game trailblazer

Chapter 108 Creative Workshop
In the following days, Zhang Lexing visited Dongfang Microelectronics, Dongfang Electronic Entertainment, Kunpeng Animation, Camry Toys, Applied Technology Research Institute and other institutions.

Under the leadership of Dr. Yu, Dongfang Microelectronics expects to complete the upgrade of the MIPSR-3000A CPU production line by the end of this year, reaching an annual output of 320 million units, which can basically meet future needs.In addition, at the request of Zhang Lexing, they began to develop a new generation of processors and corresponding auxiliary circuits, which are intended to be used in future game consoles, and this console is really the Chinese game console that Zhang Lexing planned.

At present, Dongfang Electronic Entertainment only has Maxis (Hong Kong), Blue Dragon Games, Activision, and Eidos, a few small-scale game development and distribution companies (Creative Workshop has just been established and has not yet achieved results, and Tianzhiyuan has not yet had time. Takeover, so it doesn't count), the strength is not strong, and there is still a big gap compared with EA. As for the game giants such as Nintendo and Sega, it is even more incomparable. Zhang Lexing plans to find a way.

Kunpeng Animation has basically stopped its expansion now, and the task for the next two years is to completely consume the comic assets of Xiaqiao Group. Happiness blossomed.

Jiamei Toys was established to cooperate with the large-scale animation and game peripheral production base construction project in Shenzhen. With a large number of animation images, one can imagine that the future of money is very good.

……

When Zhang Lexing left for BJ, it happened to be April Fool's Day on April 4st.After leaving the Capital International Airport, Zhang Lexing didn't bother to go back to rest, and went directly to the creative workshop. It has been out for almost half a year, and he doesn't know what the company is like now.

Taking the elevator directly to the 8th floor, Zhang Lexing saw the new office area after renovation for the first time.When you get out of the elevator, you are facing the front desk. The reception desk made of solid wood is inlaid with a layer of glass. Behind it is a huge company logo board.The person staying at the front desk today was a woman who looked a little familiar from the back, wearing a light green shirt-style lapel dress, with her back facing the outside, and she didn't know what she was doing there.

When Zhang Lexing got closer, the woman turned around just in time. This time, she could see that it was the Lu Qiuya who had been interviewed, but she seemed to be in a bad mood.

"Boss, you're back!" Seeing Zhang Lexing, Lu Qiuya showed a surprised expression.

"Lu Qiuya, you are not in a good mood, what's wrong?"

"Boss, you originally asked me to dub the game, but after the training, I finally fell in love with the game. The specific job that can be assigned is to guard the front desk every day. This difference is too big."

"It may be that the company's recent projects do not require dubbing. Don't think too much about it, work hard, and there will be opportunities in the future."

Seeing that Lu Qiuya's expression became much more normal, Zhang Lexing pushed open the glass door next to him, walked through the hallway, and entered the office area.Adjacent to the entrance is a reception room with an area of ​​about 30 square meters. There are two white leather sofas and a light-colored solid wood coffee table. A pot of cineraria is placed in the middle of the coffee table. There is a Phnom Penh Tiger Piran, and a few game posters brought back from the United States are dotted on the wall.

Leaving the reception room and walking forward is the kind of transparent large-bay office area, which is divided into several areas by using a large area of ​​translucent frosted tempered glass partitions. There is an aisle in the middle, and "program design Department", "Planning Department", "Art Department", "Project Department", "Administration Department", "Finance Department" and other labeled office areas.

Zhang Lexing walked into the office area of ​​the programming department. Because there are the most programmers, this area is the largest. It is divided into many office seats by half-height office partitions. About half of the seats are filled with office supplies and computers. Half of the space is reserved.There are mostly people sitting in front of the computer, or using a mouse or using a keyboard, and everyone is busy there.

Zhang Lexing stood behind the person near the entrance and looked carefully. This person was not coding there, but playing games there.On a metal-style background, squares of different colors slowly grow downwards. At the bottom of the screen is a long strip object that is constantly moving. Bounce a metal ball upwards continuously. Zhang Lexing You can see it, isn't this the classic "Brickbreaker".But soon Zhang Lexing discovered some abnormalities. This is not an ordinary brick-breaker game. In addition to some regular treasures, there are actually lightning (eliminate a vertical column at a time), bomb (explode eight bricks centered on the bomb) Blocks) and other special treasures, the most exaggerated thing is that at certain moments, it can trigger a chain of lightning, and wipe out a large piece of bricks that are about to grow to the end.

"Boss, you are back!" Someone noticed Zhang Lexing when he got up at this time, and hurriedly greeted him.This shout startled everyone, and everyone in the programming department stood up to greet them. Zhang Lexing couldn't continue to observe quietly, so he had to wave his hands to say hello to everyone.

After the greeting, Zhang Lexing said, "Okay, everyone, get busy first, don't delay work because of me."

After everyone dispersed, Zhang Lexing left Zhan Jun behind, pointed to the game on the computer at the door and asked, "This is it?"

"Boss, this is our new game "Thunder Bricks". It has been basically completed. Please help test it and see if there are any bugs."

"Not bad, just this one?"

