WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Potter
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ The Game Director that Returned from Hell ◈
Chapter 10
──────
“Easy to learn, hard to master.”
It was a well-known saying in the game industry.
Its meaning was simple.
A game had to be intuitive enough for players to learn its mechanics easily, while offering enough depth for them to explore.
It sounded simple, but putting it into practice was difficult.
After all, if it were easy, why would so many games get criticized for being needlessly confusing?
In that sense, Yeonho’s Hellic more than met the requirements.
『(Games)
Waiting4Zodiac3: Hellic’s fun on repeat playthroughs too. Your play style changes completely depending on your build.
(Guide)
BangbaeBloodLord: Hellic property guide for anyone who’s curious, Part 1: What is Cutting?
(Guide)
HighSchoolBigSword: Crushing-Poison build for your third Hellic run! Try it yourselves@@@
(Chat)
NationalPaladinAssociation: Seriously though, what’s with the scream in Hellic’s intro lmao. That’s a woman screaming. Could it be...?
(Guide)
SqueakyCleanT: I’ll show you exactly how to dodge the Cancer Giant lol』
Hellic had become a sensation within the community.
Of course, that sensation was still limited to the hardcore users who devoured every last post, right down to the bottom of the forum. Still, there was no denying that its influence was growing.
As mentioned earlier, the reason was its simple yet deep mechanics.
In Hellic, all changes to the player’s stats depended entirely on weapons.
Those weapons were grouped into categories called “properties” according to their type. Combining them opened the way to unconventional play styles.
In other words, there was room to experiment.
Hellic’s players thought about which weapons to combine, how to enhance each weapon with their limited resources, and what build they ultimately wanted to complete. To find the answers, they willingly played through the game again and again.
The design had achieved its purpose.
There were other factors too, such as the unusual visuals, the eerie sound, and the supposedly unbeatable boss, the Cancer Giant. In the end, though, the mechanics were at the heart of it all.
Yeonho had made a game with a clear source of fun.
Seorim scrolled through those reactions with the mouse wheel and asked Yeonho a question.
“What do you think?”
The answer came back.
“Why don’t you stop looking?”
“At what?”
“Looking up every single review like that. It’s a bad habit.”
Seorim’s lower lip stuck out.
“Aren’t you happy? All these people we don’t even know are praising our game.”
“If you let every review make or break your day, you’ll lose your own judgment. That’s a fatal bug when you’re making your next game.”
“What are you even talking about?”
She was looking because she was curious. What did that have to do with reviews and her judgment...? This person could be strangely old-fashioned sometimes.
Seorim kept browsing the community.
Her search history was already covered in traces of her ego.
『<Search History>
Hellic
hellic
game someone came to promote
Cancer
Cancer Giant
sound
art
Seorim
Han Seorim』
Most people were like that.
Their first taste of attention from strangers was so sweet and exciting that it could dull their sense of reason.
For Seorim, it was even worse.
Ever since she was young, people had seen her as a pretty young lady from a wealthy family. She couldn’t easily escape the pleasure of being recognized for something that had nothing to do with those advantages she’d been born with.
But life had its bitter moments as well as its sweet ones.
『(Games)
LuvSpaceWar: Hellic’s boring,, tsk tsk tsk -_-』
“What the hell is this asshole’s problem?!”
“What’s wrong?”
“This person wrote a post saying our game’s boring!”
Seorim jabbed a finger at the screen in anger.
Yeonho’s response, however, was indifferent.
“Guess it’s not their thing.”
“Seriously, aren’t you angry? Huh? Look at that rude little emoticon with those lines for eyes!”
“Let it go, you little troublemaker.”
Yeonho casually turned away.
Seorim was boiling inside.
She couldn’t stand how Yeonho had been doing something else this whole time.
“What are you even doing that’s so important you can’t pay attention to our game?”
“Can’t you see? I’m playing a game.”
“I know! I’m asking what game has you so distracted!”
Seorim pulled her chair over and sat beside Yeonho.
Yeonho had brought a console from somewhere, connected it to the TV, and was playing away.
It was a 3D game with a dark setting.
The playable character wore armor fit for a medieval knight. Across from the character, a horrible-looking mass swung its arms.
Just then, one of those arms hit Yeonho’s character and killed it.
[YOU DIED]
“Ah, I died.”
Yeonho smacked his lips and returned to the checkpoint.
Seorim frowned.
