Chapter 9

Terror Paradise Chapter 9

Proofreading: kukelekuuk00, Volly

“Stage completed, calculating experience . ”

“Experience received: 500, game coins: 0”

“Received items/equipment: None”

“Completed/Accepted tasks:0/0”

“Unique, hidden tasks completed: 0, Explore every sub-plots this world has to offer: Nil”

“Amount of times when your terror value spike: 0 times, Highest Terror Value: 0, Average Terror Value: 0”

“Your terror grade is courageous, additional rewards are disabled in this mode . ”

“Calculation has finished, please continue . ”

Let’s discuss the factors affecting the calculation of multiplayer mode .

In Terror Paradise, regardless of how many monsters one personally kills, it doesn’t affect the amount of experience received at the end, all of the experience is calculated once the level ends . Generally speaking, as long as he/she does not meet any heavy resistance or he/she does not go against the game’s intention, the experience that every lucky survivor will gain should all be the same, unless a player’s performance really fits the description of a “shitty teammate,” in which case the system will deduct some points from him during the calculation .

This is done to remove the problems of “Kill stealing” and “overkilling” . In order to ensure that a certain monster’s equipment and experience belongs to them, some players will use excessive methods to attack them, for example, killing a dog with a bazooka . As long as it causes more destruction compared to their teammates . This isn’t just an isolated act, but rather a waste in team resources .

However, this setting seemingly gives rise to another problem: since the experience is the same, people who kill more monsters only waste more health and stamina, which dampens the enthusiasm of the players for combat . In reality, however, players who are adept and diligent in combat will be rewarded with a boost to skill value . Further explanations will follow later .

Not only does Terror Paradise not give additional experience after killing a monster, even the concept of “loot” does not exist here . For example, if a mummy dies, its body will not drop a sword, a spear, or even a gun or anything else . . If one really wants to get something from its body, it would be either rotten bandages or shriveled muscles, that’s all… The player will still have to personally gather the items . After holding something in your hands the system will give you an item description . To see specifically how deceptive it can be, please refer to the part about the “rock” .

To get an equipment from this game is a very “interesting” matter . Besides accessing some specific treasure area by solving a puzzle, in almost every other situation a large amount of items needed for the subplots, including equipments, are completely up to the players to ‘find’ . For example, there is a spider-man costume on display on the street . This might be completely useless, or it might be a superior equipment with attribute bonuses . Another example: while wandering around the sewer one might find weapons such as a pair of swords, emei piercers, nunchucks, staffs and so on .

In short, to get equipment, it is enough to have wisdom, luck or diligence . The first two are out of anyone’s control but the third is nothing more than just spending more time for exploring . Needless to say, exploring requires the support of combat abilities and generally the level won’t allow players too much free time to roam freely . Furthermore, it will only work if players have enough stamina points to freely move about .

As this game is still basically in the internal testing stage, there is, as of now, no way to obtain equipment outside of stages . But once it reaches beta and the goods exchange launches it will be possible to use game coins and technique points to buy them .

This goes without saying, but game coins, like most games out there, can be used to buy the “store goods” that the game provides, to bid for goods that other players are offering in an auction fair, or they can be used in a direct trade .

Technique points are a fairly rare type of currency . Players are unable to use technique points in a direct trade nor are they circulated in the goods exchange . Technique points can only be used in a single place – “Scary box” . This is the name of a store specially created by the system . No one knows why they’re called that, maybe they thought that it would “frighten” the players when they check out the stuff inside .

Technique points can be used to buy two types of goods in “Scary Box” . The first type is game coins, players can exchange them at a ratio of 1 to 10 . The second type covers items that can’t be taken out of levels, for example the “Blood corpses must die” sword Feng Bujue received during the tutorial, needless to say, it functioned like a quest item, created to let him defeat the blood corpses that he’d otherwise have been unable to defeat at that stage . . It had no requirements of rank or specialisations and therefore, could not be brought out of the level .

Equipments, items, skills, etc . along those lines… do not disappear from the system’s database once the level ends, but the players do not retain them . Instead they enter a bin of some sort, namely the scary box . Those items are sold there and can only be purchased using technique points . Their properties are also adjusted accordingly . For example, the requirements of the equipment will be tweaked, some weapons’ effect which is only suitable for a certain level will be changed, skill cards will have unlimited usage, and needless to say, the requirements to learn them will be higher .

As the “recycle bin” is at present still very empty, the scary box is not open during the internal testing stage . Once the beta starts, countless number of players are bound to join, so a certain amount of items need to be accumulated as a reserve within this period of time . After the official opening of this special store, items that are not sold after being available for 7 days in real time are deleted by the system to prevent the clutter from affecting browsing .

The rank cap in the beta is 20 . As a game which revolves around clearing levels through matchmaking, ranks cannot be considered an advantage and in the near future, game coins can be bought using money . Therefore, the biggest advantage that these test build players have is undoubtedly the technique points that they have saved up . The first batch of merchandise that the scary box sells after opening is only available to these players who are loaded with technique points and to be the first to be able to choose what they want at the start is a type of privilege .

Ending on this note, let’s take another look at the problem regarding motivation to fight, as it’s much easier to explain now—how players battle for technique points .

