Universe Infinite Canteen

"Lord Aisagon is an important NPC in the game," Baldy tried to explain, "All players are his subordinates, required to show their allegiance to him, carry out his commands..."

Ma Lu shook his head, "Players won't want to be anyone's subordinate, let alone a Minotaur like this Aisagon."

"What's wrong with Minotaurs?" Baldy struggled to control the veins throbbing on his forehead.

"Minotaurs are enemies common to all players, well, not all perhaps, there are those who like Minotaurs, but they are few and far between."

Ma Lu said, "You're starting the game with a public enemy here, that's a disadvantage at the start. How about considering a different character design, like an Elder Sister figure by Black Silk Thunder? And she better be well-endowed. Right, and the legs must be fleshy, remember to model that bouncy texture when you build it."

"......"

Baldy was silent.

Coconut Jelly again signaled maybe just call it quits, but Baldy still didn't take her suggestion, only addressing Ma Lu.

"Let's set aside the part about Lord Aisagon for now and take a look at what comes next."
Your next chapter is on My Virtual Library Empire

"What, you don't want to redo the opening? Makes sense, that CG must have cost a pretty penny." Ma Lu nodded in understanding, "Then let's continue."

Zhen Ye received the order to keep playing.

The camera moved away from Aisagon and onto a wilderness where various creatures of the wasteland began to appear, green-skinned Goblins, red-skinned Goblins, purple-skinned Goblins, black-skinned Goblins, and Goblins that were half purple and half black...

"Stop," Ma Lu called a halt again and casually looked at Baldy, "Does your game only have one kind of monster?"

"The different kinds of Goblins are very different, they can practically be considered entirely different species," the game producer tried to educate him.

"But the problem is that their models are all the same, just with different colors. Players grinding the same old Goblins will get bored quickly. Don't you have any more impressive monsters?"

"There are, you can keep watching..."

Assured, Ma Lu patiently watched on and after seeing a dozen or so different colors of Goblins, finally something different appeared—a Slime Monster.

It seemed even less threatening than the Goblins.

Immediately after, the camera captured a Ghoul, another overused monster in similar games, followed by a Butcher, a Cyclops, a Troll, a Blood Demon... Ma Lu began to yawn.

Baldy whispered a reminder, "The big one is coming."

The next moment, the camera shifted again, and a few humans appeared on the TV.

Leading them was a man clad in full Knight's Armor, with a Golden Greatsword at his hip, looking dashing, and beside him stood a Dwarf wielding a battle axe.

Behind them was a slender Elf Archer with pointed ears, followed by a Holy Priest at the back of the group, holding a Magic Wand.

"This is..." Ma Lu finally widened his eyes.

"A very dangerous kind of monster from the Endless Abyss—Braves," Baldy introduced solemnly, "They are greedy and cunning creatures. We did nothing to provoke them, but they covet the precious materials produced by the Endless Abyss. They infiltrate our lands every so often, ransacking and pillaging, utterly indistinguishable from robbers."

"Ah?" Ma Lu scratched his chin, "This setup is quite special... it does make for a little difference from the competition, hmm, let's keep watching."

The animation continued, this time the viewpoint shifted to a small town. Calling it a town was a stretch—it was basically a few houses made of Stone, and there were hardly any residents except for Goblins, Skeleton frames, and Slime Monsters.

The voiceover went on.

——You, the humble servant of the great Aisagon, after a difficult journey, have finally arrived at Red Ridge Town, a vibrant land of hope, yet one that is also surrounded by peril.

Can you fulfill Lord Aisagon's command, successfully defend, and build Red Ridge Town?

Then, another option popped up on the screen.

——Yes/I can.

Ma Lu looked towards Baldy again, who explained, "This is to increase interaction. I've seen many mobile games with similar settings, giving you several options that are more or less the same and don't affect the subsequent plot."

"But these two options are too straightforward," he said.

While Ma Lu and Baldy were chatting, Zhen Ye had already clicked 'Yes,' and the screen switched to the character selection interface.

Having watched the preceding animation, Ma Lu already had a faint premonition, which was further confirmed by what happened next.

What appeared before him was the Face Alteration System commonly found in RPG games, but the object for alteration was a skeleton, not a human.

Here, players could pick their favorite bones and assemble them together to create their ultimate character.

Of course, considering that some people might not like the tedious assembling process, the project team had thoughtfully built in a one-click character selection function.

With just one click, a Skeleton Soldier would immediately be pieced together.

However, Zhen Ye didn't want to use this convenient feature and preferred to do it herself. She even used her phone to look up information, eventually assembling a Skeleton Puppy.

"Can you really do that?" Ma Lu exclaimed in surprise. "The freedom is indeed quite high, but there's too little guidance, isn't there? Most players would probably just use the one-click selection, and even if some do it manually, they're likely to assemble it in human form."

"Did you hear that," Baldy said to Happi Bear, the front-end engineer next to him, "add some more guidance."

"Okay." Happi Bear responded, pulled out a purple crystal ball, placed his right hand on it, and closed his eyes.

The next moment, a new line of text appeared on the screen —— Here, you can unleash your imagination and freely edit your character.

Ma Lu didn't see Happi Bear's slick operation, because by that time, Zhen Ye's Skeleton Puppy was already assembled.

She clicked to finish creation, and the screen went dark again.

In the next moment, the TV scene switched back to the center of the town, where a sinister black Magic Circle lit up. Soon after, the Skeleton Puppy jumped out from the Magic Circle.

After landing, it even wagged its tail.

"The modeling and scenery are impressive," Ma Lu complimented, "the optimization is good too. This must be the highest graphics quality, right? The picture is very smooth and silky, no lag at all."

"No big deal, technology has never been our problem," Baldy said with confidence.

But soon, Ma Lu discovered another issue, "Isn't there a quest prompt?"

"Quest prompt?"

"Like, what to do next. Even in an open-world game, there should be main and side quests, right?"

"The opening animation already said it, to serve Lord Aisagon, to defend and build Red Ridge Town."

"I know the overall direction, but how do you achieve this goal? Most games would break down this process into main and side quests, allowing players to complete them step by step, gaining character progression. Speaking of which, how does your character progress?"