Chương 12: Chapter 8 Zen and the Three Realms of Life
Liu Liang was going crazy, "Does this mean my reputation as a prophet is completely ruined? Who would have thought that I, Old Ox, would crash and burn on such a trash game in my lifetime?"
"No, I just can't figure it out. Why the heck does this game have such 'overwhelmingly positive' reviews!"
Predicting the ratings and sales of games had always been Liu Liang's specialty in his videos. Ever since he became an online video content creator, his overall prediction success rate was as high as 80%, and all six of his previous prediction videos had been spot on.
But this time, he capsized in the gutter!
It was a blow to Liu Liang's heart, like he was on a winning streak in a chess game, relishing in the interest, but crashed on the last player he thought he had a sure win against.
So frustrating!
Soon, Liu Liang discovered something even more heartbreaking than his failed prediction.
In the comment section of the video, the most upvoted long comment had even more likes than his video!
Keep in mind, to see that comment, viewers would first have to click into this video. This meant that the audience's approval of the comment was even higher than Liu Liang's video content!
"Normally, I agree with Old Ox, but I must disagree this time. After seeing Old Ox play 'Zen' yesterday, I also thought it was just an ordinary trash game at first, but gradually, I realized things might not be as simple as I'd thought, so I went ahead and tried it myself.
"After deeply experiencing it, I understood why Old Ox failed in his prediction! And why this game received such 'overwhelmingly positive' reviews. Because this game isn't really a trash game, but is actually quite philosophical, just like its name, it's filled with Zen thoughts!"
Liu Liang's mouth twitched slightly—what the hell!
How did this game become full of Zen thoughts, full of philosophy? Blatant lies!
Liu Liang was not convinced and continued reading.
"When I first started playing this game, I also shared everyone's confusion: what exactly am I supposed to do in this game?
"In the four chapters, we have different modes of action and different purposes. We play as a prisoner, a tree, a mountain, and a stone bridge, and all the while our freedom is restricted.
"As a prisoner, although our range of motion is limited to a single cell, we can still walk around wherever we want, completely free to look wherever we choose;
"When playing as a tree, we can't move, only slightly swaying and rotating our viewpoint when blown by the wind;
"By the time we play as a mountain, we can't even slightly move our viewpoint anymore. We can only passively watch the mountain rotate, playing notes only we can hear.
"In the end, we become a stone bridge, both unable to move and play music, and we must maintain an immobile state forever.
"From the perspective of freedom, our freedom is being increasingly restricted. Our ability to act is being continually stripped away, which is clearly counter to the typical game attempt to 'continually improve player freedom.'
"Why would the game do this? If it was just some carelessly made trash game, it could easily just split the four chapters up and sell them separately, making 'Prison Cell Endurance Simulator,' 'Big Tree Simulator,' 'Big Mountain Simulator,' 'Stone Bridge Simulator,' and maybe it could have scammed even more people that way.
"But the creator combined these four chapters together, gave them a name, and even arranged special transition animations.
"Obviously, the creator did this on purpose. After a deep experience, I believe these four chapters are actually full of philosophy. Here I'll analyze it with my limited knowledge:
"This game is actually about the three stages of life: 'Seeing Oneself,' 'Seeing the World,' 'Seeing All Beings!'
"At the beginning, we are just an ordinary prisoner in jail, our vision limited to the narrow space of the cell, which is 'Seeing Oneself.' The only way to escape the cage is by staring at that painting, liberating our thoughts from the prison and entering the world of the tree.
"In other words, the second stage, the 'Big Tree Simulator', is actually a prisoner's inner world, built through staring at the painting, constructing a real wilderness in our minds.
"Then in the 'tree' and 'mountain' chapters, we move from 'Seeing Oneself' to 'Seeing the World.' We not only see trees and mountains but also begin to think from the perspectives of a tree and a mountain.
"As a tree, we withstand the wind, the sun, and the rain, and as we keep turning our viewpoint, expanding our thoughts to the wider wilderness, our thinking becomes more open. We transform from a tree to a mountain; our actions shift from the concrete act of turning to the abstract act of playing notes.
"While our freedom of action is being gradually restricted, our freedom of thought is increasing!
"Going from 'mountain' to 'bridge' is 'Seeing All Beings.' We see the boulder at the summit roll down, sculpted by people into a stone bridge.
"Although the stone bridge can't move, it can observe the full spectrum of life.
"Someone mentioned on Old Ox's live stream, the stone bridge is also related to a Zen anecdote: I am willing to turn into a stone bridge, endure five hundred years of wind, five hundred years of sun, and five hundred years of rain, just hoping she will pass over me.
"Regrettably, no one could continue interpreting along that line of thought at that time. I don't believe that idling at the stone bridge in the game will allow you to see a girl pass by; what the game expresses is not small love but great love—not an individual girl, but all humanity.
"Some may ask what happened to our physical bodies in the end? What about the original prisoner?
"Once you have 'Seen All Beings,' does the physical body still matter?
