Game Development: Starting by Healing the Players
Chapter 49: I'm a Tough Guy—What Do I Have to Be Afraid Of?
Listening to the rustling wind in his headphones, Sun Yixie glanced at the psychiatric hospital in the distance on his screen.
He fell silent for a moment.
"Before I play this game, I want to ask everyone something. If… I mean, hypothetically, if I said I had some difficulties right now, could I not play?"
"Fine, fine. Then… then I'll go turn on the lights, okay? Don't rush me."
With that, Sun Yixie stood up, leaned forward, and pressed the light switch with a click.
The next moment, the room that looked somewhat like a storage room lit up on camera.
The livestream chat immediately exploded.
'????????? Cowardly Sun Yixie!'
'Weren't you saying horror games were as easy as breathing?'
'You turn on the lights just like that? You're already scared?'
'Brother Sun, if you really can't do it, let's wait for Brother Huang to come back and play together. At least you'll have some company.'
'If it's as easy as breathing, then why did Brother Sun turn on the lights?'
'Turn off the lights! Turn off the lights!'
'Turn off the lights! Turn off the lights!'
'Turn off the lights! Turn off the lights!'
After Sun Yixie's little act of turning on the lights, the entire screen of comments that flooded back into the livestream eventually converged into a single message:
'Turn off the lights! Turn off the lights!'
"Turn off my ass! Why the hell would I turn them off?! Shut up!"
"I'll say it one more time: horror games are as easy as breathing to me. They don't put any pressure on me at all. Of course, I might get startled once in a while."
"But that's only a tiny bit of nervousness."
Looking at the comments in his livestream, Sun Yixie tried to use factors outside the game to ease his own anxiety.
He sat back down in his chair, put his headphones back on, and officially began playing.
Based on the explanations from earlier, he now understood some of the game's basic mechanics.
In Outlast, he played an unarmed journalist.
Generally speaking, horror games could be divided into two types.
One type had a combat system, meaning players could use firearms or other weapons to kill monsters or bosses.
The other type had no combat system at all. Players had to solve puzzles, run away, and hide from monsters.
The former was currently the mainstream in the market. The latter existed as well, but it wasn't the dominant type.
At the very least, there were few large-scale productions of that kind.
And the Outlast in front of him was clearly a major production within the horror genre.
Sun Yixie could tell just from the environments and atmosphere.
Compared with AAA-level games, its visuals obviously had quite a gap to make up, but they were still remarkably realistic.
And for a horror game, that kind of realistic immersion could easily make someone nervous.
"Fuck, I'm not scared! How could I possibly be scared? Don't rush me. Let me figure out the controls first."
Sun Yixie glanced at his secondary monitor and tried to interact with the viewers in the chat, hoping to relieve some of the pressure.
Inside the unattended security booth by the entrance, he found a battery.
After searching around the main gate, Sun Yixie found several things in total.
A DV camera, a battery, and a blue folder.
"This should be the thing that'll replace the flashlight later on, right?"
Sun Yixie took out the DV camera, inserted the battery, and turned it on.
Seeing how the DV was designed, he could more or less guess how it would be used.
There would probably be some extremely dark environments later on, and he would have to rely on this DV to see where he was going.
His words were tough, but deep down, he was already feeling a little uneasy.
After confirming that there was nothing else to explore, Sun Yixie pushed open the massive iron gate and stepped into the courtyard.
The building had a European architectural style, and the entire psychiatric hospital was eerily silent.
Through the windows, he could see that the lights in some of the rooms inside the building were flickering on and off.
It was as if a pair of eyes were watching him from one of those illuminated rooms.
He controlled the protagonist and proceeded along the path.
Suddenly, Sun Yixie's footsteps stopped.
In front of him, one floor of Mount Massive Asylum suddenly lit up.
At the same time, a black figure appeared in one of the windows.
Sun Yixie's eyes, which had originally been narrowed into slits, suddenly widened.
He controlled the protagonist to raise the camera and zoom in, intending to get a closer look at whatever the hell the thing was.
But the other party seemed to realize that someone was watching him.
In an instant, it darted to the side.
From Sun Yixie's perspective, all he could see was a blurry black shadow.
At the same time, the lights in the room went out again.
A chill instantly shot up from Sun Yixie's feet all the way to the top of his head.
Nothing had actually happened.
He hadn't even seen a terrifying monster.
And yet, for some reason, he couldn't help feeling uneasy.
The Mount Massive Asylum before him seemed like a monstrous beast with its jaws wide open, waiting for him to enter.
The surrounding layout was also extremely strange.
In particular, the riot-control vehicles parked near the entrance made him feel especially uncomfortable.
Why would there be riot-control vehicles outside a psychiatric hospital?
When he reached the entrance to the psychiatric hospital, he found that it was locked and couldn't be opened.
After wandering around the area for a while, Sun Yixie eventually found a small opening in the iron gate on the left.
He squeezed through it.
What followed was a series of gameplay tutorials.
Running, jumping, climbing, and crouching were among the game's basic actions.
The camera work and attention to detail were also extremely well done. These were things Sun Yixie had never experienced in some of the horror games he'd played before.
Through his headphones, he could clearly hear the protagonist breathing heavily.
Following the on-screen prompts, he made his way to a window. The moment he climbed through it, all the lights in the room suddenly went out.
The entire room was plunged into darkness.
At the same time, Sun Yixie, who was in the middle of playing, was startled by the sudden blackout and visibly flinched.
'What did I just see?'
'Hahaha~ Brother Sun definitely just flinched, right?'
'If you're scared, Brother Sun, just admit it!'
Seeing Sun Yixie's reaction, the viewers in the livestream chat began flooding the screen with comments.
Compared with his usual streams, there were noticeably more comments today.
Clearly, quite a few viewers were also feeling scared themselves and were desperately sending messages to relieve some of their own fear.
"F-Fuck! What am I scared of?! I'm a tough guy! What could I possibly be afraid of?! What's there to be scared of?!"
After switching on the DV's night-vision mode, the sickly green tint of the camera footage made the entire atmosphere of the game even more eerie.
Sun Yixie shouted loudly to encourage himself as he explored the area with the camera in hand.
He pulled open a half-closed door and continued forward.
Suddenly, the television that had been switched off turned on by itself, emitting a sharp burst of static.
"AAAHHH!"
The piercing noise scared Sun Yixie senseless.
On camera, Sun Yixie's entire body could be seen jolting violently in fright.
With a scream worthy of a world-class male soprano, he kicked both legs against the desk. His wheeled chair shot backward, while he simultaneously covered his eyes with both hands and threw himself against the back of the chair.
Several seconds passed.
When he realized that there didn't seem to be any follow-up sound coming through his headphones, he cautiously separated his hands, leaving only a tiny gap between them.
Peeking through the gap from the corner of his eyes, he looked toward the computer screen.
Inside the game, the room was pitch-black.
The only thing visible was a television filled with static.
After confirming that there was no longer any danger, Sun Yixie finally lowered his hands.
He went from covering his face to clutching his chest instead, wearing an expression of profound relief.