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Lucas Carter, filled with excitement and anticipation, settled into his newly purchased Gundam-exclusive gaming pod and started the game.
The familiar voice-over began: "In Cosmic Era 70, the tragedy of Bloody Valentine caused the already tense relationship between Earth and the PLANTs to completely escalate into armed conflict..."
Along with the narration, stunning battle scenes unfolded before Lucas's eyes. Although he'd seen these moments in the anime, the visual effects there couldn't compare to what the game presented now.
The opening displayed even more realistic visuals, with incredibly impactful visual and auditory effects. He felt as if he were truly present on that ruthless battlefield, watching towering mobile suits clash and an endless barrage of artillery tear across the land.
The game's opening, like the manga, began at Heliopolis—the neutral nation Orb's colonial satellite. However, the game's narrative moved faster, simply showcasing the protagonist and his friends' interactions before quickly diving into the war on Heliopolis: ZAFT's invasion of the colony to seize the five Gundams secretly developed by the Earth Alliance.
When Lucas, playing as protagonist Kira Yamato, sat in the cockpit of the Strike Gundam and attempted to control it, he felt his blood instantly boil.
When watching the anime, like so many others, he'd wished he could pilot a Gundam and charge into battle.
Now, in the game, that fantasy had become reality.
The gaming pod replicated the Gundam's cockpit one-to-one. The same dashboard. The same seat. The same control sticks. Realistic visuals and true sensory feedback made him feel completely immersed—as if he were truly there, lost in the experience.
However, the subsequent plot was also compact and fast-paced. The game streamlined the anime's storyline, especially lengthy character portrayals and internal monologues, highlighting more combat sequences and richer gameplay.
As the story progressed, one exhilarating battle after another completely engrossed Lucas. He lost himself—even forgetting he was supposed to be reviewing the game. Forgetting he should maintain a rational, calm state to objectively scrutinize it. His emotions were entirely tied to the plot, fluctuating between tension, joy, excitement, and sadness.
The Gundam game did not disappoint. In fact, it was full of surprises.
Although adapted from the anime's main storyline and background, the game featured multiple narrative paths. Many plot points offered players choices, and different choices led the story in completely different directions—introducing storylines not present in the anime. These were designed logically, presenting a more expansive universe, larger maps, richer characters, and more battles than the source material.
According to Lucas's speculation, the branching storylines might converge again at certain plot points, or they might develop completely parallel to the main story, ultimately leading to entirely different endings.
This meant the game could potentially rectify many regrets from the anime.
Maybe Mu La Flaga didn't have to die. Maybe the story could forge a completely different path.
This made the experience incredibly exciting and greatly increased the game's replayability.
After several hours of playing, Lucas felt thoroughly satisfied—and still yearned for more. Although he hadn't finished the entire game, he'd largely confirmed his suspicions.
But because the game was simply too fun, even he, the studio owner, couldn't resist. He'd forgotten about his main task.
Earlier, he'd told everyone not to get too excited. Yet here he was, casting his responsibilities aside, forgetting to note many important gameplay mechanics and details that needed highlighting in the review.
Fortunately, the entire gameplay session had been recorded. He reviewed the footage, re-examined specific details, then held a meeting with the others to quickly organize the review document. After that, they divided the work and began producing the video.
Like Lucas, countless content studios, media companies, and even individual players worldwide spontaneously created Gundam game-related content, uploading it to various platforms. This formed an overwhelming flood of information sweeping across the internet, appearing before global audiences, bringing massive traffic to the Gundam game and attracting even more players.
Also deeply concerned about the quality of the Gundam content were Stormwind's competitors.
Especially Apex Games.
"How were the test results? What's the game quality like?"
Mike Pierce had just finished his work when he saw Kristof enter the office. He asked eagerly.
To be honest, the emergence of Gundam had made Apex Games quite nervous. After all, Gundam was an anime primarily focused on mech warfare, depicting mechs with a distinct and unique style—quite different from theirs. And these were truly mechs in every sense of the word.
The mechs created by Gundam had already led a new aesthetic trend, forming their own signature style, accumulating immense popularity worldwide.
Even more importantly, the Gundam anime was incredibly popular. Now that the game content had launched, it would undoubtedly have a massive impact on Apex's mech merchandise.
"Stormwind's game quality is as high as ever," Kristof reported. "This Gundam is also full of surprises. Multiple storylines. Half the plot didn't appear in the anime, and they even created many mechs that weren't in the original!"
He didn't stint on praise.
"Sigh—"
Mike Pierce leaned back in his chair, dejected. This was exactly what he'd least wanted to hear.
He'd originally hoped the Gundam game adaptation would suffer from cultural incompatibility. Or that Stormwind, to save effort, would directly copy the anime plot without surprising players—drawing criticism, damaging reputation.
That way, perhaps Gundam would pose much less threat to Apex.
But now? Even that last glimmer of hope was gone.
Mike Pierce understood clearly: Gundam's mechs would completely change the market landscape for mech-type items in Infinite Realms.
Although the appearance of Iron Man had initially brought a refreshing feel to the mech category, breaking Apex's monopoly and even shattering the price ceiling for mech items...
Strictly speaking, the Iron Man suit couldn't be considered a true mech. Its single category couldn't truly compete with the vast mech system Apex had built over years.
Especially after the recent version update, with the expansion of the interstellar map, space warfare mechs had become even more popular. Apex's mech items had once again dominated the vast majority of market share in that category.
But Gundam was different.
The entire anime depicted a great many mobile suits, forming a complete and expansive mech category system. This would inevitably create powerful opposition to Apex's mechs.
It was very likely to seize the mech market that belonged to them.
This was Mike Pierce's biggest concern...