Chapter 456: Yes indeed…… |
“Over the past decade, thanks to successive waves of game creators pushing boundaries and exploring boldly, the global games industry has made great strides and leapt forward technologically,”
“From independent game developers, to small studios, to large comprehensive game companies,”
“We have been enriching this colorful world of the Ninth Art little by little,”
“This progress is not only due to the efforts of every game creator, it is also the result of industry exchange and integration, sharing market opportunities, and pursuing cooperative development together..”
“This progress is not only due to the efforts of every game creator, it is also the result of industry communication and integration, sharing market opportunities, and pursuing cooperative development together.”
Starting last year, the Global Game Developers Conference updated its hosting format.
The conference location, once fixed in the United States, now rotates to different cities each year.
This year the conference was set to be held in Stockholm.
Nearly 80 representative companies from around the world attended the conference, ranging from large firms to small teams, even independent developers.
Ever since Golden Wind made the exception to participate, the entire GDC underwent earth-shaking changes, becoming increasingly open to a more diverse range of companies and creators, truly realizing the conference’s purpose of “top creators worldwide exchanging and improving.”
And now.
Golden Wind, which once changed GDC’s course, was again invited to appear at this grand game industry gathering.
However, the company that once had to be invited as an exception had now grown into one of the event’s most important, most-watched featured guests.
Watching Gu Sheng standing dignified on the main stage, speaking confidently behind the podium, Shen Miaomiao could not help the corners of her mouth lifting into a smile.
She was enjoying it.
Beside her, Chu Qingzhou, who had accompanied her to the event, nudged her with an elbow:
“Hey, that’s enough. Tone down that smug look, there are cameras.”
In an instant, Shen Miaomiao felt a little dazed.
At that very moment, she remembered the award ceremony at the Asian Games, watching Gu Sheng shine on stage holding the golden scepter, and she had the same expression.
But back then, she and Old Gu were still a vague, half-hidden affectionate pair.
When Sister Chuchu said that to her at the time, it made her blush bright red.
And now—?
“Tch, can’t I look at my own man?”
Shen Miaomiao turned even bolder:
“I could openly stare even if he weren’t wearing clothes, and he’s wearing clothes now, so I’m looking totally properly, okay?”
Her words reversed the momentum and instead made Chu Qingzhou blush:
“You… my young lady… your mouth is a bit unhinged!”
In the audience, the two whispered and giggled.
On stage, Gu Sheng, speaking as the invited company representative, was nearing his conclusion:
“In our Huaguo there is a proverb: ‘One chopstick is easy to break, ten chopsticks hold together,’”
“Now, as the global games market gradually expands, more opportunities and challenges stand before us,”
“One person’s strength is ultimately limited,”
“To better seize opportunities and face challenges, cooperation and win-win outcomes will be the optimal solution for future industrial development and industry progress, and the only solution,”
“Golden Wind will work together with our partners from different countries to contribute to the cause of the Ninth Art,”
“And today, we have taken the first step toward industrial cooperation and win-win development—”
As he spoke,
Gu Sheng slightly turned his body, gesturing toward the giant LED screen behind him.
As the venue lights gradually dimmed,
two ornate logos appeared on the pitch-black screen, instantly detonating the hall!
Golden Engine & Phoenix
Boom!!!
No more needed words!
Just those two names were enough to ignite a commotion in the venue!
One was an emerging in-house engine.
The other was a top-tier commercial engine.
At a top industry event like GDC, which invited leading companies, who present would not know these two engines?
After all, one had just broken through barriers and produced an FPS blockbuster that shook the gaming world, Battlefield Winds.
The other had long held a significant market share and recently publicly declared its stance against CloudPower!
In an instant, the conference erupted with chatter and speculation—
“Holy... Golden Engine is teaming up with Phoenix!”
“No wonder Phoenix blocked CloudPower...”
“This is a pledge of loyalty.”
“Technical exchange, man. I always said the biggest shortcoming of Golden Engine was insufficient detail rendering. Turns out they’re compensating like this!”
“Big move... Golden Engine’s large-scale scene construction and physics destruction plus Phoenix’s detailed rendering tech... this new title looks promising...”
“CloudPower’s offensive move was reckless.”
“Indeed, if CloudPower hadn’t insisted on blocking GW, GW might not have been pushed to develop their own engine for a year or two, and there wouldn’t be this industry partnership—now it’s probably CloudPower showing off a new title instead.”
