Chapter 434

As eager as James was to start the whole process, it still took him almost an hour to fill out all the appropriate forms. After everything he’d been through, he was more than a little hesitant to simply sign his name on any dotted line. Which meant reading through everything, line by line, to make sure there weren’t any secret, virtual lobotomy style, clauses. Luckily, Rue helped him go through all the forms, and Steve, to his credit, did his best to explain everything as James went through them.

Of course, there was the standard extension to his normal NDA regarding Dungeon Cores being run by actual living, breathing, players. If any questions regarding dungeon cores came up, Steve reminded him the generic answers developers would give were simply stating it was a state-of-the-art AI running the dungeon, and that everything was randomized from the beginning. Meaning, what type of dungeon, what type of AI personality it was that ran the dungeon, and how the floors etc were built. Given what James had seen of the AI in the game so far, including those who’d had their intelligence increased like his Terminus, he felt that was pretty believable.

The next set of documents covered when and how he was going to be able to use his new player avatar. Steve, being tight lipped, refused to tell him what the big event was. Still, once players began flowing into immersion, and the announcement went out across the world, James would have permission to use his avatar to visit the dungeon town outside of his dungeon, as well as even form up parties, and run through the floors with players.

Part of the extra coding and work that Steve and his team had put in, involved ensuring while in his avatar, the dungeon’s own NPCs and creatures wouldn’t recognize him as their dungeon core. Instead, they would see him as a developer character, and treat him as such. Meaning, the actual AI of the world wouldn’t view him as their god, but more like, an annoying, pestering coworker, or perhaps, supervisor? Either way, it would ensure the dungeon itself didn’t accidently give actual players anything suspicious to pick up on.

The actual characters, according to Steve, would have their name displayed in a different color than regular player characters. Something James had seen done in a few different games during his lifetime, usually when developers and the team working on games wanted to integrate and interact with their player base on a more personal level. There was a precedent regarding such things, which was why, according to Steve, he’d been able to convince Matt and Rachel to push for Dungeon Cores to have the ability to join in as well, under the developer ruse.

James couldn’t help but point out, at that particular part, that he was, quite frankly, the developer of his instance. After all, he made every choice, save those random moments Rue went creator mode on him, within his dungeon. He developed, literally from the ground up, his entire dungeon, all with the tools given to him. The developers and designers, sure, had created the system, but James, and the other Dungeon Cores, were the true developers of the world.

Moving past those bits, was the most annoying, in James’s opinion, bits of paperwork. Apparently, because of the extra knowledge developers had regarding the game, there were certain ‘restrictions’ placed on their characters. Some of these restrictions, had to do with the image of the company that had created DCO. In essence, James couldn’t create an avatar that would incite negative impressions of the company. Something about professionalism, which James had to snort at. After all, he'd heard stories about some of the AI in the game, particularly that Lilith that Fel and Alex had mentioned. If the devs wanted to code in AI like that, they really didn’t have any ground to stand on regarding player perceptions.

Then again, there was always the difference between what was allowable within game worlds from AI point of views, and those of actual living, breathing, humans. Considering how far technology, and AI tech had advanced, James found that line seemed to be considerably more blurred nowadays. Not to mention the debauchery that he’d seen in The Zone. Immersion tech, first and foremost, was definitely used by people to feed their vices and do whatever they wanted for their enjoyment. So, really, he felt that particular bit of restrictions a bit pointless.

Still, other than feeling unnecessary, he didn’t really care about them all that much. He’d no intention of making himself into a busty female succubus avatar, nor going the Adonis route. James wanted this avatar so he could finally adventure with the people of his town. He wanted to ‘play’ DCO as an adventurer. He had no intention of doing anything stupid, irresponsible, or damning to the company. Besides, he owed Matt, Rach, and everyone else that much.

The bit of the rules that did annoy him, were regarding some of the ‘additional restrictions’ placed on developer characters. James was aware of the job system within DCO. Players could pick a total of two different professions, and train them up, unlocking various skills and abilities as they grew. There were even achievements linked to them, titles, and unique crafting options. James had learned that Alex had been the one to bring cooked dicken to the world by picking the chef profession, as well as Fireball Whiskey thanks to his second profession option.

Because of the knowledge developers had regarding secret paths and such, they weren’t allowed to have professions. James figured it was also put in place to keep player from begging devs to craft them special things, which he knew players would still ask and request. Locking that ability from the get-go, at least, was a way to mitigate such things.

Past that though, was the bit that really sucked. Unlike with his Avatar that he had for Dungeon Wars, Skirmishes, and battles in the Coliseum, he couldn’t even select whatever classes he wanted. He was limited to a total of 10 different classes from the start. Then, at level 20, would get the two basic options, as well as the ability to select a ‘random’ choice. This, according to Steve, was to keep developers from helping players figure out OP secret classes. It was also a way to keep developers from power gaming themselves into the immersed worlds. Annoying, but again, something that James could begrudgingly understand.

There was, at the very least, a silver lining as James finished up all of the paperwork. First and foremost, developer characters got a free pass to level 20, and from there, would gain 3xs the amount of experience other players got, until they reached the average level of players in a dungeon. From there, they would gain 1.5xs the amount of experience while they played, until the reached a point in the top 75percent of the dungeon’s players, at which point, experience gain would be normalized. This, again, was a feature to allow the developers the ability to interact with players at all levels of the dungeon, while still getting to experience the thrills and joys of DCO.

The other silver lining, and the bit that had James chomping at the bit to make his avatar already, once he’d finished all the paperwork, was once this was all done, he, Rue, and even Steve, would be able to run around his dungeon, as players, until the actual players joined immersion. At that time, they were limited to a single ‘developer’ character from his dungeon at a time, until players once again logged out for the day. That limit, was to ensure even if a dungeon core was running around as a developer, their AI and handler could still oversee dungeon activities, and contact them in case anything dire came up.

Considering James had pretty much finalized all of his dungeon expansion and growth for the moment, waiting for more resources and such to really go to work on his sixth floor, it meant, once they made their avatars, the three of them would be going on a jolly adventure through his dungeon, for probably the next, at the very least, 12 hours. According to Steve, developer characters got the privilege of not having to wait for a cooldown timer upon completing the dungeon, or wiping, and they could still reap the benefits of achievements and such, all at the accelerated experience growth for now.

James had no disillusions about his capabilities as a gamer. He knew he wasn’t going to reach the levels of Z and the others before they logged in, but he could at least try to climb as high as he could, to close that gap. After that, perhaps a few dungeons carries by some higher level players could help close the gap even more, and before long, he could be standing, side by side, with Z and the others, as they took on new experiences and floors in his dungeon. It was something he’d been dreaming of, and it was all he could do, to keep himself from shaking, as looked at Steve and Rue. It was time to create his player character.