Game of the World Tree

【 PUBLICANNOUNCEMENT 】

In the quiet room, two young men each held a phone, studying something intently.

After a moment, Jiang Shang put down his phone, furrowing his brows as he looked at his friend.

“Akai.”

“What’s up?”

“Have you ever heard of a game releasing to public but still having a registration cap of 100,000 players?”

“It’s my first time seeing it too. And they’re even doing random selection after the users signed up.”

Silence.

Jiang Shang took a deep breath and managed not to curse, but he still vented his dissatisfaction:

“Was the closed beta done the same way?”

“Yeah…”

“…”

Silence.

“Ziya, are you still signing up? I see the users on the official forum are fighting over this, and the devs has been badly criticized.”

“Of course I’m signing up! Why wouldn’t I? Just look at the registration count.”

“Holy crap, it’s already 100,000? And the announcement’s only been out for what—a few minutes? Whoa… it’s climbing fast… Is this what they call ‘true fragrance’?” ¹

Akai was amazed.

Jiang Shang, on the other hand, let out a sigh.

“Developing a high-quality game really lets devs do whatever they want. Maybe the player cap is their way of ensuring quality.”

“Dude, you are talking nonsense.”

“No, I know I’m just deluding myself.”

While chatting, Jiang Shang submitted his registration for the fifth time. After that, the two continued browsing the official forum for updates on the new announcement.

“By the way, though, their pricing model seems weird to me. Membership subscription? 20% off in the exchange store? And the monthly fee isn’t exactly cheap either. Are people really going to pay for this?”

Akai stared at the game’s subscription payment details, puzzled.

“Why wouldn’t they? Man, if you knew how the best common gear and items are obtained in this game, you wouldn’t ask that question in the first place,” Jiang Shang replied, shaking his head.

“How are they obtained then?”

Curiosity piqued, Akai leaned in.

Jiang Shang pondered for a moment before explaining.

“In Elven Kingdom, while certain bosses drop extremely rare items, for most players, the gear they use and the skills they learn mainly come from the exchange store. And every item in the store has to be purchased with something called CP or contribution points.”Nôv(el)B\\jnn

“Essentially, contribution points are the hard currency between players in the game. So a 20% discount on all the items sold in the store for a monthly subscription? I’d say that’s already pretty tempting enough.”

Hearing this, Akai nodded in partial understanding.

“So that’s how it works.”

After thinking for a moment, he shook his head again.

“Still, this pricing seems way too arbitrary, right? With only a hundred thousand players, can the developers even recoup their costs? Plus, I saw some players in the comments saying that if you grind hard enough, you can even reduce the store prices to as low as 25% of the original value.”

“No that method is hardly feasible since it’s tied to personal reputation and the goddess’s favor,” Jiang Shang explained.

“One’s reputation is notoriously difficult to raise since it’s tied to NPC affinity. As far as I know, among the 600,000 concurrent players so far, only fewer than 100 have a reputation score above 70. Only two or three have maxed it out, and they’re the kind of people who suck up to NPCs daily.”

“As for acquiring the goddess’s favor? Heh, that’s even harder. So far, the highest recorded value is just one point, and that came from completing a special quest.”

“I’ve seen the relevant statistics. Currently, the highest store discount is held by Li Mu at around 50%. But most players who have decent relationships with NPCs are still stuck at 10% or 20%.”

“That’s why a fixed 20% discount is still hugely appealing to most players.”

“Of course, that’s not even the main point.”

“Look here. It also says that certain exclusive item exchanges will have higher quotas for paid members. For example, take the resurrection coins. Regular players can exchange up to 10 per day, but getting membership subscription can get you 15 instead!”

“Akai, you have no idea how severe the resurrection penalties are in this game. Each death costs lots of resurrection coins.”

“Not only that. As your level increases, the amount of resurrection coins you need per death also exponentially rises as well. If you don’t have enough coins, then you’ll even lose levels! For Silver-ranked players, the penalty will reportedly double in the future. It’s incredibly harsh to say the least.”

“Moreover, resurrection coins are hard to come by. Either you grind endlessly, or you spend money. And you have to stockpile them daily just in case. So just the ability to exchange five extra resu coins a day is enough to make a lot of people sign up for membership subscription.”

“I see…”

Akai nodded in half-understanding.

Jiang Shang continued, “As for profitability… I don’t think the devs will make their money back in the short term. But remember, this is only the start of their game being released to the public.”

He pushed up his glasses.

“The membership price isn’t exactly low, but people who can afford VR Capsules aren’t strapped for cash. Now imagine if the playerbase grows to tens of millions. The revenue potential will be enormous.”

After considering this, Akai nodded in agreement.

“That does make a lot of sense.”

“But still…”

Jiang Shang shifted the topic.

“I really want to rant about the game’s revival system. Sure, getting a membership reduces the revival penalties, but honestly? Whether it’s 10 revival tokens or 15, there’s barely any difference, you know?”

“Huh? Why do you say that?”

Akai asked curiously.

Jiang Shang sighed.

“Let’s say—just hypothetically—you’re playing a game where every time you revive, it costs you around (41 usd) 300 yuan. Would you be careful to avoid dying?”

