Chapter 18: Ignoring the Copycats

Idle Power's popularity has exploded since its official release. There have been more than ten million downloads since then, and hundreds of thousands of people are actively playing the game everyday. Fifty percent of them were even paying customers, with some of them being active donators when they felt unsatisfied at just supporting the game developer through the only in-app purchase in it.

This popularity hasn't slipped up the attention of other game companies. A few did some research, and they have estimated that, if the game used the same business model as most idle games in the market, it would have generated more than a hundred million dollars and possibly approached a billion. That kind of money couldn't be ignored by any company, regardless of if they were large or small.

So some of the companies tried copying the game. They already had access to its codes due to it being a free application with barely any black boxing in its program. They could see the entire skeleton of this app, and with it, they could analyze the data or even copy it in its entirety.

Most game companies in this age loved skipping out on all the hard work, doing the least amount of activity while still raking in the maximum amount of profits. So these companies didn't hesitate to copy the entire backend data of Idle Power and then put it in their own game.

Of course, they couldn't outright copy even its aesthetics. They might be able to hide the backend data in the eyes of the common consumer, but the face of the game itself couldn't be replicated without some serious repercussion. That would give the person they've been copying ammunition if they ever decided to settle their blatant plagiarizing in court, and along with that was the resentment of the people themselves. They had to change some things on the surface so it would look slightly different, and then they could enjoy the benefits the original source should have gotten.

Even if the developer of the game itself complained, people wouldn't know. It's also an indie game developer. Even if the original creator made a fuss, with them changing a few things, the original developer still had to gather evidence, coordinate with the relevant authorities, and then settle it in court. That would take months, time enough for them to have already accumulated millions before it got to that part. Their game might have already been taken off the platform before it got to the court, as they have no plans to actually sustain the game for that long. So they weren't really worried about Castro Games.

What they were concerned about was competition amongst themselves. Most game companies who dabbled in idle games knew that the others like them were aware of the profits they could gain from this game. They wanted to be the first to have their hands on the pie. Being late meant getting less money.

The very first one who managed to finish their ripoff was a company called GXL Game Studio. They made what they called the Superpower Idle. A complete ripoff of Idle Power and all of its functions. They just changed the name of the menus and some of the aesthetics, took out a lot of what they thought was unnecessary clutter, and even copied one of the stages on Idle Power as their own.

The team leader behind this blatant ripoff doesn't think much about Castro Games. He thought it was just an inferior game company, not having taken the time to actually analyze the game data itself and just leaving it all to his team. Even the publisher who greenlit this thought it was a simple matter, not thinking highly about the creator of the game itself and simply seeing the profitability in it.

With such arrogant mindsets, they demanded to put in what they thought were great additions. It was all out of incompetency, and the programmers and designers in charge of this ripoff could only obey. They couldn't complain. Doing so could possibly cut their already small salary. They simply worked day and night, replacing data with something of their own and putting their own clumsy designs on what was already a perfect one in the game's aesthetic.

In the end, it turned into a mess. At the first release of Superpower Idle, many immediately saw how atrocious it looked. Animation looked clunky as hell, and there were delays in the game's response. Their combat mode lagged a lot, and there were times the game just closed on its own, unable to handle the absolute garbage that was their messy code in its programming. The people who did these were having a headache, not knowing just where they went wrong.

Unlike Mike, an average programmer couldn't instantly spot the error in their code. They lacked the knowledge that Mike had, along with the talent to instantly discern what was causing bugs or delays in his game with just a single skim through the backend data.

A few days after this ripoff was released, the game was littered with negative reviews by the many players. Reviews came from both Idle Power gamers and casual players in general. It ranged from calling them out, calling their game garbage, and some even making rants about how shameless they were and the absolute flaming that could turn monks green.

