Outside the company, discussions about this new studio were everywhere.The focus was mainly on two things: Lorenzo, and the fact that more than a hundred million dollars had been invested.
As for the game producer himself, he had almost faded into the background.
Many self-proclaimed "industry professionals" launched wave after wave of analyses across various media outlets.
They dissected everything—from the company's capital reserves, to the résumé of the core producer "Mr. Nintendo," to the size of the development team.
Their final conclusion?
This company probably wouldn't make much money.
Even if it did, it would likely take decades just to break even.
Investing several hundred million dollars like this was, in their view, a bad deal.
Most of these so-called professionals were really just hinting to other capital tycoons: invest in me instead. They claimed to have more potential than Nintendo, more experience developing large-scale games, and ready-made teams—unlike Nintendo, who had to scramble just to assemble staff.
And on top of that, rumors said that over half of the people they hired were fresh graduates.
Just that?
A company like this, boldly claiming from the start that it would make a large-scale game?
It was enough to make people laugh out loud.
As for the battle royale genre itself—so far, no company had really made money from it.A brand-new company stepping in and talking about profitability right away just sounded ridiculous.
While the outside world was full of doubt, inside the newly founded Nintendo company, things were calm.
The employees had no time to care about external discussions.
If they didn't finish their tasks, it could affect their bonuses.
Putting aside what kind of game the company would ultimately make, no overtime, fast-paced work, and bonuses—that alone was something most companies couldn't offer.
From that perspective, the boss was excellent.
There was just one thing that confused everyone.
From the first meeting until now, the boss had always worn a giant smiling mask.
Wasn't he hot?
Everyone wondered about that.
Why was this Mr. Nintendo so secretive? Even his voice sounded like it had been altered.
Hiding things from the outside world was understandable—but why hide even from his own employees?
No one could figure it out.
Still, a good boss was a good boss.
"The restriction on players should be that after a certain period of time, the map gradually shrinks, forcibly squeezing players toward a central area."
Takayuki, wearing the oversized smiling mask, stood behind a programmer, giving hands-on guidance.
"Shrink the map? So… destroy the entire map? That sounds technically difficult."
The programmer looked troubled.
"Not at all. It's actually very simple. Just define a circle in the code, set a fixed time for it to slowly shrink, and players outside the circle won't be eliminated instantly—they'll gradually lose health. That's enough."
"Oh… I see. That does sound much simpler. I'll try implementing it."
The programmer immediately understood—this really was far easier than he'd imagined. It was just adding a few gameplay mechanics.
Marcus often observed Takayuki's movements.
One moment, he'd be in the programming area guiding feature development; the next, he'd be over with the art team, directing visual design.
The code was kept as concise and efficient as possible, without unnecessary complexity.The art style leaned heavily toward a cartoon look, reducing workload while avoiding blandness.
Marcus increasingly felt that development was progressing incredibly smoothly.
Was the strength of the world's number-one indie game creator really this overwhelming?
He had assumed that Mr. Nintendo was more of a lone wolf, probably not very good at team-based game development.
Being favored by Lorenzo had seemed like winning the lottery.
But judging from the progress over the past month, Lorenzo's vision had clearly been far ahead of the curve.
Mr. Nintendo's management skills and foresight in game development were unparalleled.
Normally, a game would go through project approval, then spend months defining its overall direction and core gameplay.
Even then, those directions would often change repeatedly during development.
After all, not every gameplay idea works the moment it's conceived.
Some producers propose ideas that are simply too unrealistic, causing the final product to deviate drastically from expectations.
Infinite World had been exactly that kind of case.
The gap between its marketing and its actual content had been enormous.
If not for its later reputation turnaround, it would've ended up as just another infamous flop.
Of course, it was also lucky enough to fall under Gamestar Electronic Entertainment's wing and receive their support.
That luck mattered too.
But Mr. Nintendo's designs?
They were mature from the start.
Sometimes, when programmers came up with overly complex mechanics, Mr. Nintendo would proactively suggest simplifying them—preserving gameplay depth while implementing everything with the cleanest possible code.
At this pace, finishing the game within six months actually seemed plausible.
To be honest, Fortnite itself wasn't that hard to develop.
A hundred players on a large map, a shrinking "storm" zone, building and dismantling mechanics, and matches capped at around thirty minutes.
With just those elements, the game already had a solid prototype.
The rest was all about adding polish and detail.
Lorenzo had waved his hand early on and spent twenty million dollars to purchase a two-year full-feature license of the Unreal Engine, dramatically boosting development efficiency.
With Unreal Engine backing them, development speed skyrocketed.
In just two more months, the basic framework and playable prototype were finished—it was already perfectly playable.
At that point, Lorenzo stepped in again, securing Morgan Group cloud server services at a favorable price, ensuring there would be no network issues when players went online.
Morgan Group had built its foundation on operating systems and internet infrastructure. When it came to networking services, they claimed the top spot—and few companies dared challenge that claim.
By the third month of development, Fortnite was essentially complete.
The efficiency was astonishing.
And all of this had been done with just over a hundred people.
"Excellent work, everyone. You've made a great game. If nothing unexpected happens, we'll begin the first round of online testing in one week, followed by official release. If everything goes smoothly, we might witness a miracle in two months."
Three months.
Three months with almost no overtime—and they had completed a high-quality game.
All hundred-plus developers felt slightly dazed.
They also realized just how simple this battle royale game really was.
Only a handful of mechanics, a cartoon style that didn't require hyper-realistic visuals, and extremely low hardware demands.
Even laptops from seven or eight years ago could run the game smoothly.
Marcus himself found it hard to believe.
This game…
Was it really finished just like that?