As days passed, development on Dark Souls was going smoothly.
With a large batch of art assets coming in from outsourcing…
The whole team entered a fast-paced production phase.
At the same time, Lucas's official blog and the Nebula Games website had started warming up the promotion for Dark Souls little by little.
They were doing simple interactions with players and posting some new promotional concept art and such.
Basically, it was just to remind people they're still around.
But during the same period, other games were being promoted too.
The ones that drew the most attention were the promotional battles between two of the country's top publishers and game companies: NetDragon and SkyNova.
Both were VR games kept under wraps, and both had also appeared at the previous gameplay convention.
Even though Nebula Games had stolen the spotlight at the convention earlier—
These two new games were going all out when it came to promotion.
Each trying to outdo the other.
Their campaigns were big and flashy, but the impact on Nebula Games wasn't actually that serious.
Mainly because both of those games were for VR platforms.
Besides that, there was also the ongoing anti-war themed game competition.
By now, around late July or early August, quite a few anti-war themed games had already been released on the official platform.
Some were mobile games, others were PC games.
The genres were all over the place—RPGs, FPS games, and more.
A lot of them even copied the format Lucas used in To the Moon last year, which won him an award.
But none of them really stood out. In fact, many of them got really low scores from players.
And players were complaining about it online.
"This year's competition theme is just… I don't even know what to say!"
"Like, it's an anti-war theme, right? You need to show the brutality of war. You need big scenes. But with such a short dev cycle and no big studios involved, these games just feel super awkward."
"+1. It's like being lectured by some old guy. And the worst part? The lecture is boring as hell."
"Stop arguing and go check Lucas's blog! Looks like he joined the competition too!"
"What? Isn't Lucas working on Dark Souls? How did he have time to join this contest? Don't tell me Dark Souls is already finished?!"
"Who knows... but anti-war isn't an easy theme. Can Lucas really pull it off?"
"Whatever, I'll just buy it and try it out. If it's from Lucas, it's probably not that bad. At least better than all these other anti-war games, right?"
"Yeah, good point!"
As for Valiant Hearts: The Great War being released, Lucas didn't do any major promotion.
He just posted a simple notice on his blog and added a short intro on the main page of the Nebula Games platform.
But this was clearly different from the early days when Lucas wasn't well known and had to use clever tricks just to get some attention.
Thanks to the huge success of Fall Guys and Legends of the Three Kingdoms, plus the upcoming Dark Souls, Lucas had already made a name for himself and built a fanbase.
Once news about Valiant Hearts: The Great War got out, players quickly noticed.
But while players were excited and Lucas stayed calm,
Many of the other designers in the competition started to panic.
"What the hell? Wasn't Lucas working on Dark Souls? How did he make another game on top of that?!"
"Yeah! I really thought Lucas was sitting this competition out this year!"
"This is so damn hard!"
A lot of game designers were starting to feel overwhelmed. Still, there were some who tried to stay hopeful.
"Come on guys, maybe this one from Lucas is a flop."
"Right, Dark Souls has been getting a lot of promotion lately. He's probably been focused on that. After all, it's his first big project with Nebula Games."
"Exactly. And anti-war games are pretty deep. Lucas might not be able to pull it off."
But even while saying that, just like many players, these designers downloaded and bought the game, wanting to see what it was really like.
Compared to last year's To the Moon, Valiant Hearts: The Great War was priced at 20 yuan, and it was also available on both mobile and PC.
On Shark TV, the hype around Fall Guys that once swept across the entire streaming platform has died down quite a bit.
Even though plenty of streamers are still playing it—some even focusing exclusively on Fall Guys and Legends of the Three Kingdoms—most have gone back to their usual content. At most, when there's not much going on, they'll gather with a few familiar streamers to mess around in Fall Guys for fun and laughs.
But now that Valiant Hearts: The Great War is out, it's caught the attention of a number of game streamers.
In Shark TV's Luke's stream, she had just gone live and was chatting with her viewers.
"Alright, that's enough talking for now. Let's check out the new game from Nebula Games."
"It's not Dark Souls. That one's still just hype with no release in sight. The one we're playing today is part of this season's Game Hunt—it's called Valiant Hearts: The Great War. Judging by its size, I'd say it fits the scale of an indie game, even though Nebula Games probably doesn't count as an indie developer anymore."
Inside the stream, Luke was introducing the game to her viewers.
He's always followed Nebula Games pretty closely.
Aside from Outlast and their first game Mirror, he also really enjoys games like Overcooked, Fall Guys, Undertale, and To the Moon.
So as soon as he heard Nebula Games was releasing a new title for the Game Hunt, he was ready to stream it right away.
As he spoke, Luke opened up the Nebula Games platform and immediately saw the game featured right on the homepage.
The cover showed a soldier in uniform and a war dog.
The art style was clearly cartoonish and animated.
He clicked in to open the game's store page. In big bold letters was the title Valiant Hearts: The Great War.
The game description read:
An emotional adventure game with a unique atmosphere and art style.
A mix of exploration, action, and puzzle-solving.
Help the characters survive the war by sneaking through enemy lines or solving challenges.
The story follows four men and women and one loyal dog, whose lives become tangled together in this war. It's a tale of revenge, family, and friendship.
This fictional story takes you back to famous World War I settings, reliving major battles on the Western Front and immersing you in historical events.
Luke hadn't reacted much yet, but her viewers were already flooding the chat with different opinions.
'That description's full of hot air, huh?'
'Yeah, I mean it's just a small cartoon-style game, and it's a side-scroller too. How's that gonna "relive major battles" from the Western Front?'
'Right? The visuals don't really show the horrors of war at all.'
'I trust Lucas, but come on—reliving WWI? I'd believe that from a big-budget game, but this one?'
'Exactly. Sounds like a stretch!'
'Even Nebula Games didn't promote it that much!'
After reading the description, a lot of viewers were left confused.
It really did sound like over-the-top self-promotion.
After all, it's just a small 2D game with cartoon graphics.
How's that going to seriously portray the realities of war or "relive" those brutal historical battles?
But Luke wasn't really focused on the description.
(End of the Chapter)
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