But the team behind this ripoff doesn't care. They got the players, and along with it the profits they could gain from these players. GXL Game Studios has a lot of money, and they spend their time inserting this ripoff on ads and then earning money through intrusive ads they've put inside the game itself, along with other microtransactions that they inserted on every single feature it has. Whatever they spent on advertisements has quickly been covered by curious players who tried the game, unaware of the original one it ripped off; the players who knew it was a ripoff but still tried it; those who had no idea it was a ripoff and still spent money on it because they thought the game was different compared to others; and those who simply wanted to be ahead of others.

It couldn't be helped. Billions used Woogle Play. Hundreds of millions were casual players. Most of those casual players played idle games. Even a small portion of these idle game players downloading this ripoff was enough to cover whatever expenses they spent for this game. They weren't looking to sustain these players. Superpower Idle was simply a cash grab.

After a week of its release, they gained 800,000 dollars. It was natural due to their advertisements and with it being newly released. It has also been put on the front page for at least a day, having bought a spot for it so more people download it. After this week, their growth was dwindling, and they were already at the point where their playerbase was decreasing. It doesn't matter to them. The plan was simply to make the game, profit, and let the game stay for at least a few months before taking it off the platform.

It's the usual strategy of these publishers and game companies. They simply copy what they saw as profitable and don't care about the feelings of the players. So long as they earned something, everything was normal in the world. Other companies thought it would end the same. Just another novel idea that would be copied to death by other publishers.

The next week after GXL Game Studio released Superpower Idle, another ripoff titled Heroes vs Villains Idle Game was released by another publisher called Svelte Inc. Unlike Superpower Idle, this new ripoff game made a lot of aesthetic changes. It was now set in some futuristic setting, and the graphics became incredibly more simplistic. They took off the house lobby and put the starting point with the player character already fighting in a battlefield. All upgrades could be seen in a single section, and the entire UI was changed and simplified.

Of course, with these changes, despite using the same codes, the animation itself was wonky. It looked uncanny, as the player avatar always clipped through obstacles and their own equipment as if they weren't part of its body. The environment itself seemed to glitch randomly, and all the NPCs in the stage were all enemies. There was no alignment system or anything like it.

It was like Superpower Idle, who had also simplified their system somewhat, but this one turned out worse because their additions didn't fit with the animation sprites that they copied.

It still gained enough players that in the first week, they gained a million dollars. That's what happens when a game has a proper publisher and advertisements.

They have been flamed by the people, insulted, and review bombed negatively. It doesn't matter, as they gained a million before the month ends.

Other game companies who saw that stopped trying when they saw these two spinoffs. With them being late, they knew just pushing another copycat wouldn't earn them as much. Only a very few companies still stubbornly developed their own version of the game, as they were already nosedeep in its development and had spent a lot of money on it. Their eyes could only see the potential profits of a hundred million dollars.

Everyone in the industry thought it would be business as usual.

They didn't expect that copying the game would act as a free advertisement for the one they imitated.

"Good game concept, terrible execution. Is there anything like this one that is a lot better?"

"It's an idle game alright, but it's riddled with ads and a bunch of microtransactions. I can't even progress without having to pay, and powers are so hard to get!"

"I want a refund! Dammit, paying for the beginner pack is such a waste!"

"Unlocking new powers looks fun at first, but the constant ads popping out ruin it!"

"What the fuck are these packs!? Fifty bucks for disabling ads!? Why don't you just rob me then!?"

"Spending ten thousand bucks to get ahead of everyone felt so amazing at first. Then it gets boring after a few hours."

Those kinds of people threw their grievances and dissatisfaction on the air, sometimes airing it all out in public through their social media or in the review section. A group of people who were offended at the terrible copycat games took advantage of that, seeing these aggrieved customers.

"Hey, did you know Idle Power? It's where that Superpower Idle trash got its idea. Try it out; you'll never regret it!"

"If you're looking for something like that garbage Hero vs Villain, try Idle Power. It doesn't have ads, and it's free to play."

"Anyone can whale in Idle Power. There's a single pack in there that only costs a single buck. Try it now!"

