Chapter 500: Chapter 483: Insider? Friendly Forces!
On the Whirlpool Game Forum, a post suddenly went viral.
And it was a massive hit: in just twenty minutes, there were a staggering 3,000+ replies.
The title of the post was simple – [If you were stranded on a deserted island, how would you survive?]
Contrary to the name, even though the Whirlpool Game Forum primarily discusses games, not all the posts are game-related.
Players often discuss various strange things here as well.
From social news to neighborhood gossip, to fishing spots, outdoor survival tips, and even marital and gender issues… there’s really no limit to the topics.
However, this post was submitted into the [New Game Preview] section.
Originally, it was just one of the many posts on the Whirlpool Forum that got quickly buried and disappeared without a trace every day.
Today, it suddenly caught fire because of the replies to the post.
Under the original post, the very first reply was from an anonymous account with no post history. It read-
“First, chop down trees, then build a house, and make a workbench…”
The reply was dated November 15th, last Friday.
At that time, Cloud Dream’s “My World” trailer hadn’t been released yet, and all information about the game was confidential.
So, technically speaking, this reply was a leak.
The person who replied was obviously one of the players who had received an invite to the closed beta of “My World” last Monday, and it was quite clear that-
He had violated Cloud Dream’s confidentiality agreement for the game.
This wasn’t an accidental leak, otherwise the person wouldn’t have deliberately used a newly registered, empty account to reply, and the post wouldn’t have appeared in the [New Game Preview] section – that’s just too coincidental!
This was the first time that a Cloud Dream game had been leaked by an “insider” in the true sense, and it was also the first time that a public breach of a Cloud Dream game’s confidentiality agreement had occurred.
At the time, the post didn’t attract much attention, and most people didn’t even click on it. Of those who did, they didn’t grasp the meaning of the reply.
In the end, the post quickly sank to the bottom of the forum and disappeared from everyone’s view.
It wasn’t until today, when Cloud Dream officially released the “My World” trailer, and two hours after players saw the tree-chopping and house-building scenes at the end, that the post was dug up again.
From then on, it was a sensation!
Players went wild with praise in the comments section:
“Bro, you’re awesome!”
“Why didn’t you say something sooner? Just reply to a few more posts and get this out there!”
“More! Give us more scoops!”
“That’s right, what about the game mechanics? Core gameplay? Anything, just tell us more!”
“Bro, you’re really something! An inspiration to us all!”
On the other hand, as these people praised the insider, they also went to Cloud Dream and Lincoln’s Spiritual Rhinoceros account to stir things up, saying there was a breach of contract and urging them to take action.
Just as fun-loving people should.
Mavis, who was always watching Lincoln’s comment section, noticed this issue first and immediately showed it to Lincoln.
“Mavis, you’re so clever!” Lincoln glanced at the post, praised Mavis, then went back to work without giving it a second thought.
If Lincoln wasn’t bothered, Mavis didn’t care either.
Apart from these two laid-back employees, the first to notice this issue at Cloud Dream was a female employee of the “My World” development team, Palace Poem.
She was also one of the veterans of Cloud Dream, having left NetDragon to join Cloud Dream with Fred in the past.
However, this girl didn’t have much ambition. She wasn’t interested in promotions or becoming a team leader. Little Chun suggested it multiple times, but she declined. All she wanted was to clock in and out on time as a “salty fish.”
Back then, many employees made huge profits from “Assassin’s Alliance” rewards, amounting to decades’ worth of normal earnings. Even now, they still get substantial dividends each month.
This led the more laid-back employees to live quite comfortably.
Although they still maintained quality and productivity in their work, and never stopped improving themselves, they felt it was necessary to keep up with the talented people around them so as not to be left behind.
Apart from this, they just did whatever made them comfortable.
Nobody worried about the boss giving them a hard time.
Lincoln was the kind of boss who started coming to work on time and left on time every day due to delays in the game release schedule, yet he never made the development team work overtime.
To the employees at Cloud Dream, seeing their boss Lincoln coming in and leaving work on time every day, working diligently throughout the day without slacking off, was quite a rare event. It was evidence enough that the work progress wasn’t going well, and everyone was facing immense tasks.
But the fact that he didn’t make everyone work overtime showed the true nature of the boss – of course, the boss himself didn’t work overtime either.
So Palace Poem was quite content in her role as a small-time employee – the kind with top-level salary and multiple dividends.
Recently, she had been making new friends during her study leave and having the time of her life.
Since today was the release of the “My World” trailer, Little Chun gave everyone half a day off as per Cloud Dream’s usual habit, with the excuse of paying attention to player feedback.
In reality, it was just a time for slacking off.
