Otherworldly Architect

The development work of "Assassin's Way" continues in a frenzy.

One of the more troublesome things for the programming team is that this semi-open game has more bugs than all previous games.

It may be because the setting is too grand, the number of systems is numerous, and the way to complete tasks is ever-changing...

To a certain extent, the more freedom a game provides to players, the more bugs it is prone to.

For example, some games deliberately prevent players from jumping and climbing, not for other reasons, but because they are afraid that players will run over the mountains and run out of their designated map range.

So Bluestar Studio is really painful and happy.

While developing, we gather people to test every day, and we also need to modify the bugs just discovered.

Some players may think that bugs are things that are done after the entire game is completed, and the entire studio will work together to modify them. After the bugs are corrected, they can be released and released happily.

But it's not really...

According to Schrödinger, the program leader, "bugs are interspersed in every link of the game development cycle, bugs exist in every part of the game itself, bugs are endless, and bugs are the only constant thing in this changing world. "

- Programmers are really resentful about bugs.

Even if it is a game that has been on the market for many years, in fact, it can still have many, many bugs, the difference is that the player does not find it, or the player does not care about it.

Of course, there will be more and more bugs in the game under development.

Game company testers are used to do this job.

Take the new tester Maynard as an example. He comes to the Blue Star studio every day, and the first thing he does is to download the in-development version that was just packaged today.

While downloading, he watched how the bug submitted yesterday was fixed. If the progress is not ideal, go beat the corresponding programmer.

In the afternoon, he started to test the development version, running the main line and the branch line in it, running tasks in various ways, reproducing the bugs found N times, and giving the program boss a bug location as accurately as possible.

Next, he took a look at what new content the designers and programmers submitted today.

For example, if a designer does a new small task today, the tester will conduct various tests specifically for this small task, so as to ensure that the process is normal and there are no bugs, so that the submission can be passed.

Finally, just before get off work, Maynard was responsible for packaging today's version of the game into a complete, stable version available for download.

…

Each company may have slightly different details.

But in short, making a game is actually developing and testing at the same time, struggling in the ocean of bugs every day.

The beta version of "Assassin's Way" has not been completed until April of this year.

On the one hand, it is because the map of the semi-open world is relatively broad, and on the other hand, it is also because there are many plots, and the plot animations that need to be specially produced have to be done slowly.

The production of every game animation is not easy.

First of all, the designers will confirm the complete plot process of the animation, and then have a meeting with the animation production team to communicate. At this time, there is a high probability that the latter will be able to draw a split-shot script;

Then the relevant technical personnel will prepare and provide the resources required for the animation, including but not limited to: all the characters appearing, all the scenes, the required dubbing and soundtrack, lighting and special effects...

Next, there will be a division of labor within the animation production team.

Someone is responsible for the action of the character, which is divided into three different methods: motion capture, human production and AI simulation, each with its own advantages and disadvantages;

Someone is responsible for adjusting the scene, lighting, special effects, etc., just like a set designer in a movie;

Someone has to be responsible for the soundtrack, which includes both the selection of music and the matching of the rhythm of the music - when the climax should be, there should always be a climax;

There are also people who need to be responsible for the movement of the lens, like the cameraman when shooting a movie. A good photographer may make the audience feel comfortable to watch, but cannot tell why, but a poor photographer can definitely make the audience confused, and even the basic storyline cannot be understood;

Someone has to be in charge of communicating with the voice actors, from the initial release of the script to the final soundtrack, which may have to go through several rehearsals...

Of course, all this is inseparable from a "director".

In Bluestar Studio, each plot animation is ultimately followed up by the corresponding designer, and the director's responsibility is very clear.

The plot planner is equivalent to the screenwriter following the director, always ready to adjust anything that is not right.

— of course, all will pray that nothing is wrong.

Because once the script is changed, it is very likely that everyone's work will be in vain and have to do it all over again.

When the above work is all completed, and the designer nods to indicate OK, it is time to hand over to the technical art.

"Technical Art" is a position, referred to simply as "Technical Art".

He will be responsible for importing this completed animation into the game, and complete the program logic before and after.