"If you think it barely has any content, think again. You wouldn't be able to finish it all in one sitting! In fact, you'll have to play it for a few months before you even explore half of it!"

"It's a game with more content than AAA games. If you don't play Idle Power, you're missing out on life!"

With such persuasive power, and people generally being tired of the usual slop these game companies kept releasing, a lot were persuaded to try Idle Power, and it boosted the traffic of the game once more, reaching twenty million in downloads before May approached.

"Amazing! This is what I'm looking for!"

"Oh my god, there are so many things to unlock, and I can't stop playing!"

"Only a single pack? It's only a single buck, so whatever!"

"Traits! It looks more complete than those garbage ripoffs!"

"Castro Games is amazing!"

Praises flew from their mouths as they played the originator of those copycats. It was a hundred times better than the slops they release. It wasn't just unique but rather extremely nostalgic to many middle-aged people. Before 2014, the internet was still in its infancy. Games weren't that heavily monetized at that age. It made them feel like they returned back to their youth, when games were still free to play and they could do whatever they wanted without having ads they didn't care about shoved in their face.

With the new surge of players, the CGA server also gained new members in association with the game. Not just that, the few who became fans of Castro Games scoured through their account and learned about the new game the dev was going to release in the future.

The Wandering Guild suddenly gained hype.

____________________

Mike learned about the ripoff a week after their release, but he really doesn't care. Games couldn't be unique when they get released. It also wasn't really a concern to him. He's not making games to earn money. He was simply making it because it was his dream.

May had come. With the first week of this month, it was just time for him to update both CGA and Idle Power. So he did it.

Idle Power got a new stage, more powers, and more equipment on it, along with hundreds of new titles and traits. The millions of active players of this game were joyous at the update, praising him about his diligence and loyalty for always updating this game.

Though his mind wasn't really as focused on Idle Power as on CGA. Cute Girls Academy v0.3.0 got a huge amount of new content. First was the most eye-catching in this update. This update added 12 more new students to the roster.

Lady Bloodmare, the horsegirl who was turned into a vampire, became strong enough to become the new blood queen. Mino's third original character.

Cereal Kuroshi, a sleep-loving girl who has the power to inflict fatal damage to everything instantly. Mr. Red's second original character.

Ayanami Sumire, daughter of one of the seven descendants of Abe no Seimei. Lima's second original character.

Nega Asmidiel, one of the top class demons in the demon realm and servant of Lilith. DemonGod's second original character.

Shimmering Maiden, the priestess of the richest religious country in the world. Mimicry's second original character.

Ina Takodachi, a chill art student who has been hearing whispers from the old ones after she held a certain forbidden book, and has been spreading those whispers to the masses as the herald of the great old ones. Shork's second original character.

Excalibur, a girl who is the embodiment of a legendary european sword. Supremacy_Games_Master's original character.

Aeon, an elite superweapon android working for the last remaining human civilization. Etherium's original character.

Ichinose Wakase, an aspiring highschool idol in a world where the entertainment industry became incredibly competitive. Idolatry's original character.

Hildefar, Argosia's warrior companion. Desperado's second original character.

Amagami Yuna, a young streamer with aspirations of worldwide fame. Keyboard_Warrior's original character.

And Yuyu, a young laidback spirit who simply wants to roll around, sleep, and do nothing while spouting random poetry quotes. Allypop's original character.

With their implementation, there were 24 total students in the current version of CGA. Other than that update, there were the usual updates, like a new world on the mockup challenge, a new dungeon, new mobs in the exploration mode, new equipment, and then the biggest thing comparable to the twelve new students in the game—the three new game modes!

First was the most minor one, the game mode called Mock Exams. This game mode was an entire game in itself, as the game mode has many options, all of which were different types of subjects ranging from Science, Mathematics, History, Literature, Language, Arts, and Music. These subjects were further separated by grade levels, like preschool, elementary, middle school, high school, college, and doctorate levels.

