A writer has arrived in the Chinese entertainment industry.

"You've all played roguelike games, right?"

Yao Men, Chen Kai, and Qiezi, who were present, were all seasoned game enthusiasts and naturally knew about roguelike games.

Roguelike games are essentially the same as classic roguelike games. However, when we talk about roguelike games now, we're mostly referring to roguelite games. Simply put, it's the difference between hardcore and casual roguelike games.

Roguelike games are hardcore zombie games; if you die, you lose everything, and it all depends on skill.

roguelite is a light roguelike game where you can become stronger after dying, and it gets easier the more you play.

"Mr. Su wants to create roguelite?"

"That's right, imagine a game like this. Players only need to control the character's movement, while attacks and skill releases are all done automatically."

"This... single-handed operation, automatic attack, only movement control?" Chen Kai frowned, even somewhat incredulous. "This is too monotonous. What kind of gaming experience can that offer?"

Everyone present was puzzled, even An Wenxiu couldn't understand what was so fun about such a game.

Su Liu chuckled, knowing these people were bound by traditional thinking. So he continued, "In a single game, monsters attack in waves. And the frequency of gaining experience, leveling up, and acquiring skills is extremely high. Each level up involves a three-choice mechanism, allowing players to make strategic choices even in the chaos."

Yao Men and others gradually came to understand the core of the game.

"Imagine going from only being able to attack a few enemies around you at the beginning to automatically clearing out the entire screen and bombarding you with bullets later on! Who could resist the exhilarating feeling of going from weak to invincible?"

"Then the difficulty and number of monsters need to increase exponentially." It was Eggplant who spoke; he had already grasped the essence of the game. "This is how you create immense survival pressure, forcing players to level up quickly."

"That's right! You get it! So, the core design of the entire game is the numerical values ​​and the bizarre skills and weapons!" Su Liu said excitedly. "Moreover, we've made this game in a pixel art style, and because of the game mode, the map can be designed to be very simple."

"This game is great!" To everyone's surprise, An Wenxiu actually agreed.

For An Wenxiu, all the design points mentioned above can be summed up in one sentence: it doesn't cost much money.

Su Liu didn't notice this at all and said to her with satisfaction, "Sister Wenxiu, you've improved!"

"So what's the name of this game?" Yao asked.

"Let's call him, Vampire Survivor."

In the gaming industry, stories of high-stakes, low-budget games achieving huge success are commonplace, but *Vampire Survivors* is undoubtedly a pinnacle of this phenomenon. A phenomenal game that sold 2.5 million copies in its first month and accumulated over ten million copies in sales. The developers alone earned a net income of $16 million, while its development cost was a mere $1500—yes, $1500, not $10,000.

"Wait a minute," An Wenxiu suddenly asked, "why would a game made by Chinese people be called something like 'Vampire'?"

"They're targeting the overseas market, right?" Eggplant guessed. "Detective... President Su probably wants to list on Steam and consoles, focusing on the overseas market, right?"

"That's right, after all, everyone has seen the state of the single-player game market in China right now." He then looked at the Yao family and asked, "How long would it take you to develop a game like this?"

Yao Men and Chen Kai looked relaxed, showing no sign of difficulty.

"Pixel art style, character design, map design—none of these are difficult; in fact, they're almost too easy." The two exchanged a glance. "Half a month should be enough, maybe even faster."

"Great! Go back today and start recruiting! Develop the game as quickly as possible. As for overseas distribution..." Su Liu looked at An Wenxiu, "Sister Wenxiu..."

An Wenxiu said helplessly, "We don't have many media resources in the gaming industry."

"Try to find connections; you can always get in touch. If all else fails, just throw money at it! The development cost of this game is negligible; we can definitely spend more on advertising."

"Oh my, our CEO Su is really arrogant now, always talking about throwing money around."

An Wenxiu didn't want to spend the money. In her view, the development cost of "Vampire Survivor" was indeed negligible, and it wouldn't matter even if it lost money. But spending money on promotion was a different story; it would not only increase costs for nothing, but it also might not be effective.

Of all these people, only Su Liu knew how successful the game would be. But after all, the gaming environment and spending power ten years from now would be vastly different from today, so spending some money on promotion would provide some assurance.

"By the way," Su Liu asked Chen Kai, "since a mobile version of 'Genshin Impact' (a 3D action game) can't be made, what about a PC version?"

Chen Kai thought for a moment and said, "The PC version also faces several problems. The first is competitiveness. There are many established ACT and ARPG games on the PC platform. If our game quality is not up to par, it simply won't sell."

"There's also the market problem," An Wenxiu said quietly from the side. "The so-called 'anime-style' PC game market is extremely small right now. Games like LOL, DNF, and CF practically dominate the entire PC market, leaving no room for anime-style games to survive. Distribution channels are also a problem. Big companies like Perfect World, NetEase, Tencent, and Shanda control the channels, making it very difficult for us to push forward."

Immediately afterwards, An Wenxiu said something incredibly shocking.

"If you make mobile games now, you might have a good future. But if you make PC games, you're doomed."

These words immediately silenced everyone, and Chen Kai didn't even bother to say anything about second place. It was Su Liu who finally asked him, "And second place?"

He then spoke up, "The second issue is still personnel. It's definitely easier to recruit people for PC games than for mobile games, but the pool is still limited. Just like Mr. An said, the market for anime-style PC games is too small."

"Leaving aside the anime/manga aspect for now, how many people would you need to assemble a team capable of developing medium to large-scale PC games?"

"Let me speak," Yao Men took over the conversation. "First, there's the core management team. I won't go into too much detail about that. Kai Ge and I can both serve as producer, lead planner, and lead programmer, and President Su can also be the producer." He continued, "Next is the planning team. System planner, numerical planner, level planner, etc., we need eight to ten people."

"The programming team, including the lead engine programmer and graphics rendering engineers, needs twelve to fifteen people. The art team, including the lead artist, 3D modelers, and motion designers, needs around twenty people."

"Next, we need four or five people for operations, testing, audio, and maintenance. In total, we need to recruit at least fifty people."

Eggplant, standing to the side, was stunned. Fifty people was an extremely large team for him. He fantasized about joining the company and leading such a team to realize his ideas! It would be incredibly exciting.

"We're hiring!" Su Liu made the final decision. "We don't need to max out the specs all at once, just enough to keep each department running!" He immediately followed up with, "You guys just said that besides hardware issues, what's the hardest thing about mobile games?"