“Is this fun? You’ve been doing nothing but dying.”
“Sure is. It’s a game I like.”
“This? What’s it called?”
“Evil’s Soul.”
“Never heard of it.”
“You haven’t heard of most games. Besides, that’s understandable. It only came out about a month ago.”
“Huh?”
As Seorim tilted her head, Yeonho added an explanation while continuing to work the controller.
“It hasn’t gotten much attention yet.”
“You have really obscure tastes.”
“Obscure, my ass. This game’s going to be a hit.”
At that moment, the screen turned gray, and the words appeared again.
[YOU DIED]
Yeonho returned to the checkpoint once more.
Now Seorim was certain.
“Yeah, right. What’s fun about a game where you just keep dying?”
“That’s the fun part... Well, never mind if you don’t get it.”
Only then did Yeonho put down the controller.
Judging by the stretch that followed, the gaming session was over.
Seorim glared at Yeonho with a sulky expression. Yeonho walked over to the computer and spoke.
“Time to check.”
“Check what?”
“What else? Sales.”
Seorim’s eyes lit up.
“Sales? We can see the figures already?”
“Yeah. The numbers update right about now.”
Seorim immediately moved beside Yeonho.
She leaned toward the monitor and spoke.
“We must’ve sold at least four thousand copies, right? Everyone in the community’s talking about it!”
She couldn’t help getting her hopes up.
The community’s overall response to the game was positive, and people were starting to mention it more often. Surely that would translate into meaningful sales.
But Yeonho cut those hopes down at once.
“Four hundred at best. Somewhere around there.”
“Huh? That’s all?”
“Want to bet?”
Those words stung Seorim’s pride.
In a fit of temper, she shouted, “You’re on!”
...And that was how Seorim lost.
“Three hundred eighty-seven copies. I win.”
“...No way.”
Seorim’s voice was hollow.
She couldn’t believe it.
But the number on the monitor cruelly announced the truth.
‘Only...!’
Only 387 copies!
After all that hard work!
The reviews were so good, yet they’d only sold 387 copies!
As she trembled with frustration, Yeonho spoke calmly.
“It’s not like the whole country uses that community. This is a decent showing. Besides, AAA games are pouring out right now. Not many hardcore players are going to look all the way over to an indie game released on an overseas platform.”
“Th-then what do we do?”
“What else? Wait for word of mouth to spread. The real sales will come once we make the platform rankings. We have to play the long game. We’re newcomers, remember?”
“Should we promote it some more? Or maybe...”
“No need. Too much promotion can hurt us. We’re better off gradually building up positive user reviews.”
How was she supposed to accept that?
This was a matter of pride.
‘But it’s fun!’
Even setting aside the fact that she’d helped make it, Hellic was one of the most enjoyable games Seorim had ever played.
It had even erased her old thought that she would quit development once she got bored.
She’d worked so hard, only for the result to turn out like this.
They should have been doing everything they could. She simply couldn’t understand how Yeonho could be so relaxed.
As her expression grew increasingly sullen, Yeonho spoke.
“Enough about the game. Let’s deal with something more urgent first.”
“What?”
“...Do you even pay attention to college life?”
Seorim’s brow furrowed.
“What are you talking about? I’m several times better at that than you are.”
“Our department retreat is the day after tomorrow.”
“?”
“...You really didn’t know.”
Yeonho sounded stunned.
“Forget the community and sales figures. We won’t even be able to dream of going online for a few days. Take a break and clear your head.”
Only then did Seorim remember.
‘...Oh, right.’
The semester was still going.
She’d asked someone to answer attendance for her and forgotten all about it.
Today, too, Seorim was becoming a proper developer.
* * *
“Hoyeong! Your tutor’s here!”
“Okay! I’m all ready!”
Community username: “HighSchoolBigSword.”
A high school senior living in Cheongdam-dong.
At an age when everything except studying was fun, Hoyeong immediately shut down his computer at his mother’s call.
He had seven tutoring sessions every week.
It was an unavoidable routine for the eldest son carrying all his parents’ hopes.
With a deep sigh, Hoyeong moved over to the desk he’d prepared in advance.
‘English conversation today.’
The thought put him at ease.
Unlike his other tutors, who were obsessed with entrance exam scores, Mike, his native English tutor, was practically a friend.
“Hey, Hoyeong!”
A white man with a bushy beard held out his fist.
Hoyeong grinned and bumped it with his own.
“Hello, Mike.”