For each subject on each grade level, there were ten thousand questions saved within the database that the core system could randomly choose from, putting ten, twenty, thirty, fifty, or one hundred questions in a single session depending on what the player chose. Players could only attempt three sessions in a day and would have to wait for the next day if they wanted to try again. Their rewards depend on how much they scored on all of their sessions on that day, along with the chosen grade level of that session. It included pages in the rewards if they attempted college or doctorate levels in their sessions.

It was quite easy for Mike to put those questions in the game's database. Information is free on the internet after all.

There was also the endless mode in the Mock Exams, which mixed all of the saved questions in each grade and subject into that single session. Though, unlike the normal session, in which players could skip questions or get something wrong without ending it so long as they hadn't answered the entire ten, twenty, thirty, fifty, or one hundred questionnaire exam they chose, this one forced them to get everything right. A single mistake would end the session as soon as possible. Their score also depends on the difficulty and amount of questions they answered correctly.

Of course, the rewards also depend on their score in the endless mode. This was actually the original version of the Mock Exam, but Mike felt it would be too dull, so he added his own twist to it.

Next was Defense Simulation. A new game mode that has the same gameplay as Archbishop. It was a tactical tower defense game mode where the player has a limited number of students they could take with them depending on their unit capacity. Deployment and retreating (taking off a unit on a grid) were also implemented, which made it resemble the game it was referencing. The only thing different from its origin was that, just like the other game modes, the player could change the skills of their students to their other skills. Their entire skill was also linked to the other game modes.

Mike already had the resources for those skills. He simply had to reuse them and convert some of them so they don't look uncanny in this mode.

Finally, the third mode. It was actually the one he had been holding for a long time due to the lack of content in the game.

Story Mode!

This game mode is the main story for the players themselves.

Story mode told the story of the player and the main student or group of students as they visit their world and the events that happened there that would greatly affect their lives. It might sound weird because the player avatar was blatantly inferred to be a higher entity, but there was a lore reason how other worlds that were supposedly weaker than them could affect them.

They became weak!

With a flimsy reason like "the Principal is greatly affected by the rules of the other worlds and cannot exert any of their powers," it opened up conflict and struggles for the characters to grow. He couldn't just let the player character solve every problem of the student. The entire premise of the game, where the players use students, would become nonsense if that was the case. They have to become a nonentity that only protects the students with their passive effect of causing everything to be nonlethal, and nothing more. Otherwise, character arcs wouldn't matter.

It fits with the theme of the story and doesn't break the lore that much. That's what Mike reasoned to himself, even if he knew how lame the excuse was.

Currently, there's only a single story mode in the game. It's called Shirocc's Story, a story dedicated to Shirocc's first OC, Anubis. This story mode focused on the Principal's perspective and their adventure to Anubis' world, as she wished to visit the world she had destroyed with the awakening of her divinity. That was the basic premise of this story.

As to why it was named after the author themselves, Mike has a reason for it. He has already said it in the server, and the others actually found it interesting that they decided to implement it within the story. This interesting idea was that the authors of each character were actual, higher entities who shaped the world these students originated from. Their appearance, behavior, and history were all molded by these higher entities and turned them into what they were. Of course, the authors wouldn't be shown at all, only alluded to in the game itself.

Each story mode was divided into arcs. Each arc was then separated into chapters. The first arc has already been finished in the server, but in the game Mike only managed to put a quarter of the story in the arc. There were a total of forty-one chapters in the first arc, and only ten chapters have been put in Shirocc's first arc.

Story mode was featured in a visual novel game style with a linear storyline. Mike was in charge of the main story, and because he was quite busy and also didn't want to disgust players with multiple endings, he simply turned it into a linear storyline. It also made it easier for him to make a consistent narrative if it only followed a single plot. CGA players weren't really a fan of multiple endings either, as they mostly wanted to play the game and read the story moderately. Doing one thing more than the other made them quickly burn out. It was evident to most of their players, who stopped being competitive in the mock arena on the mockup challenges.