“One mistake leads to another. GW wasn’t crushed; instead CloudPower got squeezed out of GDC...”
“Look at GW’s new work. If this title becomes a hit, Golden Wind’s counterattack will really begin.”
“Seems likely. I heard it’s a wolf-type game, maybe Wolf 2.”
“Wolf 2 isn’t scary—since the first one was so successful, a sequel wouldn’t change too much. GW’s new IP is what’s most dangerous...”
As whispers rose in the hall,
the joint logos on the big screen gradually faded,
and then, in the ensuing quiet, lines of white text appeared one after another—
Gu Sheng’s Work
Steel Chain Fingers Studio Production
Special Thanks: Huaguo National Symphony Orchestra
Golden Wind
Grand Presentation
And just as the final words “Grand Presentation” began to fade from the screen,
an aged woman’s voice, full of gravitas, rose like dust stirred from the turning of an ancient, dense, obscure tome—
Yes indeed.....
Doom—doom—wooo—
Accompanied by heavy drum beats reverberating,
a thick, low brass sound, like pulling aside a heavy, dust-covered curtain, slowly revealed the dark, weighty screen—
Weathered statues threw tattered shadows under a dim glow.
Middle Ages-style ruined walls lay buried in swirling sand and dust.
Looking up,
a Gothic-style majestic royal city sat atop remote mountain peaks,
the dying sunset shrouded by dark clouds.
The last sliver of light was swallowed by the vast shadow cast by the colossal royal city.
The whole world was ruin and rubble, seemingly only the royal city perched among cliffs and clouds remained as if barely alive—
That is Lothric
The ancestral home of the successive Flamebearing Kings
And also a confluence of lost wanderers...
Doom—doom—wooo—
Whoosh!!!
If the Phoenix and Golden Engine alliance was industry-shaking news,
then this main trailer for Golden Wind’s latest work was the blockbuster that sent players worldwide into a frenzy!
Although the venue itself fell silent,
the livestream chat barrage had already exploded!
OHHHHHHHHH--!!!
Everyone rise!!!
“What the hell! It’s not Wolf 2! It’s a new work! A medieval alternate setting!”
“Holy moly! These scenes are massive...”
“Completely different from Sekiro!”
“Epic atmosphere hits you in the face...”
“OMG—this soundtrack and voice-over are so weighty—”
“Feels even grander than Wolf 2’s backdrop...”
“No wonder people said GW is preparing a series.”
“Feels like an empire in decline, very strong narrative...”
“No matter how strong the story, it’ll be chopped into fragments; piece it together later (joking face)”
“You know Old Thief...”
“Feels like they really want to make full use of Golden Engine’s grand scene capabilities.”
“With Phoenix’s detail rendering on top, oh my god...”
“I can’t even imagine how immersive this game will be...”
......
As the audience’s excited discussion continued,
the scene shifted.
Sandstorms roared.
Within ash-gray dust, a north wind wailed.
Beneath rolling mountain ranges, a line of odd pilgrims leaning on staffs, their steps faltering, trudged toward the mountain peak where the royal city, near yet distant, loomed.
They were wrapped from head to toe in heavy gray cloth strips, garments tattered, their postures emaciated and frail, like brittle branches in a biting winter.
Yet despite those shriveled frames, each carried on their back a huge, heavy turtle shell that took up half their body.
Across those shells were crisscrossed, rusted iron chains.
They struggled onward amid the howling wind.
The gusts lifted their tattered hems and whipped the flying sand around them,
Therefore, the pilgrims all walked northward
And thus learned the true meaning of the parable—
Under the dim, despairing sky,
the black towers of the royal city showed no sign of life.
From distant vantage, the city that seemed to have one breath of life now appeared utterly dead.
Winter’s snow storm raged.
The world showed not even a hint of ember ash.
Gloom shrouded the bell tower.
Despair filled the world.
Plop.
In the bone-chilling wind, one devoted pilgrim finally could no longer stand.
Fragile as a leaf in autumn, insignificant as a speck of dust beneath endless gloom,
he collapsed to the ground. The heavy turtle shell was his sole burden.
A faint puff of sand rose, gray-white, like the cold, lonely ash left after a great fire.
At that moment, the aged, weighty voice, combined with the cello’s mournful, sinking tone, enveloped this grand yet lifeless world.