“Did you finish all your homework?” Mike asked in accented Korean.
“Of course.”
“Okay~!”
Mike shrugged and sat down.
Hoyeong took the seat across from him and spoke with a broad smile.
“So, did you try All Out?”
“Finished the whole thing. A masterpiece, just like you said.”
“Right? I told you it was amazing.”
They were speaking English.
Sure, they were talking about games, but if they were having a conversation in English, didn’t that count as conversation practice?
It had started when Hoyeong happened to discover Mike’s taste in games.
Ever since then, their conversation lessons had become time for talking about games.
It was one of the few moments all week when Hoyeong could breathe.
As a student at a prestigious high school preparing for his entrance exams, he didn’t have anyone else he could talk to about games anyway.
“I love how many good games are coming out lately. There’s no time to get bored, is there?”
Hoyeong wholeheartedly agreed with Mike.
With so many major AAA releases coming out, forget entrance exams. There weren’t enough hours in the day just to play them all.
Even among those releases, one particular game had captured Hoyeong’s heart.
Today, he brought it up again.
“Mike, have you tried Hellic yet?”
“Oh, that Korean indie game! I downloaded it yesterday. I’ll go straight home and play it after our lesson.”
“I seriously recommend it! It holds up pretty well even against all these AAA games.”
A smile settled on Mike’s face.
He still didn’t seem especially interested.
But that was fine.
Hoyeong knew exactly what would get his attention.
“It’s hard. Depending on how you play, the difficulty can go through the roof.”
“Oh?”
“There’s this boss monster called the Cancer Giant. The thing about its mechanics is...”
Mike, the native English conversation tutor.
As a gamer, he was a “masochist” who deliberately took the difficult route and played games in the most hardcore ways possible.
In other words, he was exactly the kind of gamer Yeonho was most wary of.
* * *
That evening, at Mike’s home.
Living alone in an unfamiliar foreign country, Mike found comfort in a can of beer and a decent game.
Today was no different.
Once his work was done, he opened a can of beer and turned on his computer.
‘Hellic, huh?’
The platform was Steam. It hadn’t really caught on in Korea yet, so why had the developer chosen to distribute the game there?
The question briefly crossed his mind, then faded.
Whatever the developer was thinking was none of Mike’s business.
Only one thing mattered to him.
‘All right, Cancer Giant. Let’s see what you’ve got.’
An unstoppable boss monster that couldn’t be beaten through normal play.
But hitting it did reduce its health.
What did that mean?
‘It means I’m supposed to kill it.’
Mike couldn’t imagine any other intention behind it.
He launched the game he’d downloaded the day before.
[Aaaaaaaah!]
A sharp, clear scream rang out in the intro.
‘Hmm, nice atmosphere.’
But atmosphere alone wasn’t enough to make a game worth playing.
What mattered to Mike was the gameplay.
He clicked the Start button right away.
The game began, and...
‘Oh! Is that the one?’
Before long, he encountered the Cancer Giant.
That was the beginning.
[GAME OVER]
“Fuck!”
Mike slammed his fist onto the keyboard.
Even a glancing hit killed him, while his own attacks dealt only 1 damage.
Those insane stats made his blood boil.
But the smile on his face told another story.
The Cancer Giant was exactly what he’d been looking for.
‘Let’s see how long you can stay standing, bastard.’
How thrilling would it be to see that thing fall at his feet and tremble helplessly?
Just imagining it sent a shiver down his spine.
He couldn’t wait any longer.
Mike threw himself into the game.
So completely that he couldn’t take his hands off the keyboard all night.
“Fuck!”
His scream rang through the room in place of a rooster’s morning call.
At any rate, to get straight to the result, his hunt for the Cancer Giant ended in failure.
Worn out with exhaustion, he simply posted a message on a community back home in North America.
『Fucking good game.』
His introduction to Hellic, complete with a few screenshots, spread rapidly.
『mike tester’s brought us a new game!』
Community username: “mike tester.”
He was a well-known user in a North American hardcore gaming community.
With the endorsement of someone known for reliably recommending good games, Hellic quietly began drawing attention in North America’s niche gaming scene, even before it did in Korea.
Bounty
Footnotes:
“SqueakyCleanT” plays on the Korean expression for being clear and unblemished: the letter T sounds like ti, meaning a flaw or blemish.
Evil’s Soul and its repeated “YOU DIED” screen evoke the notoriously challenging Souls games.
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