"Overseas publishing for Dark Souls?"
Listening to Lisa's report, Lucas nodded to show he understood.
The one who reached out was a well-known domestic overseas publishing agency: Target Software.
Clearly, as a large-scale PC game, Dark Souls had caught the eye of overseas publishers.
While Nebula Games hasn't announced sales numbers, some third-party data companies have done estimates.
They might not be exact, but they're a useful reference.
And since Dark Souls is a fantasy-themed game, it'll also have a large audience in the overseas market.
As for the difficulty? That's not really a big issue.
Whether at home or abroad, there are players who like fast and easy games, and there are those who love hardcore challenges.
Plus, in terms of sheer numbers, the overseas market is much bigger.
"Reply to them and set up a meeting to talk about this cooperation," Lucas told Lisa.
It's not that easy to handle overseas publishing. Back then, when Mirror went online overseas, it was just on the company's own platform abroad, basically just a simple re-skin.
But for a big game like Dark Souls, you obviously can't take that approach.
And "overseas" doesn't mean just one country—it involves multiple countries, plus all kinds of channels for game promotion and marketing.
Things like reviews, advertising, and compliance all have to be handled by the publishing agency.
On top of that, some countries have regulations that require overseas games to go through a local publishing company before entering the market.
If Nebula Games tried to build those channels themselves, there's no way they could pull it off in the short term.
They do plan to create their own overseas operations later on, but for now, finding a strong publishing partner is clearly the best way to maximize profit.
Lisa was told to inform the other side, and by the next afternoon, in Nebula Games' office, Lucas met with their representative.
At the meeting table, the two sides talked about matters related to overseas publishing.
"Lucas, we have no issue with the revenue share, but about the changes to the overseas version and the operating rights…" the representative said.
But Lucas cut him off with a wave of his hand: "That's non-negotiable."
Hearing that, the other party swallowed the words that were about to come out.
On everything else—like overseas marketing and operations, revenue share, and so on—the discussion went very smoothly.
Basically, it all followed the industry standard.
The only sticking point was the overseas version changes and operating rights.
The partner company wanted some say in those areas, but Lucas was very clear: their role was only to handle overseas publishing, translation, dubbing, and using their channels to promote the game and ensure it goes online. Then they get their cut, and that's it. Any control over the game itself? Forget it.
Put simply, operating modification rights mean something like this: Dark Souls is a pure single-player game sold at a fixed price, with multiplayer as an extra.
But if the publishing company had the rights, they could decide to switch it to a free-to-play model with in-app purchases, thinking it fits the local market better. For example, making the game free, with a "first purchase bonus" like $1 for a +4 Dark Sword at the start.
Of course, that's an exaggerated example—no game company would usually hand over that much control. Normally, it's about negotiating certain profit-related elements.
The tricky part for the partner was that Lucas clearly wasn't willing to give even a little bit of that power.
"Lucas, on this matter, it's not something I can decide," the representative said with a shake of his head after seeing Lucas stand firm.
Lucas smiled and nodded: "That's fine. I just hope your company can give me an answer soon. After all, there are a few other overseas publishers interested as well."
True or not? Believe it or not—it wasn't his problem.
......
After sending off the representative, Lucas logged into Nebula Games' official forum.
Thanks to the player base from Legends of the Three Kingdoms and Fall Guys, once Dark Souls and its discount event launched,
Nebula Games saw a peak in player activity.
Lucas also took the company's community forum very seriously and had even set up a dedicated department to manage it independently.
After all, when the Nebula Games platform didn't have many games in the early days, running the forum in this social style was one of the best ways to keep users engaged.
And looking at the results, it's starting to pay off.
In the Dark Souls section of the forum, players are still mainly talking about strategies, play styles, and different tricks.
What made Lucas happy, though, was that the Workshop they opened earlier already has some players making mods.
The most downloaded one is a text mod that changes "You Died" after death to "You Suck."
There are also some sound mods that replace the creepy sounds in the underground prison.
Of course, all mods allowed through the official Workshop are ones that don't affect game balance.
If players don't use the Workshop, they need to back up a separate save file and play offline.
Otherwise, if they go online, the system will detect it, mark it as cheating, and put them on special servers.
But there was one mod discussion thread that caught Lucas' attention.
Since Dark Souls has Workshop support, this thread was full of players brainstorming wild ideas about what cool mods might appear in the future.
Though many people in the discussion haven't even figured out the base game yet—forget finishing it, some haven't even reached the castle, still saying things like, "I just beat the big tree, am I close to the end?"
That didn't stop them from imagining fun ideas for Dark Souls.
One suggestion Lucas found interesting was: what if all the bosses and mobs in Dark Souls were completely randomized?
For example, in the Cemetery of Ash, instead of facing Iudex Gundyr with the coiled sword, you'd run into Champion Gundyr from the Untended Graves. That would be intense.
Or changing boss weapons—like if Gundyr's halberd disappeared, and he had to fight using only kicks, palm strikes, and shoulder charges. How cool would that be?
Most ideas were completely over the top and impossible to make, but they did give Lucas some thoughts.
(End of The Chapter)
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