Anyway, despite being in charge of the main story, the authors of each world have input on how the story would generally go. Every character he used in the main story would have the approval and input of their creators. He also reviewed their documents, fun facts, and most of their archived roleplay events in the roleplay channels of the server, which gave him more context on how they would act as he wrote the story.

He actually preferred putting the entire arc in one go but couldn't due to one reason.

They lacked voice!

The first ten chapters of Shirocc's first arc were fine not having any voice because they simply showed Anubis' life at the academy, the students she became friends with, the Principal's life since establishing the academy and accepting from different dimensions, and what they were doing. Chapters 9 and 10 were simply teasers of the world Anubis 'originated from and a teaser of the inhabitants of this world. Nothing important has happened yet, so even without voice it was fine.

The latter parts of the story, mostly the climax he planned for it, wouldn't be impactful if it didn't have a voice. He needed those voice-acted before he put them in the game. He wanted to give his players the best experience they could get in his game.

Going back on topic, these were the three game modes that have been added to the game. With the newly added students and these new game modes, every other detail that has been added to the game, like new equipment, new mobs, stages, and the like, was ignored as players focused on them. They were incredibly ecstatic at having such a bulky update.

Mike was happy but was also worried at the rate this was going.

'If this goes on, it will take me decades before I can even get to the meat of this game!'

He had many plans for CGA, and being stuck due to the pace the voice acting was going made him dissatisfied.

It was an irrational thought. Being dissatisfied at this pace despite having made such speedy updates was the peak of arrogance. He should be happy he got to this point by his lonesome.

But Mike doesn't care. By getting his powers, he knew he could do more than this.

"I think I'll have to do that then..."

It would be an insult to his friends, but the pace was truly behind his own self-imposed schedule. He still has many he wanted to cram in his lifetime as much as he could.

So he just has to do it.

____________________

"You want to use AI for our voices?" Catherine tilted her head, confusion evident in her gaze.

"Yeah." Mike said somberly. "As things stand, no one can keep up with the speed of my update. It will take years before anyone can catch up to the latest ones."

Catherine frowned, a bit hurt but also understanding about what he was saying. It's the truth. The new game modes didn't have any voices yet. The only ones they managed to voice last month were some of the bond stories, including the new ones. As for her, she just completed the new tutorial script for Phantasmic. They haven't touched the extra stories or character stories yet.

Then Mike told her there would be two new game modes again in the next update. The pace he was pumping out this content was leaving them in the dust. They couldn't just find other voice actors and give some of their roles to them. The voices of those students have already been cemented by their voices. Changing it now would cause the server to be weirded out. Some might also become disappointed if that happened.

Even if they wouldn't, and they tried to be understanding, Catherine herself doesn't want to let go of her role. She has already projected herself in those roles. It felt like giving something she owned to some stranger if she gave up on those roles.

There was that solution of reusing voice lines from other game modes for the new game modes, but Mike doesn't want that. He wanted the voice lines to fit the game modes. It would be weird if a student suddenly said something combative while they were just doing a mock exam, or if a student said something like their base was in danger when they were diving in a dungeon. Mike wouldn't actually do that if he ever tried reusing voice lines, but he doesn't want to reuse anything at all as much as he can.

"... I'll tell the others then."

In the end, after some discussion, the others also accepted his suggestion and decided that they would also let him use their voices for the AI software he was developing behind the scenes.

"But... what should we do about this then?" Elly gestured to the studio itself.

Thanks to Fernandez, this new studio now has employees that know what they are doing. Voice coaches, sound operators and technicians, and other minor staff like janitors were all chosen carefully after Fernandez checked the hundreds of applicants in this studio.

If he was going to use AI, then there would be no need for them to voice at all. The AI could just do it themselves.

"Actually... I have a new game that I want you to voice."

Feeling that it was the right time, Mike decided to tell them about The Wandering Guild.

"You only need to voice some of the characters. There won't be any central plotline in the game itself, so there's no need for voicing every single line in the game."

