ShangriLa Frontier ~ Shitty Games Hunter Challenges Godly Game ~

One fateful day, you have inadvertently decided to launch the mysterious game “Curse of Eternity” that got installed into your Full Dive VR system without your permission or knowledge. And as a result of this reckless action, you have been trapped inside of the game’s world, trapped inside of the cyber space completely out of the blue!

You cannot possibly hope to log out. As it turns out, when you happen to die inside of the game’s world, it would also mean that your real body back in the real world would die as well. The only way in which you can hope to survive is to actually challenge the game and clear it from the beginning all the way until the end. But there is also a catch here: only ten players can hope to survive the death game and return back to the real world.

In this dark and brutal world, you can’t trust anyone and even your fellow players turn into vicious enemies. Now, rise up! Take up your arms! Fight your way through the world and break free from the shackles of the curse of eternity ––––––!!!

* * *

After that conversation at school and the message from Takeda-san, I went straight back home after parting ways with Rei-san. Also, for some strange reason, Rei-san seemed to have bugged out, as her movements were looking strangely stiff and robotic. Could it be that she was this excited to try out that new game we were just talking about? Sometimes it is honestly difficult for me to discern what Rei-san might be thinking.

But anyways, once I got home I went straight to my room and started to download the demo version of the game straight into my gamin chair, a device I have now become completely accustomed to ever the past couple of weeks. And while the demo version of Death Game Rebellion Online! was still downloading, I decided to utilize that time to learn something more about it and well as its creators.

「Hmm, I see…… Not too shabby, I guess. So they are trying to aim for something like that, huh……?」

Death Game Rebellion Online is a game currently being developed by an indie studio with a decent amount of people currently on board. Actually, some of those people seem to be the ones who used to make blockbuster RPGs from the era when VR googles and VR technology in general was only starting to spread its wings. So they were already on the market before the era of Full Dive VR games, huh? I see. And judging by the company’s profile, their business model is to crowdfund their project and even get other indie artists involved with their works. And with every single year the scale of their projects have been growing larger and larger.

When it comes to a crowdfunding business model, if you fail to amass the amount of money that you have estimated, the game development won’t be able to proceed forward and the final product is never going to see the light of day. However, if everything goes according to plan, then you will get a start dash that accelerates with a speed of a nitro boost all at once. Well, and if you happen to make a mistake, that is…… Well, it is really the most pathetic feeling in the entire world.

「There is no option to play in Co-Op…… Ahh, but you can call people over?」

At first I thought that it was supposed to be a normal strategy game, but…… there is still that online premise, and above all else, it was made to intentionally allow external collaboration…… So maybe, it’s going to be like this.

「For the time being, let’s just Full Dive and see how it is with our own eyes.」

Is it going to be an action type game in which the player starts to take actions right of the bat, instead of watching a prologue or an introduction movie? But after making a Full Dive I have found myself in a space that looked just like my room. Full Dive inside of a Full Dive? …… It feels strange, but at the same time kind of interesting.

Moreover, this is an old type of Full Dive system, isn’t it? The early wired connection type. I see, could it be that the premise of this game is using this old-school type of setting because of its roughness? Or maybe it’s because they tended to be pretty glitch and prone to break up? I guess it’s all part of a setting, huh…… At least it’s good to know that the developers are taking the world-building part into serious consideration. Little things like that certainly allow the player to feel immersed in the world of the game and its story much more than other titles.

「Hmm, I think it’s okay to go with the flow for now, huh……?」

And so I went with the flow of the story: I have found out that I can’t log out of the game, I have been notified that the death game has now officially begun, the other players (NPCs) around me started to make some real noise, I have been sent to a separate safe area for the time being…… And since this is a trial beta version of the game, things were really progressing fast here.

By the way, when I came to the designated safety area ……… I searched for the Call application from the connected mobile terminal, booted it up and chose Rei-san as my desired address…… Oh, and what do you know? I actually managed to get my call through!

「Ah, ahhh. Umm, hello?」

「Y-Yes!? Hello!?」

Yes, hello hello. Now that we have tested it out, it seems that the corresponding app is working as intended, which is actually a good thing.

That being said, since this is a beta version, you can make calls, but it seems that the option to join your friends is actually kind of buggy and difficult to use properly. Apparently, it’s a half-tutorial at first…… First, let’s clear the area where you don’t encounter other players online, and then the players will be sent to the same place in the next stage. That’s the gist of it so far.

「First of all, thank you for agreeing to do this with me today, Rei-san, even though you didn’t have to…… Umm, is it okay for me to call you Rei-san in here?」

「It’s…… It’s no problem, think nothing of it! I was also kind of interested in this game, so I am actually really grateful that we can play it together like that right now!」

Oohh, it seems that Rei-san is really enthusiastic about this game as well. I am also sure that Takeda-san I going to welcome the input of someone who represents a sort of neutral ground in here. Since I am actually evaluating this game under the assumption that it is a shitty game, I’m afraid that my judgment might actually be somewhat biased in here. And that way we can verify and compare our respective observations.

「For the time being, let’s just proceed forward while exchanging information. That should be the most effective way to go about this thing.」