Mingyan and Varian sat down in the living room and talked face to face for half an hour.
Mingyan is a straightforward person. He said right away, "I hope to hire you as the art designer of Blue Star Studio, to be in charge of the art work for our next game project."
After hearing this, Varian's beard twitched, and he said, "Your studio doesn't have only one graphic designer, do you?"
He stated frankly, "Actually, Blue Star Studio currently only has me as the sole employee."
Varian: "..."
He added, "I've only ever released one successful indie game."
Varian looked up at the ceiling, took a deep breath, and was about to explode.
Suddenly, his wife came out of the kitchen, carrying two cups of hot water, and said with a smile, "I'm sorry, we only have hot water at home right now."
Varian sat up straight in an instant and raised his hand, saying, "Please continue."
A moment later, his wife, not wanting to interrupt their conversation, left the living room again.
Varian slumped down instantly, collapsing into his chair like a slug, and said weakly, "You're the only one with such poor capital who dares to come to my door and try to sell me something worthwhile..."
Mingyan smiled slightly and said, "I haven't finished yet. Before making a decision, I hope you can have a comprehensive understanding of Blue Star Studio."
Before he could finish speaking, Varian said desperately, "Please, please don't talk to me about ideals—my ideal is to eat all I want and not work! Please don't talk to me about the future of the game industry in Sixth Star Province—it has absolutely nothing to do with me! Please don't talk to me about future profits and revenue sharing—in seven or eight years, your kind of small studio will probably have gone bankrupt by now!"
A triple dose of despair.
Mingyan's lips twitched: "It sounds like what you've been through these past few years is quite pitiful."
"Hehehe..." Varian let out a miserable laugh and covered his face with his hands.
Mingyan took two contracts out of his bag, placed them on the table, and handed them to Varian.
"I'm not here to talk about ideals," Ming said.
Well, his ideal is to shower others with compliments, but he just can't bring himself to say it...
He stated clearly, "Let's talk about money first. I have two contracts prepared here: one is a service contract, and the other is an employment contract. For the former, I will order your order based on my needs at a 20% markup on the market price. For the latter, you will become a member of Blue Star Studio, with an annual salary that is 10% higher than your previous salary—this can be discussed further. In addition, 10% of the profits after the project goes live will be directly distributed as bonuses to the developers based on their performance."
It was decisive and efficient, without any hesitation.
Varian suddenly straightened up, and his eyes widened in surprise.
He picked up two documents from the table and fell into deep thought.
Then he stated explicitly, "Now let's talk about this project."
He explained the next game he was going to play to Varian, who nodded repeatedly.
Varian had worked for a well-known outsourcing company for the past few years, and a large part of his work involved contracts with game companies, so he had some knowledge in this area.
Mingyan then discussed the job requirements for the art designer position at Blue Star Studio, which can be simply described as: doing everything.
The only two people we can confirm for the next project right now are these two.
To put it bluntly, the team consists of architect, programmer, sound engineer, tester, and technical artist.
Varian, Art Designer + UI Designer + Tester.
After hearing this, Varian slumped back into his chair.
After a long pause, he said, "Excuse me for being frank, but I don't see a future for this project, nor for Blue Star Studio... I can't just accept this job because the annual salary seems attractive! What if you... no, your funding chain breaks down halfway through and leave me there? What am I supposed to do?"
He spoke very honestly, stating frankly that he felt it was no wonder he had conflicts with the previous company's senior management... Leaders who withhold employee stock options are probably not as cunning as a pinhead.
Mingyan thought for a moment and said, "Please be sure to check out Minecraft, produced by Blue Star."
Upon hearing this, Varian said, "A new game? I don't play games much."
Mingyan smiled slightly and said, "You can learn more and experience it before making a decision."
Varian was skeptical and remained silent.
Having said everything that needed to be said, Mingyan, not one to procrastinate, took his leave on the spot.
After he left, Varian's wife went back to the living room.
Varian discussed it with her.
As soon as she heard the words "Minecraft," his wife exploded: "My God! He's the genius creator of Minecraft! The game I play every night, and you still don't know its name?!"
Varian: "..."
The next day was very miserable for him.
While I was reading the news, my wife was scrolling through social media next to me: "Aaaaaah! Minecraft has broken into the top 100 of the IPP leaderboard! Go, little blue planet!"
While I was in the bathroom, my wife was outside trying to brainwash me: "Honey, that architect is so talented, and he thinks so highly of you. I think you should give it a try. If you could help us make a game as good as Minecraft, wouldn't that be a huge success?"
Unable to bear it any longer, Varian retreated to the kitchen to cook.
His wife followed him in while he was chopping vegetables: "Wal, I'm serious, we're almost out of money for groceries. How about we find a job for now? That job with a five-hundred-thousand-dollar annual salary looks really tempting..."
Varian said despairingly, "Okay, I'll think about it and try out the game first."
His wife followed him happily into the home game room, diligently putting his glasses on while chattering away, "Great, you're finally willing to play with me. I'm still missing a set of diamonds, could you also find two more sheep? I've already built half of the sheep farm, you should go explore the map..."
Six hours later.