Aiko's pursuits have always been more focused on pragmatic success.
Her goal has always been to achieve success.
In her studies, in her life, and in her career that she's working hard for, she wants to succeed in all of them.
This is the thing she desires the most.
So, when she decided that she would focus on game development in the future, she started thinking about how she could achieve even greater success.
When she was feeling lost, she thought that success in gaming required significant investment.
She didn't mind going through a period of accumulation, but at the time, she just couldn't find a direction that could lead to success.
However, later on, Takayuki personally demonstrated to her that even without a lot of money, extraordinary success could still be achieved in game development.
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Now, Stardew Valley has become a benchmark for independent games. According to the live sales data from Battle.net, Stardew Valley has now surpassed all other games on the platform, becoming one of the most popular games on Battle.net.
And this is just from sales on the personal PC platform.
So far, there have been many voices asking for Stardew Valley to be released on the GSX console and GSL handheld.
Since almost no one knows who the "Nintendo is the world's ruler" user is, Surrey Electronics has actively extended several olive branches, hoping to secure the release rights for the Stardew Valley console version. In return, Surrey Electronics offered a 2:8 split for physical sales and a 1:9 split for digital sales.
This can be said to be a gesture of great sincerity. Surrey Electronics wouldn't make much money off this game.
However, as the developer of Stardew Valley, Takayuki obviously could not give his competitor more strength.
Achieving such success is something Aiko desperately desires.
She wants to achieve success comparable to Stardew Valley.
But… she does lack creativity. She has strong talent but insufficient creativity, and this is her biggest flaw.
So, the main purpose of her coming to this exhibition is to find Takayuki, hoping to gain some inspiration and advice — advice that could lead her to success.
Takayuki saw Aiko's core issue, as it was similar to her previous behavior.
Takayuki raised his hand and gestured, "Let's sit down. We can actually have a good talk about your question."
"Takayuki-san, do you have a solution?" Aiko's eyes sparkled as she asked eagerly.
Aiko had been troubled about this for some time, and Aiko's close friend, Aiko, was clearly worried. If her friend's troubles could be resolved, Aiko would be extremely happy.
Takayuki nodded, "I do have some ideas, and they just so happen to align with some of my own thoughts."
"Align?"
"Yes," Takayuki said, "Recently, I've had a new idea for an independent game. However, developing it alone would be quite a lengthy process, but if you three are interested, perhaps we could work together to create an independent game."
The three girls were no longer considered outsiders at this point.
They were well-liked by Takayuki's wife, Tsukino Ai, and Tsukino Ai especially praised Aiko, sometimes offering helpful tips on programming and other knowledge. It could be said that the three girls were considered Tsukino Ai's disciples.
The three girls calling Tsukino Ai their master was no problem at all.
As for Takayuki, he was essentially half a mentor, so it seemed completely reasonable to help guide these "disciples."
Moreover, since Aiko already called him "teacher," he felt even more justified in helping these three girls.
Of course, this relationship was not public knowledge. Apart from the core staff at Gamestar Entertainment, few knew of this hidden network of relationships.
As for why Takayuki wanted to involve the three girls in developing an independent game, it was actually because he felt that having people within his company work on an independent game might raise suspicion. People might wonder if the "Nintendo is the world's ruler" user was actually an internal staff member of Gamestar Entertainment.
Takayuki still wanted to maintain some neutrality for his small account. This account leaned more toward self-indulgence, even making some not-so-popular games that wouldn't affect Gamestar Entertainment.
So, it made sense for him to collaborate with the three girls on this new game.
When Aiko heard Takayuki's words, she was somewhat excited and said, "Takayuki-sensei, what kind of new game development idea do you have?"
Takayuki replied, "This time, the game I want to develop is actually similar to two of the series we've created before — one is Castlevania and the other is Metroid. I plan to take the essence from these two games and create another new, unique game. I would like to call it a random map-based Metroidvania."
Previously, Takayuki had already introduced some randomness into Castlevania, making it closer to modern Rogue-like games.
However, at that time, it was just simple randomness without deeper development, since Castlevania's story structure didn't lend itself well to overly random plotlines.
Rogue-like games, which became popular later, gained a lot of love from indie game enthusiasts.
The most famous of these games is probably Dead Cells, and this time, Takayuki intended to create a game similar to that.
The three girls gathered around Takayuki, watching him write and draw on a piece of paper.
Random maps, fragmented storytelling, and the thrill of different equipment combinations from the randomness — these are the key features of this game.
Then Takayuki wrote down the title.
"Dead… Cells?"
The name sounded rather strange.
The combination of "death" and "cells" seemed to naturally carry a bit of a thrilling vibe.
Aiko seemed to hesitate upon seeing it.
But Aiko started to think and associate ideas based on the key words Takayuki provided.
Takayuki said, "Just using a few keywords certainly isn't enough to explain the entire game structure. Anyway, for now, I'll outline the general framework of the game for you, and then you can decide if you'd like to collaborate with me to develop this independent game. After the game is released, the profits will be split 50-50, and the credits will list my small account and your three studios as the starting point. Both are well-known independent game creators and teams. I think this should be pretty appealing."
The three girls exchanged glances, as if discussing whether to accept this collaboration.
Takayuki patiently waited.
Soon, Aiko spoke up, "Takayuki-sensei, can we collaborate together moving forward?"