Chapter 187 Wednesday, January 5th

Chen Kangtuo and Hao Qiong sat in the coffee area of ​​Moyu Internet Cafe, each with a laptop, rapidly typing away.

They both seemed to be brimming with inspiration, their fingers moving non-stop. Only when organizing their thoughts did they occasionally stop to pick up the coffee on the table for a sip.

They were working on the haunted house proposal.

During their time in the States, their experiences felt like a dream, albeit a nightmare.

"Mist Mountain" State Mental Hospital, located on the site of an abandoned hospital, was known as the most terrifying haunted house in the world.

Over the past five days, the tourist team had experienced this haunted house completely, "a little at a time, many times," and the hardships they endured were indescribable.

The impression was too deep, the insights too numerous. They even frequently "gained new insights" and "relived some vague memories" in their dreams every night in recent days.

Therefore, after returning to Jingzhou, Chen Kangtuo and Hao Qiong were bursting with ideas, eager to write down their touring experience and use it for the haunted house project they were responsible for.

But it wasn't a direct copy, but a critical absorption.

They wrote all day yesterday and again this morning. Under this efficient working mode, the basic plan was almost written.

"Come on, let's compare notes," Chen Kangtuo suggested.

The two sent the documents they had written on their laptops to each other.

From the time they came back until now, the two had not communicated too much, mainly to avoid interfering with each other's ideas.

With each person contributing a plan, and after thorough discussion, the combination of the two plans could achieve the best effect.

Of course, both plans had a consensus, which was the general direction for the haunted house construction that Boss Pei had proposed.

Boss Pei's opinion was definitely the most core standard and could not be violated.

"Let those with great courage have no place to spend money, and let those with little courage shy away," were Boss Pei's original words.

After Chen Kangtuo and Hao Qiong went through the standard process of reading comprehension, they roughly summarized the following two key points:

Open three projects, with gradually increasing levels of terror;

Through discounts and refunds, charge less for the brave and more for the timid.

In this way, they could guarantee the reputation of the haunted house, ensure its profitability, and take into account different customer groups at the same time.

However, the two of them never had a good idea of ​​what kind of specific projects to do.

That's why they needed to draw inspiration from some successful haunted houses.

Now, they had the materials and the scares, the key was the specific plan.

The two browsed each other's plans.

Chen Kangtuo was a little surprised: "It seems that we have a consensus on many aspects. Maybe it's because we have both worked in the game industry, so we are used to solving problems with the thinking of games?"

Hao Qiong nodded: "Well, maybe."

The two plans involuntarily thought of several points together.

The first project, with a low level of terror, was suitable for multiplayer social games.

Chen Kangtuo's idea was to make a more classic horror escape room, while Hao Qiong's idea was to change the gameplay of the game *BeQuiet* and make a real-life version of *BeQuiet*.

Of course, the two of them didn't have a good idea yet, they just had a simple general direction.

The second project, with a moderate level of terror, was used to transition to the third project, and was basically a single-player game.

The venue for this project could be small, but the horror effect would definitely not be bad. Only those who passed this project would be eligible to challenge the third project.

The two had the same view on this project, which was to use a narrow space of a few square meters or a dozen square meters for single-player experience.

However, Hao Qiong additionally proposed that containers could be used to decorate the interior of the containers into various scenes, and install pulleys underneath, so as to ensure that several different projects could be adjusted at any time, so that players would not be able to guess which project they were going to experience.

The third project, with the highest level of terror, was committed to restoring everyone's experience in the "Mist Mountain" Mental Hospital.

However, the plans given by the two were not quite the same as the routine of the "Mist Mountain" Mental Hospital.

At present, most haunted houses are not so perfect in terms of rhythm control.

Some small haunted houses in China are basically a route, walking from beginning to end. There is no extra exit in the middle if you want to leave, so you can only bite the bullet and continue walking.

However, in this relatively simple haunted house, there will be no staff interaction, and the fright is not so strong. Almost everyone can complete the whole process.

Larger haunted houses have longer processes and a higher degree of fright. They must reserve enough safety exits, and tourists can leave from the safety exit at any time if they can't hold on.

Of course, enough monitoring should also be installed to observe the state of the tourists in real time.

For super-large haunted houses like "Mist Mountain" Mental Hospital, it is natural to arrange more safety exits, and there must be staff on standby at any time to take out the tourists who cannot hold on.

But after visiting this haunted house, the two had a common idea: most people can't hold on in this haunted house, it's too wasteful!

In fact, the first day everyone went, the challenge of the haunted house was not smooth.

Bao Xu and Hao Qiong failed in less than ten minutes. The longest time was Lin Wan and Li Yada, who lasted for more than twenty minutes.

Of course, Li Yada was completely dragged by Lin Wan to last so long, otherwise she might have backed down as soon as she entered.

