after a year and a half of preparation, Dongchuan Che and Yuezhu Asuka have finished polishing the script. This will be a super excellent work of the original work of "A Song of Ice and Fire" and the secondary creation of a super genius!

In terms of the plot, both Dongchuan Che and Yuezhu Asuka feel that there is no need for further adjustments, but the casting has not yet been decided.

The first season of the live-action World of Warcraft series is mainly about Illidan blowing up the Well of Eternity. However, unlike the original work, the original work actually has a more mythological feel.

The main content of the original work is that the Burning Legion invaded Azeroth in ancient times. At that time, the dominant race of Azeroth was the night elves, and then Illidan and his brother Malfurion fell in love with the same woman-Tyrande.

After Illidan failed in "Stealing from the Grim Reaper" and discovered that the night elves could not resist the invasion of the Burning Legion, he chose to go undercover in the Burning Legion and finally blew up the Well of Eternity.

The Well of Eternity exploded, and the continental plates shattered, forming the later continents of Kalimdor, Eastern Kingdoms, Northrend, etc. The place that was blown up was the later Maelstrom.

This plot
Of course, this plot is also the result of Blizzard's repeated changes to the book many times, but to be honest, Dongchuan Che still finds this plot not very attractive.

There is no other reason, because this is a very typical story of heroic historical view. To be honest, the pure heroic historical view is not a big problem.

Who doesn't like heroes?

However, this plot is a very extreme heroic historical story.

Azeroth is such a huge world, but in the entire story of [the world is about to be destroyed by the Burning Legion], only a few races such as the night elves appear, and the story is almost entirely focused on Illidan, and everyone else seems to not exist.

Heroic Genesis.

It's obvious that the purpose of this plot is to create the character of Illidan as a tragic hero, but to be honest, this characterization is really not very good.

After the "Legion" version, the character of Illidan not only failed to stand out, but on the contrary, Illidan, a character who was very popular in the early days, has attracted a lot of complaints from players after this whitewashing plot.

Dongchuan Che also didn't like this plot development. First of all, the combat power system completely collapsed.

The Titans, Dark Titans, and the Burning Legion were all extremely powerful in the early stages. The Dark Titan Sargeras was even bigger than the planet Azeroth. A big sword stabbed down and almost broke the planet. But they were killed by a group of players who usually killed chickens, cows, and kodo beasts on the planet Azeroth. And the key is that after the players killed Sargeras, they would start killing chickens, cows, and spider demons in the next expansion pack.
Too discordant.

Secondly, it’s the old problem of World of Warcraft’s plot—the characters are overly stereotyped and the story is too childish.

The story of the War of the Ancients can be summarized in one sentence - the Burning Legion is about to invade Azeroth, then Illidan saves the world, and finally Illidan is wrongly accused and imprisoned by Maiev for 10,000 years
This kind of story is fine as a simple biography of a character, and its influence is limited to a small country, but if it involves the historical background of the entire world of Azeroth, it seems a bit ridiculous.

Dongchuan Che also needs to make adjustments.

The Burning Legion still wanted to invade Azeroth, but first of all, the Burning Legion was not that powerful. Second, at that time, the world of Azeroth was not only populated by night elves, but also the mysterious ancient oriental country - Pandaria!
In Dong Chuanche's conception, the plot of the Burning Legion's invasion will last for hundreds of years, just like the early plot of "Winter is Coming" in "A Song of Ice and Fire". During this period, all kinds of stories will happen in both the kingdom of the night elves and the kingdom of the dragon people, Pandaria.

In this story, there is a night elf ranger who endures humiliation and bears the infamy to save his people;

There is a great swordsman of the dragon race who has kept his promise, and went to the Great Wall of the Northern Territory to resist the Burning Legion with a room and a pot of wine;
There are cruel politicians from the East and the West who manipulate power and deceive the world;

There is the idle prince from the East who hates political struggles and spends his days in debauchery, but cannot deceive himself at the last moment and brazenly raises his sword;
There is also a cruel and bloody Duchess who leads her army to fight against the enemies from other worlds after taking the throne;
At the same time, there is also the young empress who transformed into a dragon in Pandaria to fight against A'Shaarj after the explosion of the Well of Eternity and protected all people for thousands of years.

Toru Fuyukawa wanted to write the story of the War of the Ancients into a group epic with a heavy sense of history, rather than the kind of personal heroic play in the original work.

At the same time, in this plot, he will also reveal the tip of the iceberg of the history of the Dragon People, allowing more players to understand the ancient charm of Asian culture, and make players look forward to the subsequent Pandaria expansion plot.

That is why, for this live-action drama of "World of Warcraft", Dongchuan Che not only had to find many Western actors, but also Asian actors.

What’s interesting is that this time, except for some characters that will be given to his own company to train new talents, many characters are directly posted on the voting page of the GOGO platform, allowing players to [choose their concubines] by themselves!
Whether it is a Hollywood superstar, a popular star from China, Japan, or South Korea, or a veteran actor, as long as the players vote for them, Dongchuan Che will send someone to contact them.
The problem is not big.

Let’s not talk about China, Japan and South Korea. Whether it’s funding or connections, Dongchuan Che is the best of the best. And to be honest, the star actors in China, Japan and South Korea actually lack such opportunities to participate in world-class productions.

In fact, China is relatively better, as the Chinese film and television market is large, so there are some super-large-scale productions. But it should be said that except for a few big directors, most of the works of Chinese directors cannot make any waves in Europe and the United States, and there is no actor or star who does not want to make a name for himself in Europe and the United States.

Only when a company has made a name for itself in Europe and the United States can it be considered truly world-class.