Puzzles are not something everyone is good at, but when it comes to battle, everyone can participate . The point of having technique points is that they can be “awarded for players’ productive contributions during the game . ” This can occur during puzzles, but chances to get them are even more common in battles . For example, killing enemies in a high gain low risk way, continuous kills, killing a bunch of enemies together, making use of stage conditions to complete a special kill, etc… . .

The examples go on, but let’s continue to use Feng Bujue’s tutorial stage as an example . If he hadn’t found the key in the square room and had chosen to kick down the door, he would still have been able to receive technique points . But the most important factor is how he kicked it . The majority of people would face the door directly and thrust the sole of their foot towards it, the actors in a lot of movies also did that too . In reality, this is the most laborious method: using a sidekick or a roundhouse kick to kick it down is more efficient . At that moment, if Feng Bujue had used a much productive way to kick down the door, he would still have received experience, maybe not as much as from solving the riddle, but it would still have been possible to obtain 10 points or so .

These are the two types of playing, two different avenues for growth . Players who enjoy reasoning can rely on actions such as resolving puzzles, exploring the world’s subplots and so forth, and get a large amount of technique points in one go . Players who love to fight can continue to hone their fighting skills and get technique points through fighting . Under normal circumstances, choosing to fight will yield more points . As long as a puzzle remained unsolved, puzzle players who are stuck on the last bit of the puzzle receive almost no technique points despite almost solving the entire puzzle . Players relying on force,however, can accumulate their points incrementally .

But no matter how one chooses to play . the most controversial part about this game is the “moronic” way it is set up . Each terrifying elements is set up to simply make people lose their cool and perform actions like shooting a dog with a bazooka . In Terror Paradise, the most logical way to fight is the only way to reap the most benefits . Using a bazooka will only get you a pile of sludge, whereas, if you use a stick, you might get some of its fur and a pot of stewed meat .

————–

After looking through the match summary . Feng Bujue went back to the login screen . When he reopened the menu, he found that he’d ranked up directly to rank 4 . His stamina value had been raised to 400/400, and his experience right now was 0/400 . It seemed that this game had not exaggerated the experience required for ranking up . At least for the time being, the experience needed for each rank was increased by 100 for every rank gained, as did his stamina value .

“Brother Jue, I jumped straight to rank 3! Just 30 points more and I’ll reach rank 4!” came Wang Tanzhi’s voice from the communication line .

“I know . ” Actually, Feng Bujue had already calculated little Tan’s experience earlier . When compared to himself, the difference was nothing more than the 30 technique points gained from the newbie tutorial . “If we play multiplayer practice mode again, we should be able to level up to rank 5 . But…this mode is pretty unrewarding . Once we reach rank 5, naturally, we will want to play team survival mode as that is the main attraction of the game . But we are severely lacking in equipment right now to the point where we don’t even have regular equipment, not to mention good ones . If we enter a team like this, we might drag others down…”

“Huh? Team? Drag the others down? Who are you referring to?” Wang Tanzhi replied in shock .

“Dude, you really didn’t read even a single word of the game manual…” Feng Bujue started explaining, “The number of players in team survival mode is determined at random and can hold two to six players . You also don’t join the level immediately once it’s initiated but enter it based on a queuing system . If we have a full group of six people together, it would not matter, but if our group only contains the two of us, if we do not encounter a two person level, but a three, four, five, six person level, we will need to cooperate with other people .

“If our strength is too weak, there’s a high probability that we will die in the middle of the level . Even if the others successfully clear the level, we will only receive experience based on the contributions we made before our death and will not be able to get the level bonus from clearing the stage .

More importantly, there’s also a problem with spoils in that mode . Players with no sense of camaraderie as a team will naturally keep any items and skills they find for themselves . Unless it’s an item which cannot be taken out of the level or something which they cannot use, no one will be willing to part with the equipment or skills that they find so easily .

This is how people’s mentality works… . . Even if they pick up something worthless which can’t be sold in the exchange and would only be worth a couple of coins if sold to the system, they would still be unwilling to give it for free to the other players in the level . You must give them something in exchange, so they feel that they’ve profited . ”

After listening up to this point, Wang Tanzhi replied, “In short, you mean, if we don’t make use of our time now to raise some of our characters’ physical prowess, it will be even harder to do so when we reach rank 5 . If we don’t unlock our specialization rank by then, even if people give their old equipment or useless skills to us out of pity, it would still be of no use to us . ”

Feng Bujue replied, “I am glad you understand . Well then, let’s dissolve the party and head into solo survival mode . ”

“Hey, you’re saying this before you abandon me and go ahead alone!”

Feng Bujue smiled and replied, “We must have finished that multiplayer training mode in a nonstandard fashion, since normally we shouldn’t have gotten as many as 500 experience points . I am thinking… that maybe this boss was originally not created to be killed by us . The probability that this level could be cleared by killing the boss is very small . If we had cleared it by escaping, I estimate that we could probably have gotten around 300 points .

But since our ranks has already risen faster than expected, it would be best if we go through the single player survival mode once each on our own . Once that is done, our strength should be significantly improved . At the very least, we’ll be able to unlock one or two specializations and grab one or two pieces of equipment or skills or something . “

“All right, let’s start by queuing alone . Can you see the progress of my game in your friends list?” Wang Tanzhi asked .

“Yup, I can,” Feng Bujue replied, “Anyway,the first one to finish would wait for the other . If everything goes well, we will be able to clear the stage in at most an hour and reach rank 5 . After that, we will go and have a taste of the legendary team survival mode…”