Chapter 14 Saturday, April 14th

0:00 AM.

Lu Xiaoping, the vice president of Fanqi Media, arrived at the movie theater near the company on time with the person in charge of the promotional campaign for *Raging Sea Battleship*.

Even in the Imperial Capital, this movie theater could be considered large. Lu Xiaoping had specially bought two tickets for the imAx theater hall this time. The entire theater hall was two stories high, with a super-large screen and panoramic sound, ensuring the best possible audio-visual experience.

"Mr. Lu, popcorn."

The person in charge of the promotional campaign for *Raging Sea Battleship* held two large buckets of popcorn and handed one of them to Lu Xiaoping.

His face was all smiles on the surface, but in reality, he was secretly thinking *mmp*.

This person in charge was quite wronged. Going to see a midnight movie would normally be a happy occasion, but that depended on who he was with.

Watching a movie with his immediate superior just felt wrong somehow.

What's more, he had been working overtime at the company until after midnight before coming here.

He had already worked overtime for four or five hours. This movie should strictly be considered a business matter, so this person in charge was very unhappy and didn't have much of a mood to watch a movie. He just wanted to go home and get a good night's sleep.

But there was no way around it. He was just a high-level corporate slave. Usually, it was no problem for him to throw his weight around in front of his subordinates, but when he met Lu Xiaoping, he could only act like a grandson.

As for why this was the case, it was a long story.

After hearing that *Mission and Choice* had been moved up, Lu Xiaoping felt that Tenda was backing down. He further deduced that the quality of the movie must not be very good, so he deliberately hired some internet trolls to create controversy.

Everything had been going smoothly at first. Tenda hadn't responded immediately, which made Lu Xiaoping feel like he had found a soft persimmon to squeeze. This act of stirring up trouble was so comfortable that he even started to enjoy it a little too much.

But he never expected that two days before the movie was about to be released, the situation would suddenly change!

Posts about *Mission and Choice* suddenly exploded online. Netizens were discussing it like they were possessed. Even though there wasn't even any basic promotion, it still managed to gain a lot of attention!

And gog updated its new version. The new hero, *Yun Que* (Cloud Sparrow), officially debuted. Her appearance and backstory strongly hinted at *Mission and Choice*, which triggered another wave of discussion!

It had to be said that gog's influence in the country was huge. The release of this new hero was like pouring oil on the fire, instantly igniting the preliminary heat for *Mission and Choice*!

Of course, this was only relative. It was hotter than ordinary movies, but still incomparable to blockbusters that had invested a huge amount of publicity funds.

Even so, it was enough for *Mission and Choice* to sell out its movie tickets for the first day.

Although the screening rate of *Mission and Choice* wasn't high, it was enough to show the enthusiasm of the audience.

The previous series of events had made Lu Xiaoping quite swollen, but now he was a little panicked again.

Therefore, Lu Xiaoping ordered the person in charge of the promotional campaign for *Raging Sea Battleship* to work overtime with him until midnight, and then come to watch the midnight screening of *Mission and Choice*.

It was to finally determine what the movie was really like and whether it would really pose a serious threat to *Raging Sea Battleship*.

Although Lu Xiaoping felt in his heart that this possibility was very small, after all, the release dates had already been staggered, but he was taking precautions, so he had to come and see for himself.

For ordinary people, tickets might be difficult to get, but for Lu Xiaoping, it was definitely not a problem.

Lu Xiaoping looked serious, waiting for the movie to start.

He saw the discussions online, with some people saying that the reason why *Mission and Choice* was brought forward wasn't because it was afraid of *Raging Sea Battleship*, but because it was related to *Fantasy Battle Remake*.

Although Lu Xiaoping himself didn't agree with this statement, he had to admit that there was indeed such a possibility.

He was beginning to vaguely realize that Tenda hadn't given up resisting, but was instead brewing something terrible...

As for the person in charge of the promotional campaign for *Raging Sea Battleship*, he had just worked a whole night of overtime and was yawning constantly. He couldn't muster any energy at all and just wanted to go home and sleep.

Why wasn't Lu Xiaoping sleeping?

Because as the vice president of the company, he had a special car to pick him up and drop him off, and his office had a special lounge where he could sleep at any time.

Many bosses bragged about working more than ten hours a day and only sleeping four or five hours, using this to give their employees pep talks and draw them pictures of success, trying to prove that they became bosses because of their hard work, and that if you worked hard, you could become a boss too. That's all pure bullshit, and anyone who believes it is an idiot.

In short, the two of them fell silent for different reasons, occasionally eating some popcorn and watching the warm-up advertisements playing on the big screen.

The audience had already entered the theater one after another, and the imAx hall was already full.

*Mission and Choice* didn't arrange a premiere or a preview screening. Tenda's confidentiality work was so ridiculously good that there were no spoilers online so far.

The audience in the movie theater were all discussing in low voices. Lu Xiaoping didn't deliberately listen, but he roughly determined the sources of these people from the conversations of the audience around him.

