Chapter 256: Location of New Experience Store
Chen Mo walked back into the experience store after sending off the pair.
Chen Mo was quite touched by the whole interaction with Nini as it reminded him of something he had neglected.
What is a game?
To a designer, there are many aspects to a game.
The idea of a game also differs from person to person.
It could be a work of art that combines many different design and artistic concepts.
It could be a great source of entertainment and the best way to deal with work related stress.
It could be a job, eSports, and a way to challenge oneself.
It could be a drug, an unkillable monster, something that many cannot escape.
Everybody knew that videogames could be emotional, it could bring happiness, and it could bring negative emotions.
Of course, games can also empty your wallet and bring the developers a lot of money.
But Chen Mo also noticed that during the process of churning out games, he seemed to have forgotten the most basic primitive thing: that video games should bring happiness.
Ever since he entered the industry, Chen Mo had been smoothly sailing in the eye’s of the others, making a great deal of money with all the games he released. But in reality, n.o.body had seen any of his hardships.
Chen Mo had never stopped making games ever since he entered the industry, maintaining three to four games a year, and one of which will be an investment of over one hundred million RMb.
Other than that, in order to help him gain capital for more investments to allow this speed of developing video games surpa.s.s what the other designers were used to, Chen Mo had made quite a few pay to win games.
He had been working almost every single day.
Before development, he’d to market research to see what players were into, and work on the design doc.u.ment. During the development, he’d overlook how everyone was doing, and monitor all aspects of the game including playstyle, art, and music. Before the game is released, he’d promote the game using various methods. After the game is released, he’d make changes according to player feedback, then move onto the next game soon after.
It could be said that Chen Mo could take the place of anyone on the team, and n.o.body could take Chen Mo’s place.
Even taking out various aspects of it, even if it’s just in terms of work ethic, Chen Mo wouldn’t be inferior to anyone in the videogame industry.
Of course this was helped by Chen Mo’s personality as well as the environment he was in.
Although Chen Mo had many ideas from cla.s.sic games, ideas aren’t worth much in the videogame industry.
Compared to distribution and capital, creativity is sometimes a weak force.
Therefore, Chen Mo had to take each move carefully as losing grip of an opportunity could mean never seeing it again.
But after watching Nini play Minecraft, Chen Mo realised something.
Thunderbolt Entertainment was now an incredibly influential video game company. He no longer was the videogame designer that n.o.body cared about.
He could slow down slightly and didn’t need to calculate every step he took and make sure that there were no missteps.
He should treat every player as a person and not just numbers.
He should consider things outside of making money.
-In the second floor of the experience store, Chen Mo’s own office.-
Lin Xiao handed over some doc.u.ments to Chen Mo, “Manager, the design of the new experience store is basically complete. It’s just as you requested, and this is the detailed report.”
Chen Mo grabbed the doc.u.ments, “Alright, thanks for that.”
Lin Xiao asked, “Then when are we moving to the new office manager? If the date has been decided, I’ll let everyone else know.”
Chen Mo replied after a few moments, “Let’s do next week, you can let the others know now.”
Lin Xiao nodded, “Alright.”
After Lin Xiao’s departure, Chen Mo started looking through the doc.u.ments.
The matters about the new experience store had been in the works in last November, or before the development of Minecraft started. Lin Xiao had looked at many places within the Imperial City.
Chen Mo finally settled on a four-story office building.
It was located in the northeastern corner of the Imperial City between the third and fourth ring road, right by a train station. As there were historical sites nearby and tall buildings weren’t allowed to be built, the building was only four floors tall.
The floor was still in construction and was due to be completed in March. As Chen Mo was quite happy with the location and structure of the building, he decided to buy the building.
It cost forty-six thousand RMB per square metre, and had sixty-four hundred square metres across the four floors for a total of two hundred and ninety million RMB. This was on the expensive side but it had its upsides. First was the easy access to public transport, and was located pretty close to Chen Mo’s current experience store. Moreover, the area and the number of floors suited Chen Mo’s needs, which was why he decided to buy the entire building.
When the construction was finished in March, Chen Mo got professional interior designers to renovate it and made slight changes to the structure of the building and added decor to the inside and outside of the building.
In addition to various spendings as well as various fees he had to pay to buy the experience store, Chen Mo spent over three million RMB. And now, all of the experience store’s renovations were done.
The structure of the entire experience store was handled by Chen Mo himself.
It’s a five minutes walk from the train station to the main entrance of the expensive store. The front desk and the resting area was located on the first floor, with many sofas to allow players to relax and chat. Coffee and vending machines were also provided.
The elevators were directly opposite of the main entrance, and there were two elevators that provided access to all floors.
Next to the elevators was a public area that led to the PC experience area decorated similar to an internet cafe. The two areas next to the hall combined were about twelve hundred metres squared and contained two hundred computers.
The holographic projection viewing area and the mobile expensive area was located on the second floor. There wasn’t a need for a main hall in the second, third and fourth, but all of them will have someone working at a front desk.
There was one large holographic projector and two smaller ones in the holographic projection area, and in game scenes or gameplay can be shown holographically here.
But holographic projection weren’t mainstream in this world as they were quite expensive and weren’t all that useful. Chen Mo bought it in consideration of future eSports compet.i.tion.
Moreover, there was a ma.s.sive LED screen in the viewing area, similar to ones that were present in concerts or eSports compet.i.tions that were in place for a better viewing experience.
A portion of the area was used as seating and another was used as the mobile gaming experience area. At each seat was a tablet and a mobile phone for the players.
The VR experience area was on the third floor, stocked with eighty VR gaming pods. The pricing for a VR experience was more expensive and had time limits, but it was cheaper than VR internet cafes.