Chapter 200 - Celebratory Dinner
At a high class restaurant in the vicinity of the experience store.
The members of staff that worried if the game could even break even could finally relax after seeing Diablo's sales.
It was a proper big sale.
It was only the first month, the sales might be able to maintain this momentum for another two to three months. By that time, Diablo could easily achieve five or six million sales to become a high quality and popular game like Warcraft.
Although the scary art style did prevent a small amount of players from playing, since Diablo was a highly fragmented RPG game that was also high quality, it wasn't too difficult for it to sell more copies than Warcraft.
Chen Mo didn't cheap out of this celebration feast, getting his assistant Lin Xiao to book everyone a meal at a restaurant that charged around six hundred RMB per person.
Chen Mo didn't care about customs like these as his relationship with Su Jinyu, Zheng Hongxi and the others was closer to friends than employee and employer. Moreover, Chen Mo wasn't a big fan of going out.
But now that the team was larger, he should follow the customs of a serious company.
Of course he didn't need to have rules upon rules like certain departments. This gathering was somewhere between a gathering for friends and a business meal, focusing on celebration. The staff were free to drink if they desired.
Chen Mo lifted his pint, "I'd like to thank everyone for their hard work in the past six months. Diablo selling 1.87 copies is a fantastic result, all thanks to your hard work and corporations. This is to everyone here, cheers!"
Everyone lifted their drinks in the air too.
"Cheers to you, manager."
"Congrats for the sales, manager."
"It's all thanks to your creativity!"
"Yeah, we're just along for the ride supporting the manager."
"Cheers!"
Everyone was having fun and was happy for the huge sales as they all got bonuses and something noteworthy to add to their resumes, and a cool story to tell.
Zou Hanyu lifted his cup and said to Chen Mo, "This is for you, manager. I thought this was a company like the other ones I've worked at. But I've only just realised that this company is different from the others. I'm surprised that I was able to learn something working here. I never thought a game with an art style like Diablo could be successful. I'm thoroughly impressed."
Chen Mo lifted his cup too, "You say that, but it's only because of how hard everyone worked. I've only provided the overall concept for the art style and music, the rest of which were finished by you and Guangnan. There's no way this came would be nearly as popular if anyone here was missing. There's no need to restrain yourself, eat to heart's content!"
Chen Mo was quite happy too as Diablo went through a lot of trouble to release in China. Although this game made a record breaking thirty million sales internationally, it didn't do well in the Chinese market.
Chen Mo wasn't even sure if this game would pass the reviews or if the players would be accepting of it. Judging from the sales, there was no need for his worries as this game was more than enough to support his first step into RPG games.
"Manager, it's been about a month, and the first batch of players are starting to get bored of Diablo, should we make some changes?" asked Zheng Hongxi.
Zhao Yunting from operations replied, "I don't think so, we are selling copies of the game after all. It's pretty good if the players were able to play it for a whole month, do they expect to play it for the rest of their lives?"
"That means you don't understand the manager well enough. Just look at Plants vs Zombies and Warcraft, they are both single player games, but which one of those aren't suited to be played for a long time? The manager will release an update or two to extend the lifespan of the game," said Su Jinyu.
Chen Mo laughed, "Goldfish is right, there's an update and a DLC."
Qian Kun clapped, "Alright, let's sell another two million copies of the DLC!"
"I'll give you guys more details tomorrow on the updates. In short, there are two aims, developing a DLC which will have two new classes, seasons and competitive mode, and an expert mode. The other is a small game."
Su Jinyu asked, "We'll work on two games at the same time?"
Chen Mo nodded, "Yes. As we have more helping hands now, DLC could be handled by the greater half of us. It's not in a hurry, I expect it to be done in around three months. The others will work on a smaller game."
"Manager, I think we should stick with bigger games. Think about it, bigger games make more money and improve our name. Why should we spend our time on smaller games," asked Qian Kun.
"It's not that simple," replied Chen Mo,"There are advantages to both big and small games. You could have the best of the best every day, but you'd get bored of it eventually. The smaller game is to help stimulate our minds."
Zhou Hanyu said, "Sure, we'll do that if that's what you've decided. We can't go wrong following in your footsteps."
Fu Guangnan was speechless, "Calm down with the praises!"
Chen Mo laughed, "Don't be so surprised. I've already mentioned it before, I look at tangible things so these praises don't affect me too much. The most important thing is that the games are done well, everything else are just minor details.
"When I promised everyone that we'll be making money together, it wasn't an empty promise, but it's not just about making money. I hope to make some meaningful smaller games to give the players some inspiration. I hope everyone here thinks the same. Making money is just something that happens along the way, our primary aim is to make good games, understood?"
"Yes!"
-In the office the next day.-
Everyone was in the meeting room waiting for Chen Mo to go through the plans for the next stage.
Chen Mo mentioned in the dinner yesterday, there will be two different projects happening in parallel, one will be an update for Diablo, the other was a new game.
The words Diablo: Reaper of Souls appeared on the projector.
"This new update is called Reaper of Souls. There will be two new classes, some new story elements as well as new game modes like a competitive season and expert mode.
"It'll go through both of them now."
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