My capital is quite large.

Jinling, Xianlin Science and Technology City.

Inside the headquarters building of Haofeng Group, the game division occupies four full floors.

This geeky area, usually filled with the sounds of mechanical keyboards and programmers' cursing, was eerily quiet this morning.

"Put away all those random snacks and takeout orders! And stuff all those anime standees on your desks into your drawers!"

The heads of several large groups were patrolling the corridors before dawn, their voices tense:

"General Manager Li will be coming downstairs for an inspection at 10 o'clock sharp. He hasn't visited our game department in over half a year. If anyone messes up right under our noses today, don't blame the HR department for being ruthless!"

The big boss is coming to inspect the place in person.

This brief notice issued by the president's office in the early morning put the entire game division on high alert.

10 o'clock sharp.

The doors to the private elevator slid open silently.

Li Feng was wearing a gray suit with a dark pattern, with his jacket draped over his arm, and Zhang Yuxi following behind him, holding a tablet.

Although he wasn't accompanied by a large entourage of executives, the moment he stepped out of the elevator, his imposing aura, born of long-standing authority, still made the employees standing at their sides in the corridor hold their breath.

"Mr. Li, please take your time."

Old Chen, the director of the game department, who had been waiting at the elevator entrance, greeted Li Feng with a beaming smile. He bowed slightly and led Li Feng through the glass doors, directly into the large, single-level apartment of the mobile game development department.

"As is customary, let me first show you our mobile game development department. Everyone is working hard to prepare for the version update in the third quarter."

As the place where Li Feng rose to power by creating a few casual games, the mobile game development department has always been the first stop he visits.

Inside the large, single-level apartment spanning thousands of square meters, hundreds of dual-screen monitors are neatly arranged.

Li Feng walked unhurriedly through the passageway with his hands behind his back.

The light and shadow on the screen change.

But what Li Feng saw were scenes that looked very familiar—

This is a Q-version Three Kingdoms card flip, with a new skin for the Journey to the West illustration.

Over there is a nine-square grid formation based on the theme of cultivating immortality, with similar combat power stat bars embedded at the bottom.

Further in, you'll find identical offers like "First recharge of 6 yuan grants a divine general," "VIP privilege pop-ups," and "Consecutive logins reward treasure chests"...

Old Chen walked beside Li Feng, pointing to the assembly-line-like R&D teams, his tone full of pride as if he were recounting something he cherished:

"Mr. Li, take a look at these newly approved projects."

"This is a mature numerical framework that we borrowed from the top five best-selling models on the market, wrapped in a traditional Chinese mythology theme, and the model's detail is top-notch! The retention rate in testing is quite impressive!"

"And this one, a card battle game with light idle gameplay, has had its development cycle compressed to within four months, and its guaranteed revenue for the first month is at least 30 million!"

Old Chen eloquently described the KPI assessments and payback periods for each group.

However, Li Feng stood in front of the screen, his eyes showing no emotion whatsoever, but rather a hint of disappointment.

Reskinning.

Homogenization.

A predictable pay-to-win strategy.

But Li Feng did not react.

He knew that this was the inevitable fate of all large companies to become bloated.

Haofeng is too big.

In the gaming sector alone, there are four or five independently operated studios with thousands of employees.

Once a company reaches this scale, it inevitably chooses to align everything with KPIs and financial reports.

Homogeneity means that the product category has been validated in the market, which means the lowest risk and that middle managers will not lose their jobs due to decision-making errors.

Is it reasonable to expect these team leaders with million-dollar salaries to engage in disruptive innovation at the cost of huge sunk costs?

"Mr. Li, what do you think of these directions?" Old Chen asked tentatively, seeing that Li Feng remained silent for a long time and was unsure of what was going on.

Li Feng looked away and didn't respond to the topic of game quality.

He turned around, his gaze sweeping over the director's private office area at the heart of the penthouse, and asked in a calm tone:

"Where is Feng Ji?"

"Isn't he the director of the mobile games department? Why haven't I seen him today?"

Upon hearing Feng Ji's name, a barely perceptible glint flashed in Old Chen's eyes, but his smile grew even more benevolent.

"Oh, Director Feng, what a coincidence."

Old Chen sighed and explained, seemingly unintentionally:

"He submitted a report to go on a business trip to Shenzhen two days ago."

"He said he was going there to check out cutting-edge motion capture studios to prepare for his long-awaited new project."

"Recently, I've been taking care of the daily project progress and version control for the mobile game department."

At this point, Old Chen seemed to remember something, and shook his head with a wry smile:

"Mr. Li, I shouldn't be talking about my colleagues behind their backs."

"Director Feng is young, energetic, and full of drive, which are all excellent qualities."

"But... young people are sometimes a bit too radical in their thinking."

"Take this time for example. He insisted on making some kind of 3A single-player masterpiece and wanted to use a self-developed physics engine to work on it completely... Our Haofeng has been around for so many years, but we have never had any experience in developing a large-scale 3A game."

"These investments often involve hundreds of millions of dollars. If they go down the drain in the market, it'll all be bad debts. I've tried to advise him privately several times, but he just won't listen..."

Old Chen's words were quite insightful.

He not only firmly established his image as a hardworking and dedicated ox, but also conveniently labeled his colleagues as recklessly ambitious.

however.

Li Feng simply listened quietly.

He neither echoed nor commented on the so-called 3A project.

Just when Old Chen thought the boss had taken his wise and prudent advice to heart, Li Feng suddenly spoke up:

"Old Chen, I remember... you're almost fifty-five this year, aren't you?"

Ga.

Old Chen, who had prepared a long string of clichéd lines about sound business management, choked back down by this unprovoked question.

"Huh? Fifty-five...?"

Old Chen looked at Li Feng, somewhat bewildered, and subconsciously chuckled awkwardly as he corrected him:

"Mr. Li, you...you must have misremembered."

"I'm only fifty-two years old this year."

In large, non-state-owned companies where retirement age is strictly enforced, a three-year age difference can mean the difference between a glimmer of hope and a bleak exit!

"oh."

Li Feng's expression remained unchanged, and his tone was leisurely:

"I remembered it wrong."

"Let's go check out the PC game."

……

at the same time.

The Haofeng Film and Television Building, located halfway across the city, has twelve floors.

Because Director Han is still holed up in Xiapi, overseeing "Northwest Past," the huge film and television department has become quite deserted.

The only exception is the variety show division, which has been holding meetings every day lately, making a huge commotion.

*Smack!*

A stack of contestant information was slapped onto the conference table.

"What kind of shoddy work has your coordination team been doing these past few days?!"

At the head of the table, Huang Jie, the director of the variety show division, slammed her hand on the table and stood up.

This female backbone, who was known for her gentleness when she worked as an executive planner at the TV station in her early years, has undergone a drastic change in temperament since being put in the position of independent director by Lao Han. She has become as irritable as a powder keg that can be ignited at any moment.

There's no way around it; the higher the position, the greater the responsibility.

Everyone knows what the consequences will be if you mess up a project that the boss is personally involved in.

"Get these rotten potatoes and rotten eggs off the list!"

Huang Jie pointed at the contestants' photos on the screen, almost screaming:

"Look at this! Take a good look at what kind of nonsense is printed on this!!"

"Big gold chains, studded leather jackets, face tattoos, smoking opium... that's called 'Hip Hop Girl'!!"

"We're choosing girls! Not hip-hop aunties! And definitely not someone to put on a performance for detention centers!!"