Chapter 607: The Layout for the Switch
Chen Mo logged out of the game pod.
He secretly left his own name on the first-kill list as a little Easter egg; it didn’t matter whether the players noticed or not. As for future first kills on other bosses, he didn’t plan to get involved.
He walked to the first-floor lobby of the experience store and sat down on the sofa.
Zou Zhuo and Shuyi were sitting on the opposite sofa, clearly playing a ranked match in *Honor of Kings*.
Shuyi was playing very seriously: “Quick, Fatty, come save me!”
Zou Zhuo hurriedly replied, “Coming, coming!”
They were pretty immersed.
Chen Mo opened a can of cola: “You two are addicted?”
Zou Zhuo shook his head vigorously, clearly feeling that the phrase “addicted to *Honor of Kings*” didn’t match his style: “She’s addicted, not me.”
Shuyi retorted, “Nonsense! You’ve been playing longer!”
Chen Mo chuckled: “Alright, stop arguing. Let me ask you a question. Say Zou Zhuo gets sick one day, and a match of *Honor of Kings* starts. Who do you pick?”
Shuyi thought for a moment: “I’d pick Li Bai. My Li Bai is super smooth.”
Zou Zhuo: “...”
Chen Mo laughed: “No problem! Of course, you pick someone who can carry!”
Zou Zhuo: “...”
Suddenly, Shuyi thought of something and looked up: “Oh, by the way, store manager, I feel like the virtual joystick in *Honor of Kings* is a bit stiff. Can this be optimized?”
Before Chen Mo could answer, Zou Zhuo jumped in: “That’s because of the screen. It’s just a virtual joystick after all. There’s a slight deviation between the hand movements you imagine and the actual hand movements on the phone. Add in sweat, screen protectors, and other factors, and you get that illusion. It’s probably not a design issue—it’s limited by the hardware.”
Shuyi nodded with some disappointment: “Oh. Every time I play for a while, the feel gets a bit weird. That’s a shame.”
Chen Mo said, “It can be optimized.”
Zou Zhuo: “... Store manager, I finally ran into a question I know something about and showed off a little. Did you have to slap me in the face that fast?”
Shuyi’s face lit up with joy: “Really? But Fatty said it’s a hardware problem?”
Chen Mo nodded: “It is a hardware problem, so just change the hardware, problem solved. But you might have to pay an extra four or five hundred.”
Zou Zhuo: “...”
Shuyi thought about it: “That fee... seems a bit high?”
Chen Mo smiled: “It’s not just for *Honor of Kings*. You can use it for other things too. Forget it, you’ll know when the time comes.”
Chen Mo stood up and returned to the studio.
For now, Chen Mo hadn’t started planning the next new game, mainly because there were two areas of work.
One was creating DLC content for *Dark Souls* and the *Dark Souls* prequel, to be used for future updates. But these DLCs were essentially half-giveaways, with nothing particularly noteworthy. They were just meant to fully complete the *Dark Souls* series, after which they could be archived.
The other was porting *Honor of Kings* to the Switch platform. Once that was done, these issues would all be resolved.
In the previous life, the overseas version of *Honor of Kings* was actually brought to the Switch platform. This was just a start, a test run. When conditions were right, Chen Mo also considered porting most popular mobile games to the Switch. As more games were added, more players who valued the gaming experience would buy the Switch. When playing *The Legend of Zelda*, there were archery elements, and on consoles, there were plenty of shooting games. Though not as convenient as keyboard and mouse, with practice and some auto-aim correction, the experience would absolutely blow phones out of the water.
For Chen Mo, this was a preemptive layout. He was by no means satisfied with the Switch being just a niche handheld console. He wanted it to compete on a larger scale with popular phones and mobile games.
Besides that, it was time to start developing the next game.