Building a Gaming Empire From Scratch

The closed beta participants were quickly decided.

An old friend called, and they gathered 10 reputable anchors and video uploaders, 10 professional gamers from different clubs, and several well-known game media outlets.

—A game media outlet with a perfect reputation is non-existent.

The only distinction is whether they’re better or worse compared to their peers.

Even “Game Base,” Lincon’s first choice, which gained popularity due to the successful gamble on “Traveler of the Wind,” wasn’t spotless.

It’s just that its mistakes and shady advertisements from the magazine era hadn’t been publicly discussed yet since it had just started as an online media outlet.

After all, for game media outlets to survive, they mostly can’t live without advertising from game companies. And when they accept many advertisements, it’s inevitable that they’ll occasionally step into pitfalls.

Or they might be blinded by money and willingly step into them.

Under such social conditions, if they could only accept advertisements for well-received games and have reasonable criticism without taking money to defame others, they could be considered conscientious.

Next, staff’s relatives and friends were allocated another 10 spots.

The remaining spots went to Mavis, who was given free rein to choose from the list of registrants.

After sending out 100 invitations, all preparations were officially completed.

Lincoln started to relax and waited for Saturday’s game test.

On Friday, Dream Cloud Studio returned to its previous development pace— because the boss, Lincoln, disappeared again.

Of course, it wasn’t that he planned to spend all his saved 3-day vacation. Absolutely not.

He had another important job to finish at home today.

To complete this task perfectly, he slept until 10 a.m., ensuring he had enough energy.

He ordered a luxurious takeout meal—five dishes, two soups, and a cola—to replenish his energy levels.

After eating to his heart’s content, he went to the virtual world.

He squeezed onto the small sofa with Mavis, played games and watched variety shows to relax his mind so he wouldn’t be too tense and make mistakes during critical moments.

After a nap, he laid on the sofa and browsed social networking sites on his alternate account, warming up by snacking on melons and watching skits. After devoting an entire day to preparations, Lincoln was finally ready. At 6:30 in the evening, he worked overtime to release the announcement about the new batch of Mirage consoles going on sale:

“Tomorrow at 8 a.m., 2.6 million brand-new Mirage consoles will be available.

Friends who like them, remember to buy them on time.”

“Hmm—” Lincoln got up, stretched his arms, and called it a day after an excellent job.

At NetDragon’s R&D center, Warner didn’t leave work as he was waiting for Lincoln’s announcement.

Now that Lincoln finally sent it, Warner couldn’t help but slam his fist on the office desk and promptly send the edited notice to the group chat.

“All Members:

Tomorrow, come to work one hour early, clock in at 7:30 a.m., and be ready to buy the Mirage console at 8 a.m. No one is allowed to take any leave! You must arrive on time, and there are no exceptions!”

This time, he was truly prepared and brimming with confidence!

Last time, with over 1,000 people, they didn’t manage to get one. This time, he learned his lesson.

Yesterday, he sought out Richard and put in a request to mobilize more people. ‘I’ms time, not only researcn start ana aamnustratlve assistants were Involved, but also front desk receptionists, warehouse gatekeepers, office cleaners, file registrars, and restaurant spoon handlers….

Everyone would follow his command and participate in the purchase.

Almost 2,000 people! There’s no way they can’t get one now!

Even if they couldn’t, the marketing department’s staff was ready to spring into action. They would immediately intervene and buy back from other online purchasers.

These elite personnel wouldn’t return empty-handed!

In a nutshell—this time, they must succeed!

In another office at NetDragon, Gary didn’t share Warner’s confidence.

On the contrary, he was troubled.

Under his organization, the Anti-Cloud Dream Alliance’s actions were highly efficient and had stirred up quite a bit of heat. However, this time, Lincoln didn’t bother to respond, remaining completely silent.

In the “Anti-Cloud Dream Alliance” group chat, the members’ confidence was also waning, and they became increasingly impatient.

“What’s going on? Why hasn’t Cloud Dream reacted at all?”

“If there’s no response, we could lose almost one-tenth of our followers!” “I’ve lost 300,000 fans!”

“The past few days, my live broadcast room has been filled with people leading the charge, and my paid fans are rapidly decreasing! If there’s no result soon, I’m out, and I don’t even want the remaining payment!”

“Is it because we only made the hot topics list but didn’t make headlines, so Cloud Dream doesn’t want to acknowledge it?”

“Headlines?” Gary saw the last person’s comment and began to have doubts.

Lincoln’s frequency of appearing on hot searches could be described as absurdly high. If multiple appearances led him to ignore anything that didn’t reach the top, it wouldn’t be impossible.

However, this matter had already made headlines once, and players had already rushed to it. They even obtained Lincoln’s promise that it would be coming soon, and they understood the delay.

Now, seeing people still targeting Cloud Dream online, many players felt it was excessive and wouldn’t participate anymore.

When facing excellent game producers, players are ultimately kind-hearted and easy to talk to.

Without these fresh troops, though they could still raise the topic’s popularity, it would be difficult to reach the top of the hot searches.

Gary thought about it, looked at the remaining budget, and sighed as he called Spiritual Rhinoceros.

Buying official hot searches isn’t a good method: the traces are too obvious. It’s not as natural as mobilizing players to raise the heat.

Moreover, many third-party companies offer hot search promotion services at lower prices, better service, and after-sales support.

However, the official channels have their advantages: they’re simple, direct, efficient, and safe.

They guarantee you a top headline spot for three hours. Even if the moon exploded during that time, nothing could shake your headline position!

Gary decided to play it safe and chose the official route.

After all, it’s not his money. As long as he achieved his goal, he didn’t care how much he spent.

After the call, he managed to arrange a headline jump with a 30% increase in price.

Gary breathed a sigh of relief and regained some confidence.

He also remembered to mention it in the group chat to boost morale.

“Hang in there. I have already purchased the Spiritual Rhinoceros hot search headline. It starts tomorrow at 8 a.m. and lasts for a full 6 hours. Be sure to cooperate and make the most of the opportunity.”

“No problem!”

“We should have done this sooner!”

A flurry of agreement filled the group chat.

Roooooobert, who had been sneakily lurking and non-stop screen recording without interruption, couldn’t help but exclaim in his heart: As expected of a big company, their moves are bold! They don’t care about money at all!

After marveling, he quickly exported the video, cutting out this part, tagging it

“NetDragon Buys Hot Search,” and filing it under “Key Material.”

Roooooobert was very efficient. The framework for the new video had already been written, and he was now in the material editing stage.

With the addition of this hot search buzz, he was very confident—his new video would definitely be a hit!

“Working all night tonight! Strive to release it tomorrow! Ride the hot search headline wave!”