For Rent

Chapter 12: Evergrande: The Game

So at lunch with her coworker who supported her most in her MAA playing career for Canada's Death Fiscalists, they discuss an upcoming indie horror game release, which that coworker deemed of interest to Karine after the debacle of MAA:

"Look at this game: it's looking for beta testers, I think you might have wanted to play it since what you're doing in there amounts to ranged tanking" her coworker tells her about the game.

The trailer released from the closed beta build of that game involves character creation, unfinished condo towers and players wielding PLAGF (i.e. Chinese army) weapons... So many PLAGF weapons that the game almost feels like a Norinco ad in game form. And the game itself feels like it's more of a first-person shooter than a horror game.

"Are this game's developers Chinese?" another colleague asks the two.

"Why? There are times where I feel like there's too much emphasis on local purchasing! Video games aren't like food!" Karine retorts. "You make me feel like you wouldn't play a Chinese-made video game based solely on the country of origin!" She then turns to the first coworker. "As for ranged tanking, isn't that how most ranged DPS would feel when you play a ranged DPS in single-player content?"

"The developers are actually based in Quebec. I wonder if you played FPS games before; you might have a hard time taking cover initially if you didn't" the first coworker answers both people.

As they keep watching the trailer, they also realize that one of the levels involves a high-speed car chase across Guangdong, and another level in Luoyang where the player must face the ghosts of dead customers whose families sacrificed everything to even own a condo in that city.

"The devs may as well call this action-horror game Evergrande: The Game, if they can secure the rights to use the Evergrande name and logo. There is just too much pointing at Evergrande that it would be obvious to anyone who have any knowledge of Chinese economy!" Karine comments on what she views as the biggest opportunity the devs can seize.

"Karine? Do you plan on streaming the game? I watched you play MAA, tier in, tier out, but I knew that often women were pushed into healing provided the game has healing, a girl played in group content, and knew what she was doing mechanically!"

"I don't interact the same with a fight when I tank vs heal, but I converted Monseigneur into a tank because, in the early days of MAA, there just wasn't a whole lot of tanks"

By then Karine starts signing up for the open beta of what she called Evergrande: The Game, or, for short, Evergrande. Asking for her email address, username, date of birth and other information deemed necessary by the game's devs to access open beta. I really hope that game's manufacturer is not going to release the game without first securing the right to use the Evergrande name and logo. A Canadian attempt to secure the rights to use these would raise eyebrows in Shenzhen or Guangzhou. However, at this point, Evergrande's manufacturer appears to be banking on Evergrande's despair to wring even a nominal amount of royalties for these rights. It would suck for that game if they fail, Karine ruminates, believing the game's future to be shaky. I would love to see whether there's a political loyalty system in place... at this point, this sounds a lot like my idea for a zombie apocalypse horror movie/game.

The devs' answer is quick: Karine is allowed into the open beta of Evergrande. And she announces her followers on Twitch (provided there are any remaining from her MAA days willing to watch her) that she's back on air for the open beta testing of that game.

As soon as she returns home that day, she braces herself for lengthy installation time for the beta build of Evergrande. Which, because of the game's weight in Chinese content, she decides to open her stream by cooking up... Cantonese chow mein. Especially fitting since the game is implied to start in Shenzhen, and hence Cantonese food is common there.