Some were hardcore fans of Lu Zhiyao, who came specifically for him;

Some were die-hard fans of Tenda Games and loyal supporters of domestic games. Because *Mission and Choice* was a "disgrace to domestic games," they came specifically to see how Tenda made it;

Some couples originally wanted to just pick a movie to watch and spend the night outside, but the movies available today were not very good, and there weren't any good movies. They heard that this movie was made by the original crew of *A Better Tomorrow* and that the quality should be guaranteed, so they decided to book tickets to see it...

In short, the sources of the audience were diverse.

Lu Xiaoping felt that something was not right, because this situation meant that the audience of *Mission and Choice* was relatively diverse.

If the audience was relatively uniform, such as the majority being fans of Lu Zhiyao, then the movie's stamina might be insufficient. After all, there were only so many hardcore fans. If it couldn't break out of that circle after they had all seen it, then the subsequent box office would definitely plummet.

And a diverse audience meant that the chances of this movie breaking out of its circle would be greater!

Of course, the key was still to see how good the movie itself was.

Soon, the lights in the screening room gradually dimmed.

On the big screen, after a bunch of logos, the movie officially began, and the movie theater quickly fell silent.

At the beginning of the movie, Qin Yi woke up in the hibernation pod and talked to Aeeis, becoming the new commander.

For players who had played the *Fortress at Sea* DLC, this beginning was actually very easy to understand, because it was connected to the content of the DLC.

And for those viewers who hadn't played it, it didn't really matter, because this opening scene interspersed some of Qin Yi's memory fragments, mainly the scene of him performing the beheading operation in the Zerg nest and his teammates dying one after another.

Although these pictures were fragmented and very short, they were enough for the audience to understand the background of the story, so they wouldn't be confused.

Moreover, as the plot of the movie progressed, at some key nodes, such as when performing tasks in "Simulated Training," there would be some memories of the "Beheading Operation" interspersed again. Although the time wasn't long, it was enough to ensure the integrity of the entire story.

While Qin Yi took over the console and familiarized himself with the operations, the audience also saw the simulated image of the United Fleet's first encounter with the Zerg, and learned the background of the story through Aeeis's explanation.

...

Lu Xiaoping stuffed a handful of popcorn into his mouth. The light of the big screen shone on his face, and the bright and dark light changed rapidly, reflecting his slightly sluggish expression.

He was stunned by the movie's cool scenes!

In the past, domestic science fiction movies often showed perfunctory and careless details everywhere. For example, the characters' clothes, the furnishings inside the space capsule, electronic equipment, etc., would clearly show very cheap and pieced-together traces, and they were very careless.

On the one hand, this was due to funding problems, and on the other hand, it was due to ability problems, but more than anything, it was an attitude problem.

Because many domestic science fiction film directors didn't pay enough attention to these details. They just wanted a "science fiction-like" set. The focus was all on other aspects, such as how to change the script according to the requirements of the investors.

If the attitude wasn't right, these details couldn't be done well.

But *Mission and Choice* was completely different.

The differences in these details didn't even require careful viewing. With a quick scan, you could clearly feel them!

The imAx large screen presented all kinds of details to the audience without any difference, including the spacesuit worn by Qin Yi, the hibernation pod he slept in, the commander's control console, etc. They all looked like the products of future technology and had a strong sense of realism!

Of course, one of the important reasons why it could be done to this extent was that this movie only had this one real scene.

These were the only things that were used back and forth, so Zhu Xiaoce could naturally invest a huge amount of money, modify them repeatedly, design them repeatedly, strive for excellence, and achieve the most perfect state.

But the players didn't know this. At the beginning of the movie, they saw a space capsule scene with a sense of reality that killed all other domestic science fiction movies. Every item in it was impressive. This kind of shock was unmatched by movies of other genres and could allow the audience to quickly enter the state!

And what was even cooler was the picture displayed on the surrounding cabin walls when Qin Yi used the console.

According to the plot setting, the moment Qin Yi sat down, the surrounding cabin walls would be covered by holographic imaging technology. He was like he was in the endless starry sky. Looking from any direction, whether it was up, down, left, or right, it was like seeing a real scene in the universe.

Moreover, Qin Yi could use the console to constantly change the perspective. Whether it was moving, zooming, or jumping, the surrounding scene would change in real time.

In traditional movies, the commander and the actual picture of the battlefield are separate, and can only be displayed by cutting the scene, which will have some slight sense of separation.

In *Mission and Choice*, the commander's behavior and the actual picture of the battlefield are integrated. Qin Yi is like a ghost shuttling through the endless starry sky and directing the battle. This not only makes the whole picture more smooth and coherent, but also more visually impactful.

In fact, during the shooting, the surroundings were all green screens, and all the intense battles in space were made with special effects.

But after all, a huge amount of money was invested in special effects, and compared to using special effects to make humans, using special effects to make spaceships would appear more real, so the special effects and the exquisite set perfectly combined to make the audience feel like they were really in it!

For science fiction movies, the most terrible adjective is "fake."

Once the scene or details make the audience feel fake, then even if there is a good story, the audience will not be able to watch it.

And *Mission and Choice* had achieved the ultimate in realism, whether it was the real scene or the special effects, so it had a head start from the beginning, shocking all the audience!

Lu Xiaoping realized that the situation was not good, and his originally indifferent expression had become stiff.

On the other hand, the person in charge of *Raging Sea Battleship* was originally sleepy, but woke up instantly when he saw this beginning!