"Prison, tree, mountain, bridge—these four chapters seem unrelated at first glance but upon careful reflection, you'll find they are all closely tied to the theme of 'Zen.'
"Of course, it's not Old Ox's fault, given the short time he had to experience the game, and the fact that the understanding of a game varies from person to person.
"But returning to the point, why did Old Ox fail in his prediction? Why did the game get 'overwhelmingly positive' reviews, and its sales are decent? This shows that most players also felt the ambiance I described. They might not be able to articulate these philosophies, but they obtained inner peace from the game.
"Everyone, don't just speedrun and then claim this game is bad, because when you actually play it yourself, you'll find the graphics are great, the materials are fine, and there are some thoughts that can only be felt through playing the game personally."
"Is this game worth it? In my opinion, it's absolutely worth the 5 yuan. Its scenery is beautiful, and it has a much larger volume than your average indie game. The transition between the four chapters isn't so much a puzzle but more like a change in the way of thinking, which is really interesting to ponder on!"
"This game alone has a fixed playtime of two to three hours, but the longer you play afterwards, the more contemplation you get. In the eyes of players who really love it, it's no longer just a game, but a fine piece of art!"
"Enough said, I'm going back to playing as a Big Tree."
After reading this lengthy review of over a thousand words, Liu Liang was stunned.
Is this even possible?
From the number of likes, it was clear that people really agreed with this opinion, and many players who had played the game also expressed that they had similar epiphanies.
Liu Liang continued to browse through more comments and the reviews on Zen in the official store, only to feel his heart growing colder the more he read.
There were just praises everywhere!
Of course, among these positive reviews, some were simply hopping on the bandwagon, thinking, "This game is so absurd I cannot be the only one blindsided; I need to share this with more people."
But there was also a significant portion of players who weren't just bandwagoners; they genuinely found the game fun!
If it weren't for these people initially boosting the review score, the subsequent bandwagoners alone couldn't have made the game's rating "Overwhelmingly Positive."
Faced with the hard reality, Liu Liang had to admit: He had really predicted wrong!
He had originally thought that the game would surely receive mostly negative reviews, at best mixed, and that the sales wouldn't be high. But now, he realized how terribly mistaken he was!
Liu Liang could only silently prepare for the lottery event while actually starting to contemplate life because of this game.
Only, it wasn't contemplating life within the game but outside of it.
How could such a game possibly become popular? Could this "Stranger" really be a genius in game design?
"My ten thousand yuan..."
...
Meanwhile, at Starway Internet Cafe.
Lu Zhixing was unaware of the poor victim Liu Liang facing a crisis because of Zen. After using the streamer to create initial hype for the game, Lu Zhixing had stopped paying attention.
What interested Lu Zhixing now was the game's data.
"Both sales and reputation are good, eh? Taking the risk of social suicide to gather material was worth it!"
So far, the PC version of the game had sold over ten thousand copies, and while the VR version sold less, it still sold over two thousand copies.
As a new creator, he had to split profits fifty-fifty with the platform, but even so, his estimated earnings were already close to forty thousand yuan!
What's more, the game had only been released for two days, and it was still expected to enter a peak period of popularity.
By this estimation, reaching the goal of earning a hundred thousand yuan from the Life Role-Playing Game seemed just around the corner.
Lu Zhixing's production costs were very low, having spent no money, only taking the risk of becoming a social outcast by playing the role of a Big Tree.
Having a golden finger sure is great!
Lu Zhixing planned to wait a few more days to withdraw all the money and help his brother, Lu Mingyuan, through tough times first.
Although it wasn't enough to completely change the fate of the internet cafe, it would be sufficient to keep it afloat for some more time.
"I can start to wrap up this game now and get back to concentrating on my classes while gathering inspiration on the side. Once I make the hundred thousand, I can activate the official version of the 'Life Role-Playing Game'."
Although the popularity of Zen was just beginning to take off, for Lu Zhixing, the game's creator, once the game was completed, launched, and started earning money, it was essentially time to turn the page.
This weekend, Lu Zhixing had been busy gathering materials and making the game, as well as promoting it in Liu Liang's live stream – or rather, fishing, oops, promoting the game; and just like that, it was over in the blink of an eye.
Tomorrow is Monday, and he has to go back to attending classes.
"Speaking of which, what do they teach in the game design majors in this world? I'm quite curious."
In Lu Zhixing's past life, there was no such thing as a game design major in college, and even esports majors were only offered by a handful of universities.
But this world was different. Games as an important part of cultural industries were highly valued, and in universities, game design was even a popular major.
In his previous life, although Lu Zhixing was a mediocre planner, he was self-taught; he learned everything about writing design documents while working at a game company without much theoretical foundation.
Now that he was in this world and coincidentally in a game design major, he of course had to start learning seriously right from the beginning.
After all, in his previous life, he was a white-collar worker who hadn't accomplished much. Having finally transmigrated with a golden finger, he should obviously go all out to achieve something great!
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