"No, this game really doesn't need many people to make it, but for the growth of newcomers, we made a new one, and invested ten people. The rest of the people will do another project, which is an idea proposed by John. , Boss, come here and take a look."

Zhang Lexing followed Zhan Jun to a computer inside. Zhan Jun started a game by himself. As soon as the game screen came out, Zhang Lexing looked at the cars, trains, planes, ships and cities all over the map. I was taken aback. Isn't this the "Transport Tycoon" I once played.

Zhan Jun didn't notice Zhang Lexing's abnormality, he held the mouse while operating and said: "This is a simulation business game proposed by John, in which players can act as transport business owners, in different periods from 1932 to 2000 Start development, with a variety of passenger cars, freight cars, ships, planes, trains to choose from... It is not yet fully completed, and it is expected to be about a week before testing can begin.”

"Let me try it." Zhang Lexing couldn't wait to invite Zhan Jun away, sat down immediately, took the mouse, and began to move and click.First, he chose a map at random, and then found a city with the largest population to build a bus stop in the city. After building four bus stops in southeast, southeast, northwest, Zhang Lexing wanted to buy a car, but the program reported an error as soon as he clicked it.

Zhan Jun next to him said: "Boss, there are still some program modules that have not been added, so if you play directly, some functions will report errors. The scene you saw before was made with an editor for testing. If you really want to play , have to wait a week."

There was no other way, Zhang Lexing had no choice but to reluctantly put down the mouse, and when he got up, he patted Zhan Jun on the shoulder and said, "Come on, do it well, remember to give me a copy when the time comes, and I will help to test it."

Leaving the programming department, Zhang Lexing came to the art department on the opposite side. More than a dozen people inside were busy drawing with their mouse. In the East, there are not only cars, ships, trains, and airplanes of various shapes, but also trees, forests, and terrain maps.

Coming out of the art department, Zhang Lexing came to the planning department next to the programming department, but there was no one there, only the screensavers of a few computers were flashing.Opposite the planning department is the project department. Zhang Lexing glanced at it as he passed by, and saw that there were three people hiding in a place where he thought no one was there. One person and one computer were typing hard on the keyboard.When I walked in, it turned out that it was Ken Silvermanzer and the Han brothers.Zhang Lexing's voice startled the three people who were working hard, and they all wanted to get up and say hello.

"You don't need to get up, I'll do your work first." Zhang Lexing signaled the three of them not to get up, then walked over to Han Jiaxiang and asked, "What are you doing?"

Before Han Jiaxiang could say anything, Ken Silvermanzer spoke first: "Boss, we are working on a 3D engine and plan to make a better game than "Wolf-3D"."

"Are there any results now?" Zhang Lexing asked curiously.

Ken Silvermanzer shrugged: "Boss, we've only started for a week, and we haven't produced any results yet. Now most of the company's staff is busy with "Thunder Bricks" and "Transport Tycoon", and Jen can't arrange it." It’s too slow to rely on the three of us alone, if we can find a way to add a few more people, it should be much faster.”

After listening to Ken Silvermanzer's words, Zhang Lexing thought deeply: "In addition to administrative and financial affairs, the creative workshop now has a dedicated development team with 63 people. It is a game development company with a lot of masters, but compared with the nearly 300-person development team of American Blue Dragon Games, there is not only a gap in quantity, but also a far worse quality. It seems that the talent problem is the biggest obstacle to the company's current development Of course, this is probably also one of the obstacles to the development of the game industry in mainland China. It seems that this problem has not been solved until the era of online games. Instead, the gap is getting bigger and bigger. It seems that I have to think of a way. Own companies are stymied on the same issue."

Leaving the project department, Zhang Lexing thought about the problem of talents while walking, but he forgot to go in when he passed the administration department and finance department, and he didn't wake up until he came to the door of the conference room.Just as he was about to turn around, Zhang Lexing heard Mike Ronald's excited voice coming from the meeting room.Pushing the door of the conference room lightly, Zhang Lexing found that the door was not closed, so he opened it and walked in.When I entered the door, except for Mike Ronald, all the planners who could not be found just now were inside, and all of them were very emotional.

"I said, what's the matter with you, all of you are blushing and have thick necks." Zhang Lexing patted the door of the conference room, trying to draw everyone's attention to him.

The voice from the gate made everyone look there, and found that it was their boss who came, and everyone was honest, but Mike Ronald didn't see him at all, and he was still bluffing.

Zhang Lexing came to the conference table and asked again: "What are you guys doing?"

"Boss, we are discussing what to do in the next game here. Everyone's opinions are a bit inconsistent, so..." Zhong Guoqiang stood up and said.

"Oh, then tell me what everyone thinks."

"We have discussed together before that the company has not produced role-playing games (RPGs), so this time we plan to try in this area. However, we are not sure about the specific style of RPG games. Mike wants to make D&D (Dragon and Dungeon) rules RPG game, Xiao He (He Yufei) wants to make a Japanese-style RPG, and Lu Yongcheng wants to make a martial arts RPG. They both have their own supporters, so they can’t be unified. Boss, you started making games a long time ago. , why don't you come and give us some pointers."

Unexpectedly, the RPG style dispute would appear in his company so early, Zhang Lexing couldn't help but sigh in his heart.

(End of this chapter)