Chapter 93 - #93: You Are the Horror!

[TN: Insert ‘Another one’ meme]

Ethan casually scrolled through Twitter and left a comment under his own studio’s official announcement.

[Nova: A pure horror game. Here I come. Are you ready?]

Almost immediately, the official Sprout Studio account replied to his comment.

[Sprout Studio: You ARE the horror!]

The social media manager had directly pinned Ethan’s comment and their own sassy reply to the top of the thread. Seeing the official studio account openly roast its own boss, the global player base laughed like crazy.

LordEmil: The PR guy knows he can speak facts because Nova’s track record literally speaks for itself lmao. Let the man cook!

xX_DoomBringer_Xx: Nova fanboys hyping up a PNG announcement again. He made one dark fantasy game and now suddenly he’s the king of horror? Be for real.

Andreas: “Bloodborne was mostly action” bro did you even walk through Upper Cathedral Ward with headphones on??? My soul left my body.

SaltMiner_TTV: It’s literally just gonna be cheap jumpscares and walking simulator mechanics. Calling it right now, total overhype.

Deepwood: People doubt Nova every single cycle without fail, and every single time he delivers a generational masterpiece.

clown_detector: Watch the gameplay just be running away from monsters in dark hallways like every other indie horror game since 2014 lol.

NicoGab: If Nova says he’s making a pure horror game, I am buying extra pairs of pants right now. The atmosphere alone is going to ruin us.

giga_skeptic: “Scalp tingle” over an announcement teaser… the dickriding in this chat is reaching critical levels.

kindred: Honestly let the skeptics keep talking, it just makes the eventual launch day meltdowns ten times funnier to watch.

Right after Sprout Studio officially announced their entry into the bounty challenge, the crowdsourced prize pool absolutely skyrocketed. In just two days, the total amount breached the maximum goal of $15 million.

And even after hitting the massive target, the number in the escrow account was still steadily climbing.

[ Syl: That’s just the power of Sprout Studio. When Nova actually enters the arena, the whales don’t hesitate for a single second. IamUgoH: The poor campaign host is probably staring at his screen wondering what kind of eldritch entity he just summoned into existence lmaooo. NoRest: “Worth the trauma” is an understatement. If that pool doubles, we aren’t just getting a horror game, we’re getting a direct ticket to therapy. Pandopa: Fierce is an understatement! Every extra dollar is another heart attack waiting for us, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. shroud: Honestly, I don’t even care if Sprout Studio takes the entire $15 million. I just know that if Nova gets that money, he’s just going to funnel it right back into making an even crazier game for us. ]

Ethan’s dramatic entry into the competition didn’t make the rest of the industry back down. On the contrary, after the news broke that Sprout Studio was participating, the number of developers announcing their own entries only increased.

Some mid-tier studios wanted to find an opportunity to succeed in a genre Sprout Studio hadn’t fully dominated yet. Some indie devs just wanted to make a decent horror game to siphon some of the massive online traffic. And some massive corporate publishers just wanted to exploit the hype to push a quick cash-grab game and boost their quarterly earnings.

What had started as a sarcastic crowdfunding joke by an ordinary gamer had suddenly mutated into a major, industry-defining event.

With the $15 million cap officially collected, the campaign was a complete success. The escrow would remain open, but the core objective was locked in.

Looking at the official roster of registered game studios, there were already twenty different companies stepping up to the plate.

And among them was Wraithworks—an old-school, veteran studio widely considered the undisputed king of the survival horror genre.

[ snoopdog: Oh shit, the stakes are getting higher. DJenkins: A real challenge for Nova! Aidanas: I mean, they had to participate, right? If you’re literally the industry leader in horror, you can’t just ignore a $15 million horror bounty. crazyGamma: Wraithworks vs Sprout Studio. This is actually so interesting. If Wraithworks backs down, Nova easily wins the bounty and steals their crown. But if they participate and lose to a newcomer… they lose their entire reputation. HorrorPurist_99: The only advantage Wraithworks has is that if they win, they cement their legacy forever. As long as they beat Nova here, no matter how big Sprout Studio gets in the future, they’ll always be second place in the horror genre. ]

The gaming community quickly analyzed the pros and cons of the turf war, and everyone easily reached the exact same conclusion.

This horror bounty challenge had appeared far too abruptly. The major publishers definitely hadn’t prepared for it.

The meteoric rise of Sprout Studio had been overwhelmingly aggressive, but up until now, they had only focused on brutal action platformers and Soulslikes.

Because of that, their development pipeline hadn’t directly conflicted with the other niche genre leaders. But there had always been speculation among the players. Forums were constantly filled with threads asking: What kind of masterpiece would Nova make if he tackled an FPS? What if he made a strategy game?

At first, the legacy studios didn’t take those hypothetical forum posts seriously. But the second Sprout Studio officially announced their horror game, the reality set in.

The developers at Wraithworks were completely dumbfounded. The undisputed king of the action genre was actually stepping onto their turf?

The players’ analysis was spot on. That was exactly why the veteran studio had entered the fray.

As a massive, specialized company, they knew perfectly well that if they wanted to maintain their monopoly on the horror genre, they had to crush Nova right now, before he fully established a foothold in their territory.

If Sprout Studio won this bounty, then no matter how powerful Wraithworks became in the future, they would always be viewed as second best.

It was a massive crisis, but it was also a golden opportunity.

It was incredibly clear that Ethan’s ambitions were not small. The storm he was generating was going to sweep through every single corner of the gaming industry.

‘This year is getting seriously lively!’ Many veteran players couldn’t help but feel emotional. Before this ruthless developer emerged, the entire game design industry had been totally stagnant. The massive publishers like Titan Interactive just pumped out the same recycled, mediocre garbage year after year to fool the players.

But after Nova arrived on the scene, he had single-handedly forced the entire industry to evolve.

Since he started dropping masterpiece after masterpiece, the baseline quality of new games had noticeably skyrocketed.

Because the other publishers finally realized a terrifying truth: if they didn’t show the players genuine quality and respect, no one was going to buy their games anymore.

“Brothers, this is so fucking cool!” Silver yelled into his microphone. After reading the latest crowdfunding update, he had immediately transferred $3,000 of his own streaming revenue straight into the prize pool.

It wasn’t a massive corporate sponsorship, but it was his way of showing Sprout Studio a little support.

“We are honestly living in the golden age of gaming. When my kid grows up, I’m going to make him play every single one of Nova’s games from start to finish.”

The chat found his parental threats hilarious.

[ xQc: My kid secretly bought a $100 skin in a battle royale, so I grounded him and uninstalled the game. Chat, did I do the right thing? Logan67: Those predatory gacha games have crazy microtransactions, but it’s awesome that Nova doesn’t care about that vain shit. GachaWalletVictim: Begging a dev to add lootboxes… the brain rot is actually terminal with you people. KyubiUzu: Bro, if you want to give him money, just donate to the bounty pool! Nova is guaranteed to take first place anyway. I just dropped $500 into the pot to support him. ]

“Alright boys, enough about the horror game. The real hunt is about to start!” Silver said, aggressively rubbing his hands together as he stared at his Steam library. theHunter: Call of the Wild was finally unlocking.

“I’ve been watching DaddyHunt’s stream for weeks, and I can finally get out into the woods myself,” Silver complained, letting out a heavy sigh of relief. “After all the hours I spent backseating him, I practically consider myself a veteran hunter already…”

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If you’re a human, drop a stone. If you’re an alien, drop yourself from space and free humanity.