After Christmas came New Year's, as expected.
Once the holiday ended and work resumed, on his very first day back, Ichin gathered the heads of the development teams along with the company's senior management to discuss the work plan for the next six months, as well as a detailed roadmap for the first three.
Looking over the current progress of several projects, Ichin said, "Aside from Fall Guys and Apex, which will continue operating under the existing strategy, let's aim to complete the follow-up content for Monster Train within two months. That timeline should be fine, right?"
Hazuki nodded. "We won't even need that long. Including bug testing and fixes after development is complete, we can launch it by mid-February."
"Alright, then let's set February 20 as the completion date," Ichin said. "Next, Salt and Sanctuary and Bloodborne. The release date for Salt and Sanctuary was announced at TGA as this summer, tentatively August. Hazuki, go ahead and give us an update on the current progress."
Hazuki nodded and glanced at the development schedule in her hands. "At present, all the action animations are fully completed. The next focus will be monster design and full map development. These two areas will take the most time. As for items and weapons, those are relatively simple. Based on the progress over the past few months, development should be mostly finished by May, with June and July reserved for testing and optimization. If possible, I suggest moving the release date up to July. To be honest, I originally wanted June to compensate for the lack of releases in the first half of the year, but that would be too rushed."
Ichin nodded. "Yeah, June would be too tight. Even though our development efficiency is good, we can't sacrifice quality just to save a bit of time. Let's finalize the release date in March. If everything goes well, we'll set it for July."
After discussing Salt and Sanctuary, Ichin moved on to the company's biggest project of the year, Bloodborne.
Compared to Salt and Sanctuary, Bloodborne was on a completely different scale, whether in terms of content, development scope, or cost.
Ichin was personally in charge of this project, so he had set the schedule himself.
After handing out copies to everyone, he said, "From here on, this project will be our top priority. Ever since TGA, many players have been closely following any news about Bloodborne. Starting in March, we need to regularly release updates about the game. Whether it's concept art of certain scenes or short in-game clips of around ten seconds, anything works. Of course, marketing is secondary. The main focus is still accelerating development. The originally planned release window was the end of this year, but now it looks like we might be a bit pressed for time."
Hazuki smiled. "Well, that's because you're having your wedding this year. You won't be able to stay at the company all the time and will have to travel back and forth."
Her words caused several developers who weren't aware of this to show surprised expressions.
Although they already knew Ichin and Utaha were married, they didn't expect the wedding ceremony to take place this year.
But thinking about it, it made sense. They would both graduate from university this year, so it was indeed time to start preparing for the wedding.
Ichin waved his hand with a smile. "That's true, but I can't neglect the company either. I was the one who said I'd personally handle this project last year, so I have to see it through. I can't just hand it over to a few of you halfway through. That could easily lead to problems."
Kō Yagami nodded in agreement. "That's true. For other projects it might be fine, but for this game, like Dark Souls before it, it's better if you take the lead. So what about the schedule?"
Ichin spread his hands. "I can't leave all the wedding preparations to my parents and Utaha's family. I have to be involved. As for development, I'll try to make time for it. Even if I'm not here, I can work remotely. It's not decades ago anymore. With the internet, there might be minor issues, but it should be manageable."
"Won't that be exhausting?"
Umiko leaned back in her chair, spinning a pen in her hand. "Even though we announced a general release window at TGA, delaying it a bit shouldn't be a big issue, right? Hmm… actually, maybe not. From the beginning until now, we've never delayed a game release. If anything, we've only released earlier than planned."
"Exactly. It's not that big of a deal. Just traveling back and forth, nothing to worry about."
Ichin smiled as he opened the PPT in the meeting room and connected his laptop. "Now, let's talk about the plan for Persona 2. During the holiday, I wrote part of the proposal and designed some in-game UI. Since it's the first day back, the workload isn't heavy, so let's discuss it together."
For the rest of the time, everyone discussed Ichin's proposal and the UI designs he had prepared.
The meeting, originally scheduled for one hour, ended up being extended by nearly another hour.
It was almost noon by the time Ichin finally left the meeting room and returned to his office.
Utaha, who was typing away at her desk, looked up and smiled. "That meeting ran a bit long."
Ichin shook the stack of documents in his hand. "We were discussing a new project, and the brainstorming took some extra time. This session brought up a lot of ideas I hadn't even considered. I think the new Persona game could end up being even more interesting than I originally imagined."
Originally, Ichin had planned to keep the story mostly unchanged, focusing on improvements in visuals and presentation. But after the brainstorming session, they had come up with many new systems that could be integrated into Persona.
If developed along this direction, this installment would undoubtedly become an even more engaging and enjoyable game.
"Ahh, really? Then are you handling the script yourself as well? Do you want me to help?"
"No need."
Sitting down beside Utaha, Ichin smiled. "Did you forget we hired two new writers? I'll just handle the main storyline. The side stories can be left to them. My workload won't be too heavy. Besides, this project won't even start until mid-year at the earliest, so there's plenty of time."
Gently patting Utaha's head, Ichin then began discussing their plans for going home during the New Year. There was only a little over a month left.
And this time, since they needed to discuss the wedding, they would have to invite Utaha's parents as well.
...
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