“Of course! For 300, I could have a fancy meal instead!”

“Now, what if the revival cost was reduced to (27.3 usd) 200 yuan?”

“Damn… Even though it’s a hundred bucks cheaper, I still feel bad when I think about it. I definitely try not to get myself killed…”

“Exactly.”

Jiang Shang exhaled deeply.

“It’s not that players can’t afford the resurrection mechanism of Elven Kingdom, but who wants to lose so much for nothing?”

“You may have saved up resurrection coins in the game for several days, but they are only enough for you to revive once, which costs at least several thousand contribution points.”

“Even though there are discounts for paid members, it’s still not beyond the scope of this heartbreaking thing. I can only say that the devs is quite sadistic for implementing this brutal system, as if they’re deliberately telling players not to recklessly squander their life.”

He added with a smirk, “Of course, even knowing there’s barely a difference, most people will still buy the membership.”

Hearing this, Akai raised an eyebrow.

“And what about you? Would you get the membership?”

Jiang Shang nodded seriously and replied,

“Of course I would. Sure, I want to complain about the pricing model and how limited the registration quota are, but if I get in, I’d still support it. After all, ElvKing is really amazing. I can’t let the developers down. You know how original single-player games from our country used to fade into obscurity… It’s hard enough being a developer in this industry.”

Akai nodded in agreement.

“That being said…” Jiang Shang shifted gears again, pointing to a specific line in the announcement.

“I’m really curious about this new weekly leaderboard event. It says starting in the second week, players will get extra rewards based on their leaderboard rankings from the previous week. Look, the rewards even include cash prizes.”

He sighed lightly.

“The developers of this game are really quite bold, huh? They haven’t even made money yet, and they’re already introducing monetary incentives to its users. It’s really unbelievable! I can already see a flood of hardcore players and professional gamers swarming in due to this.”

Akai then added, “Did this happen during the closed beta too?”

“Yeah, the contribution points were tradeable even back then. A lot of players were making money by selling them. But now that the developers are stepping in directly, the players will definitely be excited.”

“Sounds like this company, World Tree Black Tech behind this game is pretty loaded.”

“Yeah definitely. I’ve started to really like this company.”

“Generous to the point of being a little reckless,” Akai teased.

Jiang Shang shot him a glare, but Akai just whistled innocently and looked away.

The two friends continued chatting and scrolling through the beta announcement. Of course, as potential players, they had no idea that the seemingly strange pricing and rewards system was just a calculated move by a certain god.

It was all part of a plan to silence criticism and entice new players.

The announcement had plenty of other details besides the subscription membership, such as the opening of a new map and teasers for upcoming storylines. The accompanying image depicted elves and orcs locked in battle.

Akai found these details confusing, but Jiang Shang read them with great interest.

“Looks like the next part of the storyline will finally focus on the orcs. I wonder if I’ll get a chance to join in.”

His expression brimmed with anticipation.

“A storyline?”

“Yeah, the game’s overall narrative. I’ve been keeping up with Elven Kingdom’s overarching plot, you see. Here, look at this early-released opening cinematic… See that? Every elf shown here is actually a player! It’s amazing how far everyone’s progress has come. Watching the opening cinematics from each version, you can’t help but feel emotional, you know?”

“That’s incredible. Being included in the games cinematic intro must really be quite immersive.”

“Exactly. Why do you think ‘Yggdra Players’ became such a phenomenon online last year? The sense of immersion and community pulls everyone together.”

“True. It’s even reached the point where some fans even bash other games just to hype this one up.”

“…”

Jiang Shang shot him another glare, and Akai once again whistled and looked away.

The two mischievous friends spent the rest of the day bantering and exploring the announcement. Although they were no longer high school students, they were still busy as college freshmen with packed schedules.

While weekends were for relaxing, they dutifully attended classes on weekdays.

The next day, when they checked the forum again, they discovered the number of registration had skyrocketed past five million and was still climbing.

Unsurprisingly, Elven Kingdom had once again made headlines as a revolutionary virtual game, beloved by gaming enthusiasts everywhere.

At this point, anyone who followed the gaming world had already heard of it by now. Heck, even people outside the gaming sphere had caught wind of its name.

The game’s influence had even stirred up activity in niche online communities, subtly boosting the search traffic for a certain dedicated creator.

Cough, cough.

It was clear that the game’s limited public launch would see just as many registrations as the closed beta did—if not more.

This realization left Jiang Shang feeling increasingly frustrated.

Initially, he had hoped that with only 100,000 limited slots, his odds of getting in might improve. But with so many users registering, his chances felt getting slimmer and slimmer than ever.

He knew his luck was notoriously bad.

The higher the number of registration are, the lower his odds would be.

As a die-hard fan of Elven Kingdom, he was thrilled by the game’s growing popularity.

But still… couldn’t he get a spot for himself first?

Fortunately, his frustration didn’t last long.

This time, he finally got selected.

¹ 真香 – True Fragrance refers to an internet slang expression originating from a viral moment in a Chinese reality TV show. It describes a situation wherein someone initially rejects or criticizes something but later enjoys or accepts it enthusiastically, often much to their embarrassment or humor.

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