"Yes. Do you remember Gogyo Ruri, the animation director at my company? She also participated in designing the Heroic Spirit character cards for the game. She's quite interested in it, but apparently she's been applying for a game test account for the past few days and never managed to get one. She's feeling a little down about it now."
"Mm~ Mm, sorry to trouble you."
Kamiyā Yuu held the phone in his left hand while using a pen in his right to write down the game test accounts Mizuhara Raiko gave him. One was an ordinary test account for players, while the other was a GM account intended for game developers, which Kamiyā Yuu himself would use. After hanging up, Kamiyā Yuu took out his flip phone and sent the test account to Gogyo Ruri's phone email. He then went to [Mirror Flower Water Moon] Game Studio's official website to download the game client. A week ago, he'd already received the follow-up plans for the game's operation from Mizuhara Raiko and knew when the test would begin. However, as the game's creator, he understood it extremely well and hadn't been particularly eager to play it himself. Since Gogyo Ruri happened to bring it up, he decided to take a look at the finished product.
As soon as he clicked onto the official website, he saw a prominent statistic displayed on the homepage. Stroking his chin, he chuckled. "Pre-registrations have surpassed five hundred thousand. These game-marketing tactics really transcend national borders. If those five hundred thousand pre-registrations are genuine, that's major news even for Japan's gaming industry."
The game had entered testing three days earlier. Although [Mirror Flower Water Moon] Game Studio had explicitly prohibited the buying and selling of test accounts, some of the accounts distributed still found their way onto the game market. On average, an account with test access was being scalped for more than 300,000 yen, roughly equivalent to an ordinary Japanese office worker's entire monthly salary.
Gameplay videos recorded by players gradually began circulating. On the livestreaming platform of the NICENICE video website, there was even a popular game streamer with more than a hundred thousand followers who spent entire days livestreaming and exploring the systems of 'Throne of Heroes'. In just a few days, the popularity of his stream had increased more than tenfold. Whenever he streamed 'Throne of Heroes', his viewer count would at times exceed one hundred thousand.
There weren't many players participating in the test, so the PVP mode was actually played less frequently. PVE became the main focus during the testing period.
'Throne of Heroes' was positioned as a competitive card game, but its PVE content had likewise been meticulously designed. Its gameplay came in endless varieties. There were traditional Japanese-style card-game battles, pseudo-PVP modes similar to 'Hearthstone', as well as the original [Holy Grail Victory] PVE system. Combined with the game's battle mechanics, the entire PVE system offered an astonishing variety of ways to play.
The crucial aspect of this kind of PVE mode was enemy design. Make it too simple, and PVE would become extremely dull. Make it too complex, and ordinary players would find it difficult to get into. On top of that, the balance between difficulty and rewards also had to be considered. With so many factors involved, even card-battle games from the year 2060 had never found an excellent solution.
Kamiyā Yuu had only barely managed to solve the problem by relying on an independent data-calculation system designed through [Matrix Space]. The drawback was that it increased the game's hardware requirements. The system requirements for 'Throne of Heroes' already far exceeded the standards of ordinary collectible card games and were comparable to mainstream single-player games in this world. It wasn't particularly demanding on the graphics card, but it had relatively high CPU and memory requirements.
There were probably still many people who wouldn't understand what kind of system this was. By way of analogy, the matchmaking mechanisms in 'Hearthstone', 'League of Legends', and 'DOTA' were all aspects of the same general concept. It was also similar to the "dealer" in 'Hearthstone' adjusting the player's gameplay experience, except that 'Throne of Heroes' genuinely possessed such a game system.
To put it even more simply, it was a wide-ranging intelligent AI specifically designed for card games—the AlphaGo of card games. It broke through the limitations of conventional AI design, allowing players to experience far more enjoyment from the game's PVE content.
During the testing period, every test account came fully developed from the start, possessing most of the collectible cards and game items. After all, the purpose was to allow testers to examine every function and corner of the game rather than conduct a promotional-style test. Because of this, the entire game system of 'Throne of Heroes' was officially exposed to the public. It lived up to the expectations of the players who had been waiting ever since the first information about the game was released and received overwhelmingly positive reviews from the wider community.
The schedule from the beginning of development to the official announcement of 'Throne of Heroes' had been extremely tight, so the game hadn't been sent to gaming media outlets for testing and review. Nevertheless, one famous gaming publication had managed to secure a test account—'4Gamer'.
...
Knock, knock.
"Mitsuaki, you skipped lunch again. What exactly is going on? You haven't left your room for three days straight. What about work? How are things going with your job?" A middle-aged woman's concerned scolding sounded from outside the room.
Fukuyama Mitsuaki, who had been staring intently at his computer screen, sighed helplessly. He paused the game, got up, and opened his door. Sure enough, his mother was standing there, frowning as she looked him over, concern evident in her eyes.
"What's with the state you're in?"
His state?
Fukuyama Mitsuaki remembered that he hadn't slept all night. He didn't even need a mirror to know that neither his complexion nor his mental state could look good. Taking the meal from his mother, he explained, "Don't worry. I have to conduct a comprehensive review of a newly released game right now, so I probably won't be able to go out at all this week. This is the assignment the company gave our team."
"But your complexion..."
"I know what you're trying to say, Mom. I'll take proper care of myself." Fukuyama Mitsuaki gave his mother a warm smile and closed the door. He casually placed the meal on the desk, returned to his computer, and once again stared at 'Throne of Heroes' on the screen—the culprit responsible for his sleepless days and nights.
Coming back to his senses, he shook his head and sighed. "This game really does have some kind of unbelievable magic to it. It's been a long time since I've spent an entire night unable to sleep because my head was filled with a game..."
"The overall review is almost finished anyway. I should get some rest."
He rubbed his temples, lay down on his bed, and stared at the ceiling. Closing his eyes, he remained there for a long while, allowing his exhaustion to take over...
...
"Damn it, I still can't sleep! What the hell is with this game? I've already played it for more than three days, and there are still so many things I haven't figured out!"
Fukuyama Mitsuaki abruptly sat up and cursed with a wry smile. Resigned to his fate, he returned to his computer. He genuinely couldn't accept stopping until he'd completely figured out every system and gameplay mode in 'Throne of Heroes'.
He was a veteran gaming enthusiast. Several classic analytical guides he'd published about games while still in high school had caught '4Gamer's attention, and the publication had offered him a position as soon as he graduated. By now, he had been with '4Gamer' for more than five years. Despite only being in his twenties, he was already a seasoned editor capable of handling assignments independently and was also responsible for reviewing certain games.
He had been following 'Throne of Heroes' ever since it was announced in September. The reason was simple: the game was being created by Kamiyā Yuu, the designer of 'Warship Girls Collection'. Furthermore, the entire project surrounding the game was simply enormous. Even the new work of the nationally renowned novelist Kirigami Ruri was part of it. Although it appeared to be an ordinary competitive card game, the project behind it might be even larger than those of some AAA single-player blockbusters.
Fukuyama Mitsuaki preferred Japanese RPGs, but even he had marveled at the entire game system of 'Warship Girls Collection'. He had described it as ushering in a new era for collectible card games, declaring that every other game in the genre could only live beneath its shadow. Its sole shortcoming was that its positioning had gone wrong: it catered too heavily to so-called otaku players rather than targeting a broader audience. Otherwise, becoming a nationally recognized IP would merely have been a matter of time.
Little did he know that Kamiyā Yuu had never considered any of that in the first place. He had simply wanted to reproduce the 'Kantai Collection'-themed game from his previous world.