Until this step is completed, the player can see this carefully crafted animation on the predetermined logical node.

After preliminary statistics, the total number of animations in "The Assassin's Way" is expected to exceed 100 segments, with a cumulative duration of more than 100 minutes, which is almost as long as the last movie.

Of course, compared to the more than 200 minutes of "Blue Star Doomsday", it still pales in comparison.

50% of it is the main storyline, which is the content that players will basically experience, and obviously requires careful preparation.

In addition to the protagonist, the characters with the most frequent appearances in the plot are obviously the wizard Copernicus, the assassin predecessor Odin, the assassin mentor in the Bluebell Organization, and several villain bosses in the church.

In this long and precise process, if anything goes wrong, the familiar roar can be heard in the Blue Star studio again.

"Maynard! Open an order! Animation 017 has another bug!"

"What bug? You describe it to me!"

"All the NPCs in the show are bald! You need to ask Jimei to confirm whether there is an error in the model import!"

"OK! This bug is directly transferred to him, let him fix it before the evening, don't encapsulate it for me in today's version!"

Um.

Many employees have ridiculed this point: in our case, finding bugs basically depends on yelling, and fixing bugs basically depends on cheating...

In short, today's Blue Star studio is also very lively.

…

In the spring of this year, Bluestar Studios were all in the middle of intense research and development.

Mainly because they hope that the beta version of "Assassin's Way" can catch up with the Blue Star Carnival on May 21.

Unfortunately, this may not be possible.

Because of the huge amount of work, until the beginning of May, the completion rate of the beta version of "Assassin's Way" was still around 85%.

Most of the art resources have been completed, the game system is basically completed, and the game process can be advanced to the finale—

However, the animation and dubbing have not yet been completed, so there will be "black screen here" and "this NPC's voiceover suddenly disappeared?" in some places.

In this case, this year's carnival will basically not open the beta version of "Assassin's Way" to players.

So Ming Yan also decided happily: just hold a press conference and let Luke play "Assassin's Way" for players to see.

Anyway, the promotional film has just made the first one!

Recording Luke's actual play process, isn't this the second promotional video?

perfect plan.jpg

This year's Blue Star Carnival, the overall process is not much different from previous years.

The first is the venue area of ​​each game, which provides demos of new versions, visits to original paintings and design drafts, and a small peripheral souvenir shop.

This is followed by the opening and closing performances.

It is worth mentioning that at this year's opening ceremony, Mingyan invited several distinguished guests to form two "League of Legends" teams for the exhibition match.

The specific list... I'll keep it a secret for now.

Finally, the main content of this year's conference.

The most important thing is of course the public announcement of "The Assassin's Way".

Although this game, the studio has already finalized the schedule in September, but it still has to say "we can probably finish it by the end of the year".

It's not the first time that Boss Ming has played this trick. Speaking of which, it's still the fault of those players who are urging them to be so mad...cough.

In addition, there is the promotion of the new version of "League of Legends".

Although "League of Legends" has new seasons and new heroes every year, this version is still worthy of additional publicity.

Because the designers added a unique gameplay in the new version: let players in a new map, no longer push towers, but return to the more traditional battle royale gameplay.

Equipment basically depends on picking up, killing basically depends on Yin...

Judging from the studio's internal testing, this new "Battle Royale" gameplay has received unexpected praise, so they soon decided to officially launch the new map.

This year's carnival has a lot of content, and Bluestar Studio has done quite a lot of preparations.

Of course, there are more substantial players.

Because this year's carnival tickets, in addition to 50% of the invitations are still randomly drawn through the system, the remaining 50% have flowed into various game channels!

This is also what the players have been demanding—

[Please beg the dog to plan to give the African Emirates some way to live! ! For four years in a row, I have participated in all the activities, but I still haven't drawn an invitation letter! Is this how people live? ? Please, don't just test your luck, and give us a place to show your strength! 】

When the designers saw this request, they all smiled kindly.

"Okay, okay, no problem, let's select some qualified players in each game. Of course, the number of places is limited, first come first served."

So, the month before the carnival opened...

Part-time job players, here we come!