Chapter 175: Casual Puzzle Game
“These guys have no self respect!” complained Su Jinyu.
Wen Lingwei nodded, “Yeah! Manager, bring out your VR game too!”
“I don’t have one!”
Everyone let out a collective sigh, it seemed that they ran out of fire power. Emperor Dynasty Entertainment prepared an unreleased VR game for testing but Chen Mo hadn’t. He hadn’t even made a large PC RPG game.
Just as when everyone thought Chen Mo was out of ideas.
Chen Mo was on a laptop for a few moments, putting up a QR code on a nearby display.
Chen Mo grabbed the megaphone from Qian Kun’s hands, “Ladies and gentlemen, come take a look. I have a new mobile game! It’s alright if you don’t want to queue, we at Thunderbolt Entertainment will help you! Just scan the QR code to download now. It’s only 120MB, you don’t lose anything if it’s just 120MB. It’s a casual puzzle game, free download!”
Everyone collectively facepalmed, “My goodness, now manager is an infomercial salesperson now? Shameless! We don’t know him…”
But it actually worked, Chen Mo’s voice actually managed to gather the attention of a few players.
Sure Emperor Dynasty Entertainment’s VR game was really attractive, but now many VR gaming pods did they have? Most of the people were queueing in line with not much to do.
And when they heard Chen Mo’s calls, they noticed a huge QR code on the screen.
“Chen Mo has a new game too? Casual puzzle game?”
“Could probably use it to pa.s.s time.”
“What fun does casual puzzle games have?”
“It’s Chen Mo’s casual puzzle game, did you forget Plants vs Zombies?”
“Yeah that’s made by Chen Mo, how could you not play? I personally would play anything with “Made by Chen Mo’ on it.”
“Sure, why not. I’ve got nothing to do anyways.”
Many of the players either in line or just staring at cosplays pulled out their phones to download Chen Mo’s new game.
Su Jinyu and the others were shocked.
“Manager, you secretly make a new game?” Wen Lingwei exclaimed.
Chen Mo was speechless, “What do you mean secretly, do I need to consult you when I make a new game?”
Wen Lingwei laughed, “Of course not. Alright, I’ll download it and check it out.”
Upon scanning the QR code, they were met with a file called Anipop
“What is this, a tile matching game?
“Match three?”
Discussion among the players started.
“What is it, is it a match three game? It’d get stale after five minutes!”
“Yeah, these games are so low IQ. It just depends how well you can see the moves.”
“What do you mean ‘see the moves’, it’s a testament of luck. If you are lucky, you’d beat the level within the time limit, otherwise you have no chance of finding any matches.”
“I thought Chen Mo would make a game like Plants vs Zombies, I feel scammed!”
“Whatever, let’s just download it and see.”
Su Jinyu was also confused, “Manager, why did you make a match three game? Sure There are many players, but it’s kind of pointless. It’s only there to kill time, you’d get bored of it pretty soon.”
“You try and see, it’s different from the other match three games,” said Chen Mo.
Everybody started the game filled with scepticism.
Chen Mo did some research before making the game. The match three games in this world were quite primitive, most of the challenge was finding matches within a time limit.
These types of games were tiring to play in the later stages of the game, tiring for the hands, tiring for the eyes, and even more tiring for the sounds.
Which was why these people were disappointed to see a match three game.
There wasn’t anything special with the main screen. It featured a few animals and a vine that led upwards, not much different than other casual games.
There was a simple cutscene to lay the grounds for the story, which only had a few pieces of artwork. A huge seed fell to the ground and grew into a giant vine in an instant, pushing the mayor’s house to the sky.
The scene ended with the animals deciding on saving the mayor
The levels started from the bottom of the vine. Green fruits appeared from the bottom up, and a finger hinted the player to tap on the first fruit.
There wasn’t anything special with the first few levels as the players were hinted that they needed to line up animals to clear them, and you progress after clearing a certain amount of lines.
The first level was pretty state, but in the second level, the game hinted that players could achieve better results if they lined up four or five different animals.
“Huh? Special clearing effects if I line up four? There are so many ways to clear four, nice!”
“Yeah, the bomb clears out such a large area, it feels so satisfying.”
“And the area is even larger when you have two different animals together.”
“I also noticed that there isn’t a time limit, only move limits!”
“Yeah, it’s not like other matching games where you frantically search for matches. You have time to think about your moves in this game.”
“It feels so easy, can we cruise through this game?”
“It’s not bad for killing time.”
“The sound effects are great. The ‘unbelievable’ and ‘excellent’ after each clear feels so good.”
“Not bad, Chen Mo even manages to add a flare to matching games? But I’m confused, there are so many ways to clear tiles, and there’s only a limit on the number of moves. How are they managing the level difficulties? I haven’t encountered any challenges, I’ve been clearing these levels with three stars every time.”
It didn’t take long for the players to realise it wasn’t your ordinary matching game, before being sucked into the game.
As the levels got harder and harder, they realised it wasn’t as simple as they thought, and they might even fail a level here and there.
However, the ramping up in difficulty was done really well. After the occasional fail, they’d most likely pa.s.s it the next try. As the difficulty increases, players unlock new mechanics. The designs of the levels were also changing just the right amount so every level feels fresh.
“Geez, this game is actually quite fun, it’s great to kill time.”
“Yeah, the best part is the unlimited amount of thinking time. This is what I’d call a casual puzzle game. Unlike the other matching games that entirely depend on your eyes.”
“The difficulties of the levels are quite reasonable too. The graphics are also quite nice, it’s definitely worth a play.”
“Really? I’ll download it too.”
Soon, the first batch of Anipop players had nothing but praise for this game, even players who didn’t want to play started downloading the game.