Game development begins with destroying Girls' Frontline.

Page 574

The latter requires further explanation.

In Punishing: Gray Raven, each consecutive normal attack generates a skill orb, which takes about 1.5 seconds to generate. This means that if normal attacks are performed continuously, a skill orb can be generated.

That's one ball every 1.5 seconds.

After you get the balls, these colorful balls will line up in a row.

Players need to perform a match-3 to achieve greater power.

For example, when the sequence "[Red, Blue, Red, Red]" appears, players can tap the blue ball first to unleash a skill.

In this way, the three red balls came together.

Clicking the red ball again will unleash even stronger moves and greater power.

Essentially, this is similar to the "Return to 1999" skill card, except that this one requires players to activate it during battle, and it's instantaneous.

Chapter 156 Reducing the Burden of Combat

Having understood this, let's revisit Punishing: Gray Raven.

Actually, its combat system is quite simple.

Although each character has a different control mechanism, the basic gameplay and strategy are basically the same.

The game involves dodging to trigger bullet time and gaining a single ball to complete a three-ball combo, after which you attack based on the character's skills.

Encountering story-driven dungeons is fine, as they don't require any special actions.

However, when it comes to boss battles, it becomes very difficult because although the operation method looks simple, it is actually very difficult to execute.

For example, a stable dodge that enters bullet time.

Many people just can't do that.

Not to mention, the combat pace in Punishing: Gray Raven is very fast; the player-controlled character moves quickly, and so do the enemies.

This means.

What was originally meant to add fun to the game has become a burden in high-mobility situations.

For skilled players, it's truly exhilarating to be able to perform various maneuvers while maintaining high-speed mobility through match-3 puzzles.

But for ordinary players...

Match-3 puzzles, which require a bit of thought, are somewhat incompatible with combat.

Lin Li provided the production team with ideas for optimization in this regard.

Lin Li initially wanted to have Kuro go straight to the point and use the combat logic of Naruto, but after carefully reviewing the development progress of Punishing: Gray Raven...

He abandoned the idea.

After all, many characters and gameplay elements are derived from this match-3 basic combat system.

If we really make changes, it will have far-reaching consequences.

Therefore, Lin Li gave another instruction: to optimize and minimize operations as much as possible.

This leads to two systems.

One called Automatic Ball Combination.

Previously, when three or more red balls were together, the UI would display multiple red balls in a row. Now, when two skill balls of the same color are together, they will automatically combine into a burning skill ball.

As more balls are synthesized, their states will change.

This method will more intuitively tell players what skill they can unleash by clicking on this item.

The second system is called energy absorption.

Once a player completes all three stages of any colored skill orb, the skill bar will automatically absorb energy.

After two rounds of synthesis, players can release skills on their own initiative.

What does that mean.

Taking the scenario of "red, blue, red, red" as an example, when the player clicks on the blue ball to release the skill, the three red balls will automatically combine into a ball in a three-red state.

It also charges the skill gauge.

This actually further enhances the player's mobility.

While reducing the complexity of the process, it further amplifies the effect of the three-in-one puzzle.

Lin Li played the first level and felt it was pretty good.

Because matching three items can both release skills and charge skills, players can often choose one of the three skills to release after completing a match.

The feeling of being stuck in the ball also disappeared.

For example, if you want to use a blue skill, but the system just won't generate blue orbs, in previous versions there was nothing you could do but not use it.

In the current version, you only need to perform two match-3s.

All three skills will light up simultaneously.

At this point, you can simply select the blue skill to unleash it.

The overall combat is smoother, while the difficulty of operation is greatly reduced.

To put it another way.

Even if you just randomly press buttons, you can still unleash a gorgeous and smooth combo.

It just might not have any combo effect.

And this optimization solution will not affect the original character design.

For example, some high-output characters can increase their damage by continuously eliminating balls of the same color.

Therefore, during battle, you can prioritize arranging skill orbs of the same color to form combos and quickly deplete the enemy's health.

After completing this optimization.

At that time, Lin Li also talked with Song Lun and other Kulo employees about why this kind of optimization had not been done before.

Their replies were actually quite interesting.

"The boss thinks that the normal characters are too easy to play, which will affect the draw of the featured characters."

Lin Li laughed it off and didn't say anything.

Many things, you have to peel back the layers to see.

There are no real games; it's all about spending money.

All of them are result-oriented, reverse-engineering game systems.

This is the same as the constellation system in Mijia games.

Don't the developers know that the splitting mechanism will make players unhappy?

I know.

It's all about making money, forcing players to spend money. How can you expect players to spend money if you don't force them to?

Including the subsequent roaring tide.

Combat with regular characters just isn't as satisfying as combat with limited-time characters.

The reason why Kuro has optimized these battles at Lin Li's request is essentially because the profit-making strategy has changed.

~~~

After completing the first level, Lin Li entered the game's main UI interface.

As soon as I arrived at the main interface.

Lin Li laughed.

Because once you enter the interface, the event page will pop up.

[First monthly card includes a free S-rank character]

[Activate the Strategy Assessment Manual (Pass) + Receive a Free Unique Weapon Gift Box]

[Enjoy a 8% discount when you subscribe to an annual or monthly subscription, plus a free limited-edition skin]

Lin Li was stunned when he saw these activity pages.

"Great, great, you've even come up with an annual pass! Your thinking is really quick!"

"Why don't you learn from video memberships and add an automatic payment system?"

Hearing Lin Li's "praise," A Dong, who was in charge of operations, felt a little embarrassed.

"Um, Mr. Lin, the automatic renewal promotion is on the store page."

Lin Li was also taken aback when he heard this.

Then he burst into laughter, which puzzled the others. They didn't quite understand why Lin Li suddenly laughed.

Only Lin Li himself knows the truth.

His loud laughter was not for any other reason than that someone had made further explorations based on the current Spark.

Lin Li patted A Dong on the shoulder.

"Very good, you have mastered the core of the Spark Mode."

"You're really something, giving away a selectable S-rank character with a monthly card."

Upon hearing Lin Li's words, A Dong smiled shyly.

This is actually another change brought about by the paid model, where the activation rate of monthly cards becomes more important.

"Actually, as long as the game is well-made, there are many ways to increase the monthly card activation rate, and Spark has experience in this area."

Spark's operations team has conducted in-depth research on monthly passes and the "big monthly pass."

They have also done extensive research on the monthly card activation rate among daily active users.

They discovered that players primarily renew their monthly subscriptions for two reasons: emotional spending and value-based spending.

Many players' logic for making their first purchase isn't based on what's included in the initial purchase bonus, but rather on their first impression of the game.

This is what emotional payment is, similar to...

"This version is fun! I'll probably keep playing and buy a monthly subscription!"

Another one is called value-based payment.

"Holy crap, this month's mini-card even gives extra resources!"

That's roughly the case.

subsequent time.

Lin Li played the game while communicating with the Kuro development team.

He did not go into the details.

After all, at this point, the details are no longer relevant.

more.

Lin Li continued explaining his thought process, his ideas about the game.

Making a service-based game is like writing a long adventure novel; the story is important, but so is gameplay innovation.

Lin Li said.

A group of people surrounded him, asking questions every now and then.

Standing at a distance, Kuro's owner, Liu Sheng, watched this scene and sighed.

"A teacher is one who imparts knowledge, teaches skills, and resolves doubts."

Chapter 157 Brother Dawei's Fireside Gathering

all in all.

After optimizing the combat and level design.