Palace Poem happily refused Little Chun’s promotion suggestion again – it was a promotion to take full charge of “My World’s” long-term operations in the future – and then she started slacking off and chatting with her new friends.
They were just talking about the game project she was working on at Cloud Dream, which was “My World.”
Before today, her friends only knew that she was developing a game at Cloud Dream but didn’t know the specific project.
Suddenly, one friend excitedly said, “A lot of people online are saying that a player violated the confidentiality agreement of the game you’re working on. Is that a problem?”
Palace Poem took a look and felt it was not a big issue. However, out of professional ethics, she went to inform Little Chun anyway.
“What’s wrong? Did you change your mind?” Little Chun was pleased.
“Give up on that idea.” Palace Poem rejected again, “I am determined to go and do Chang’an.”
“Forget about it for now, take a look at this.”
She pulled the post information from the panel and showed it to Little Chun.
Little Chun took a glance, didn’t care too much, and forwarded it directly to Samuel and Luke.
As a result, Samuel didn’t take it seriously either, replying, “Received, thanks,” and continued discussing the follow-up update plan for Hunter: Call of the Wilderness with the new operation group.
Only Luke, even though he didn’t think it was a big deal, seemed to have to deal with it properly as it fell within his scope of responsibility, so he went and found Lincoln.
After all, this was the first occurrence, a precedent, it was still necessary to ask the boss what to do.
Just as he expected.
When he found Lincoln, just mentioning “players violating the confidentiality agreement,” Lincoln directly interrupted: “I appreciate your hard work, but there’s no need to take it to court this time. I’ll handle it.”
With that, Luke left with peace of mind and continued fishing.
He had been quite idle since he set up the Legal Department.
Since then, Cloud Dream had not encountered any lawsuits, and the employees under his hands were more than capable of handling issues related to business cooperation. Only when there were big international cooperations would he get involved.
Just… quite idle.
Luke went fishing, while Lincoln continued to work on the Secondary Artificial Intelligence Core.
Samuel and Little Chun didn’t take it seriously either.
The most troubled person in the entire Cloud Dream was actually Palace Poem her new friend was constantly curious about how Cloud Dream was going to handle the situation.
She said she didn’t know.
Her new friend said, “Oh, I see, it’s because of the company’s regulations, right? Can’t talk about it until the final decision is made. I understand.”
“You don’t know shit!” Palace Poem muttered under her breath.
Of course, in the chat, she wouldn’t say that.
They had only been friends for a few days, so she had to be reserved and not use foul language…
No wonder these friends were curious. During Cloud Dream’s silence, the matter was getting more and more intense.
Perhaps the players, after watching the trailer and getting too excited, had nowhere to vent their excitement, so they caught on to this melon and took a bite, even pulling up the melon vine with it.
Soon, a bunch of game media also joined in the hype, competing to report the news:
“Mysterious insider breaches Cloud Dream’s trust!”
“First case of breach in virtual reality game industry!”
“A million-dollar worth post!”
“Which will come first, the next mole or Cloud Dream’s sanctions?”
The internet was buzzing, but Cloud Dream remained silent.
Players and media were baffled.
However, in the Spiritual Rhinoceros operation team’s office, the team leader had already given orders in advance: “Be prepared for a possible need for additional expansion at 4:30 or 4:50.”
Group members understood.
At 4:50 PM, there were only ten minutes left before Cloud Dream’s closing time.
Cloud Dream’s employees were basically finishing up their work and getting ready to leave.
Lincoln also put down his development work and turned his attention to dealing with this minor issue.
So the players, media, and Spiritual Rhinoceros operation staff who had been waiting for a response all afternoon finally got one
“Thank you all for your concern, but please stop tagging me; I’ve seen it.
This incident indeed violates the confidentiality agreement of the game, but I don’t intend to pursue it because I think it’s quite interesting.
Of course, to prevent all sorts of leaks in the future, I must clarify my attitude in advance:
If you can post something like this, completely leak the game without being discovered, and only be found out after we announce it, then it’s OK, Cloud Dream will not pursue it.
But if you are caught, then sorry, penalties start at 500,000.
And the game you leaked will be permanently closed to you.
How about that? Isn’t it interesting?
Do you want to take the challenge?”
Why is Lincoln so tolerant?
The reason is quite simple he thinks it’s fun this way.
Compared to a chilly lawsuit for compensation, isn’t it more fun to play a “real-life game” with players?
Anyway, it’s not the first or second time that Lincoln has been capricious; as long as the risk is controllable and the cost is acceptable, it’s just like spending money for fun.
Besides, just looking at this issue, whether or not the mole had this intention, objectively speaking, the person did help generate buzz for Cloud Dream and further promote the new game.
To Lincoln, this is a friendly gesture!