Mike has been working on it within his mind lately. The game, unlike CGA, wouldn't need too much voice acting. The main gameplay was always about his version of JRPG. Those would need voices. The scrambled narrative on the world itself could simply be written without voicing anything from it. Even if it was an open-world game, without following any storyline at all, voices weren't needed for the NPCs. He could just limit them to one or two voice lines, but no more so he could focus on the game itself.

"A standalone game, and it's not free? Sure, I'm in!" Catherine quickly said.

She would be reluctant if it was free once more. The quality of Mike's games was so high that not profiting from it felt so wrong. With Mike telling them that the game would actually be sold on the platform, she felt she had to help him.

The others weren't against this either. So long as they could voice act in a game, they would go along with it.

"Oh, and we're going to add tagalog voices in this game too."

The others were surprised when they heard that but quickly relented. It was natural Mike would add that. He was a Filipino game developer. Promoting their language to the wider world shouldn't be that surprising. CGA was different because Mike wanted it to be a game for otakus. This one was a game that, while still having that anime-style feeling in it, wouldn't focus that much on anything related to otaku culture.

"Okay, let's immediately start rehearsing for the lines."

Mike's words made them confused. Seeing their confusion, Mike smiled as he raised his phone. On the screen of his phone were the scripts he has already written for his new game.

"I made the script already. I only need the voice so I can start putting it in the game."

"... Seriously!?" Catherine exclaimed, surprised.

They felt they had underestimated Mike's obsession with his games. He wasn't in the planning phase. He was already in the development phase!

'This guy really...' Catherine sighed internally.

She felt like Mike was working too hard, but she really couldn't say anything. She still didn't know how Mike could work so fast. They have seen him develop his games a few times, and they still couldn't wrap their heads around it when the screen just blurred around while he operated his keyboards and mouse without hesitation. All of his movements were calculated and precise. He just used different types of shortcuts and presets to instantly finish any illustration, string of codes, sound design, or even entire level design. They wondered just what possessed him that he could do such impossible feats easily.

____________________

With their consent, Mike resumed developing the AI software when he came back home. This AI software would be implemented directly on the game system itself.

With his programming skills that have reached beyond what master programmers of this age could achieve, he managed to easily create one. He already has experience with self-learning AI and generative AI due to Idle Power. Translating that knowledge into software for machine reading didn't take him a day. The problem after that was tuning them so they would sound natural.

"No, not this. It sounds too robotic."

The first day of its implementation was met with a lot of hardships. He kept changing a lot of codes, optimizing them, and tuning them for an entire day. The next day, he managed to make things right, but the result was that the voice doesn't have emotion in it at all. The tone of the voice also became ambiguous as to whether the one speaking was a man or a woman.

"I have to use the recorded voices and let this AI learn about it."

The next thing he did was make sure the AI recognized the tone, pitch, and inflection of the voice actors who had offered their voices to the game. Surprisingly, this took him an entire day before he managed to perfect it.

"Great! Now they're speaking with just the help of this system!"

With the integrated AI system, all of the lines that hadn't been voiced yet acquired their voices. He was ecstatic at first.

Then, while he was in the middle of testing them all, he found out something was wrong.

"... No! That's not the right emotion!"

They might have perfected the intonation for both English and Japanese voices on the script, but it still lacks the emotion. Instead of voice acting, it felt like the AI was just reading the script or singing it. He shook his head, quickly moving to the codes and trying to find what else he could do.

"... Well, it seems like I'll have to do it the harder way then."

He was hoping the AI could understand each script and act accordingly, but he realized he overestimated what it could do. So he changed tactics.

He wouldn't just make an AI system that could read script. He would also integrate a subsystem that could understand emotional depth in each script and feed that to the AI, which would hopefully change how the AI read the script.

Mike was unaware that he was making what might be the most revolutionary AI technology. In his mind, he was simply making a system to add more quality and depth to his game.

He was struggling right now, but Mike knew he wouldn't need a month before he was done with the system.