According to everyone's observation, this reaction was not an isolated case.

Most tourists buy tickets and are frightened by the short film rendering the atmosphere in the waiting area, and can't hold on long after entering the door.

Chen Kangtuo and Hao Qiong both believed that this was a pity.

It took a lot of effort to make such a terrifying haunted house, but more than half of the tourists were persuaded to quit before entering the door, which was too wasteful.

As the saying goes, pigs have to be fattened before they are slaughtered.

Just like games, if a game is made to suffer, it is normal for someone to be persuaded to quit in the first level, but if more than half of the people are persuaded to quit in the first level, it can only be said that there is a problem with the difficulty setting.

The difficulty should be gradual. Even if players suffer, they must grasp the degree and not really abuse them to run away.

If their own haunted house blindly copied the routine of the "Mist Mountain" Mental Hospital, there would only be one result, which would be that no one would be interested.

Because the "Mist Mountain" Mental Hospital has already made a name for itself as the most terrifying haunted house in the world, and the passenger flow is guaranteed.

And their own haunted house is built in the suburbs of Jingzhou, and it is not well-known in itself. It is temporarily impossible to attract tourists from all over the world to play. If the threshold is too high, it will definitely not be able to recover the cost.

Therefore, every tourist is very important.

Chen Kangtuo and Hao Qiong each came up with some solutions.

Hao Qiong's plan was to sell tickets that could be entered multiple times, and at the same time deliberately lower the initial level of terror.

In the initial process, arrange some fun but not so terrifying links, and first try to keep the tourists.

At the same time, each ticket can be entered multiple times, and the ticket price can be set higher, which is equivalent to giving tourists a certain buffer time, so that they can calm down and then enter the challenge.

This is what Hao Qiong and the others did in the United States. In fact, the first time was very terrifying, and they didn't remember what they played at all. The whole person was in a completely confused state.

But after entering again, after having a certain psychological expectation, the haunted house became interesting.

But normal tourists cannot queue up again and pay for another ticket to suffer the second time, so naturally they cannot experience this feeling.

Therefore, Hao Qiong believes that the tickets can be directly set to be entered multiple times.

In this way, even if some tourists are temporarily frightened away, since the ticket still allows them to enter again, then after a period of time, when their mentality calms down, they will come to play a second time.

In this way, a group of repeat customers can be harvested.

Chen Kangtuo's plan was to design the haunted house as a circular route with a safe house in the center.

After passing each small stage, players can enter the safe house to rest and adjust their emotions.

Like the "Mist Mountain" Mental Hospital, most people can't hold on after spending more than an hour in the haunted house in one breath, which means that most people cannot browse the entire haunted house.

This can be said to be a serious waste of resources.

Therefore, Chen Kangtuo felt that some methods in the game could be used to solve this problem.

Many horror games have settings such as "save points" and "safe houses", which are designed to allow players to rest their highly tense spirits and relieve their tension before continuing to advance through the subsequent process.

Therefore, Chen Kangtuo felt that the safe house mechanism could be added to the haunted house, so that players could constantly adjust their mentality during the game and not be easily frightened away.

Although the two plans were different, they did not conflict and could coexist completely.

After reading Chen Kangtuo's plan, Hao Qiong was a little worried: "Will this arrangement allow our haunted house to be cleared quickly? If tourists can clear it once, they will definitely not come a second time, right?"

Chen Kangtuo shook his head: "I think the ultimate purpose of the haunted house is not to scare tourists so much that they cannot clear it. If tourists are frightened away in the first level, what's the point of making your subsequent process better and more terrifying?"

"Letting tourists play the whole process naturally gives them many opportunities to be frightened."

"In fact, no matter whether tourists have finished the entire haunted house, they are unlikely to enter the same haunted house again."

"If most tourists are frightened away at the beginning, then their evaluation of the haunted house will definitely not be very high, which is not conducive to building a reputation. Other new tourists will be persuaded to quit when they see the evaluation, saying that this haunted house scares people away at the beginning."

"Since this is the case, trying to let tourists play for a while, step by step, and leave them with some deep impressions and thoughts, is more conducive to us building a reputation and attracting new tourists."

Hao Qiong thought for a while and nodded: "Well, that's the truth."

"Then next, should we report the progress to Boss Pei first, or should we first come up with detailed plans for each project?"

Chen Kangtuo said: "It is definitely impossible for all the detailed plans to come out all at once. The first and third projects are more difficult to design, occupy a large area, and have complex gameplay, so they need to be considered in the long term."

"For these two large projects, let's roughly reserve the venue first, and slowly work on them while recruiting people."

"The second project is composed of many small projects, which is relatively simple and easy to do. Let's finalize the second project first. Then let's show the whole plan to Boss Pei."

"After Boss Pei nods, we can start construction. During the construction of the second project, we will slowly consider the first and third projects."