As for Japanese and Korean celebrity actors.
Let’s put it this way. In Japan and South Korea, exporting cultural products to Europe and the United States is actually a kind of [national policy].
In Asia, those actors and stars are eager to find connections to ask Dongchuan Che for help. As for Europe and the United States.
It's not a big problem either.

The reason is simple - money.

With the explosive popularity of "World of Warcraft", previous works such as "FGO", plus music and several other sectors, Dongchuan Che's net worth is now over 20 billion US dollars, and this is when "Pokemon" and the handheld console have not yet been released!

Although those celebrity actors are very rich in the eyes of ordinary people, even a phenomenal Hollywood star like Tom Cruise, who starred in "Mission Impossible", has assets of only a few hundred million US dollars after making movies for decades.

Under such conditions, as long as Dongchuan Che is willing to spend money and as long as the script is not so bad as to affect the reputation of the star actors, then anyone can be hired to film the movie.

Rich and powerful!

This voting mode, which is like a buffet and a concubine selection, has indeed brought a wave of popularity to World of Warcraft! More importantly, tonight, a group dungeon in World of Warcraft, Molten Core, will be launched!
Wave after wave!
It has been almost two months since the server was launched, and the popularity of "World of Warcraft" has remained high, and is even getting higher and higher!
At the beginning of this month, Sayuri Sato saw through a short video that the number of simultaneous online users of "World of Warcraft" exceeded 1900 million!
It took more than a month to surge from 1782 million to 1900 million.

It may not seem like much, but in fact this data is extremely exaggerated!

You should know that the previous record of the online game industry was 1623 million simultaneous online users. Dongchuan Che's "World of Warcraft" broke this record a long time ago, and 1900 million simultaneous online users is almost the limit of the entire current online game market.

What’s more crucial is that in the past two months, apart from making some BUG fixes, "World of Warcraft" has hardly added any new content. Even the core gameplay - the group version - has not been opened.

In this case, not only did the number of players not decrease, but it increased! The popularity did not decrease, but it increased!
This is also the reason why Dongchuan Che’s wealth has skyrocketed in the past month, because it means that "World of Warcraft" is not a game supported by publicity and gimmicks, but a game of real quality!

"Although my brother-in-law is a bit lazy at ordinary times, he is still very reliable when doing serious work."

Sayuri Sato skillfully logged into her Dragon Clan Warlock account while recalling what had happened during this period of time. As she thought about it, her eyes also showed some other meanings.

To be honest, she has always known that Dongchuan Che is very capable. After all, when her family discusses things, unless it is some core secrets that they are worried that she might accidentally let slip, they will not avoid her on most other matters.

And ever since the business of the Holy Light Society got on track and Dongchuan Che had carved out a space of his own, she had been highly valued whether she was within the Holy Light Society, at school, or participating in other activities such as dinners.

Therefore, she also knew how wealthy Dongchuan Che was and how high his social status was, but it was actually difficult for people to have too strong a sense of admiration for those they came into contact with every day and had a very close relationship with.

Because she was with Dongchuan Che every day before, many of her feelings were diluted. However, with the half year of high school boarding life, and not being able to be with Dongchuan Che often, standing farther away from Dongchuan Che, she can see the difference between Dongchuan Che and other men more clearly, and has more free time to recall every little thing that happened.

This feeling
fantastic.

Thinking of the time she spent at home with Toukawa Tetsu, Sayuri Sato's face showed some nostalgia and a little blush. But before she could think about it for a while, the voice of her friend asking her to join a team interrupted her thoughts.

"Huh - no luck! I don't want to think about it anymore! Anyway, I'll be on vacation and go home in a while, and then I'll be able to see my sister and brother-in-law." Sato Sayuri shook her head, trying to pull all her thoughts away, but after she controlled the character in the computer to take a few steps, she thought of another thing.

"If I remember correctly, I seem to have heard from my sister and brother-in-law last time that Pokémon Go will be launched a few months after World of Warcraft is launched. Well, if this happens, I won't be able to stick to my sister every day even if I go home during the holidays."

A little crazy.

Thinking that even if she went home, she would have no legitimate reason to stick around Sato Fujiko and Fuyukawa Che every day, and that they might even lecture her with words like "Sayuri, you're an adult now, you need to learn to be strong and independent," Sato Sayuri became a little crazy, with a look of aggrievedness in her eyes.

At this time, my roommate Nohara Akiko suddenly asked, "Hey, Yuki. Speaking of which, someone in the forum said that the Holy Light Club might also release some competitive games in the future. You are also a professional player now, do you know any inside information?"

"Ah?"

Hearing her roommate's words, Sayuri Sato was stunned for a moment, but soon, she seemed to think of something in her mind, and her somewhat aggrieved eyes quickly brightened.

"My brother-in-law seemed to have said that after World of Warcraft and Pokémon are launched, the company will release two competitive games! Fufufu, by then my sister and brother-in-law will definitely hang around me, Sayuri, every day! Maybe they will even ask me, Sayuri, for some advice on the e-sports industry in exchange for a big meal!"

"Well, we have to work harder starting tomorrow!"

Sayuri Sato couldn't help but get excited at the thought of being able to show off in front of Toru Fuyukawa and Fujiko Sato when she got home, and that she could finally become a meaningful member of the family like Nanako Ohara and be treated as an adult. However, before she could get excited for a while, the little dragon warlock she was controlling was killed by several velociraptors on the roadside.

".Yuki, can you really go far as an e-sports player? You were killed by the monsters in the Novice Village."

".No road race! Hurry up and form a team for me!"

(End of this chapter)