Chapter 403: Promotion

Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio

What kind of game would be best?

Li Dong first thought of an action fighting game.

Its requirements included a smooth sense of impact, a good sense of strength, and near-real collision damage.

The size of the game should be about 100 million, and it should be a single console with a download fee of 10 yuan per download.

In truth, Eastern Jupiter also had a game industry, but it was on a small scale. There were very few masterpieces which could be considered excellent. On the other hand, if he produced a game with good sales, there would be a trend of numerous copycats, leading to a glut of near-identical games.

But after all, they were only NPC, albeit highly intelligent ones. Even if they were 99.9% similar to a real human, as long as they lacked that 0.1% of creativity and inspiration, their world would remain highly tedious and boring.

Hence, Li Dong strongly believed that his game would become successful, because things like creativity and inspiration were never lacking in reality.

…

About a month later.

Li Dong purchased a set of source code for a game on the internet from the real world, and after some slight modifications, his game was successfully created.

The name was The Brave Road of A Hero In An Alternate World.

The game had a total of nine regular levels and three hidden levels. Players would have to deal with up to nine bosses and could choose single or double pass mode. They would constantly improve their ranks and skills and upgrade their equipment in the process of leveling up….. The players would get stronger and stronger.

Moreover, there was a function that allowed the player to save their game data anytime.

There was also a rich variety of hidden and collectible elements.

Li Dong tried the game a few times and came to the conclusion that it was a boring game for killing time.

Of course, it was very boring for him. But for Eastern Jupiter, which had an undeveloped game industry, there would be many aspects of the game that were fun and interesting. Here, it could be considered a fun sort of game.

Li Dong immediately put it in the store of each gaming website, hoping to attract players to download it.

However, after three days, the game had sold a total of 317 copies. After subtracting the store commission rate of 50%, Li Dong only earned $1,585 for himself.

Obviously, this could not satisfy his needs.

“No matter how good a product is, if it’s unknown, it will remain unknown. Seems like I have to advertise and market this game.”

…

Xihai No. 3 High School.

After class.

Li Dong took out his mobile phone and walked to the center of the row, where there was a group of girls.

“Denen, Nishihara, Ishinaka, and Shangguan, please excuse my presumptuousness. I’ve been working on a game recently and I believe you all know that I’ve finished it now. But I don’t know if it is fun. Only players of the game can give me the answer, so…

“Can you be my players and trial the game I made?” Li Dong said.

“Ryu, your game is done?”

Satoshi was very surprised. It was completed, and so quickly at that?

“Touki, I am very interested in your game. Please let me try.” Nishihara Kaori reached out for the phone.

“I’ll give it to Satoshi first. She probably wants to play it more.”

Li Dong handed the mobile phone to Denen Satoshi. After all, she was his staunchest supporter.

Nishihara Kaori snatched her hand back and glared at him as her face swelled up.

“However, if you want to experience it right away, you can search for The Brave Road of A Hero In An Alternate World in the game stores and download it to your mobile phone for $10. Of course, if you don’t want to spend any money, you can wait for Satoshi to be done.”

“Only $10?”

Shangguan Feifei quickly found the game and clicked to pay for the purchase. “I’ll just take it as treating you to the simplest meal.”

“I’ve downloaded it, too.”

“How’s the game made by Touki?”

Nishihara Kaori and Ishinaka Mei paid for the download of the game and tapped the button to start playing. Soon after, they began to exclaim.

“Wow, the scenes and style of the game are so good. Did you really do this, Touki?”

“I killed a small demon and found some money and materials.”

“Interesting! This game is very interesting!”

“I didn’t think that Touki could make such a great game.”

The yelling of these girls caught the attention of other students in the class.

“Why don’t you guys try playing the game I made?”

“It’s very smooth and the fights are explosive. Many of the combat moves were created via trial and error. The moves are very formidable and powerful.”

“It can be downloaded for $10, everyone. Let’s support it.”

Li Dong did not give up on this precious opportunity to market his product; he advertised and sold his game to his classmates.

After putting in some effort during the ten-minute break between classes, he sold more than 30 copies of his game, and the response was generally very good.

“This game is so fun! Touki, you are a genius.”

“The experience and feel when I deliver a hit is very enjoyable.”

“This is the first time I played such an exciting combat game. Only Touki, the King of Underground Fighting, could achieve this.”

“Touki, please accept me as your disciple, let me follow you and learn something. Something like your fighting techniques that will ensure that one is never bullied, or how to make fun combat games. Please teach me one of these!”

“Although I am a girl, I think that Touki’s game is really good.”

“I don’t really like all that fighting and killing, Touki. Can you do another game that girls will fall in love with?”

“…”

From the chatter surrounding him, Li Dong could tell that most of it was positive.

He sighed with relief. This sort of praise that came straight from the mouth must be real. The game The Brave Road of A Hero In An Alternate World had good market potential.

He just had to increase the intensity of his promotions.

However, Li Dong did not have much in the way money or resources. The promotion method which he adopted was very simple. He would make full use of the resources around him.

He would let his classmates help to recommend and promote the product.

Then, it would be spread to the whole school.

After which, thousands of students would help to advertise and popularise it outside of the school.

Also, a major event was currently being held: the city’s annual high school basketball championship, held in the capital of Shengjing. The event had already started with a bang. He had joined the school basketball team and had become the main player alongside the captain, Morido Shenli. Li Dong had the opportunity to go to each high school to participate in competitions. As they won one game after another, he also promoted the game that he made.

Such a scene was undoubtedly embarrassing: his victory was a total crushing of the opponent’s team, yet he then remained on their home turf at the end of the match, desperately promoting his own game in the hopes that basketball fans attending the away-game would pay for the download.

For fans who had come to attend the game, this was a provocation, an insult—this was asking for a beating!

Even so, Li Dong needed a lot of money, and so he poured all his energy into publicizing the game. With every violent slam dunk on the court, he would scream, “Play The Brave Road of A Hero In An Alternate World, and you’ll be able to slam dunk like me!”

With this shameless promotion, coupled with a good word-of-mouth reputation from the game’s players, his success was brewing.

The final result was remarkable.

Two weeks later, the game The Brave Road of A Hero In An Alternate World had been downloaded more than 100,000 times.

Li Dong had earned a total of $500,000 for himself.