After checking everyone's game progress, Ichin returned to his office and turned on his computer to see how Dark Souls was doing after its first night on sale.
First up was Steam: the game's concurrent player count had already surpassed 500,000, and that wasn't even the peak. Within the first five hours of release, the peak number of concurrent players had reached 600,000.
Then came the sales figures—initially, the total pre-orders across all platforms had hit two million, but now, just on Steam and Epic alone, PC sales had already reached two million copies.
As for the Nintendo Switch version…
That number honestly surprised Ichin.
Browsing a few gaming forums, he found that quite a few players had purchased the Switch version of Dark Souls and were already sharing their impressions online.
At 1080p resolution in docked mode and 720p in handheld mode, the visuals barely showed any downgrades, and both modes held a stable 30 FPS. Players praised how smooth the gameplay felt.
> "Now that's optimization—GF, take notes."
> "Forget taking notes, GF should just learn how to make proper textures first."
> "Lying in bed playing this on my Switch is pure bliss!"
> "Only downside—no achievement system. But that's a small price to pay."
Reading through all the positive feedback about the game's performance, Ichin finally relaxed with a smile.
With such a huge Switch player base, unless optimization was truly impossible, he would never give up on supporting it.
And not just the current model—earlier this year, Ichin had received word from Nintendo that development kits for the upgraded Switch model were about to be distributed. Soon, they'd be able to develop with higher frame rates and better graphics for the new system.
Of course, the new console's actual release date would only be announced at Nintendo's end-of-year showcase, and Ichin wasn't about to leak anything. In fact, the only person in his company who knew was Hazuki.
Utaha leaned against Ichin's chair, glancing at the screen full of data.
"Looks like it's officially a mega-hit, Ichin. You should make a proper announcement to everyone."
Ichin nodded with a smile. "Yeah. At this rate, we'll easily break ten million copies sold before the end of the year. Definitely worth celebrating. There's not enough time today, so let's book a hotel banquet hall for Sunday night and hold a celebration party."
He picked up his desk phone and called the administration department, instructing them to handle the arrangements.
Once the hotel booking was confirmed, Ichin and Utaha left the office together.
Clapping his hands, Ichin addressed the art team:
"Alright, everyone—pause your games for a moment. Rin, Kou, go gather everyone. I've got an announcement to make."
Judging from Ichin's grin, the others already had a pretty good idea of what was coming.
A few minutes later, Yagami Kou and Toyama Rin brought everyone together.
Once the team was assembled, Ichin began, smiling broadly.
"Alright everyone, good news! After just one night, Dark Souls has sold 4.7 million copies, and we'll break five million any moment now! I know it's early to say this, but I'm confident we'll hit ten million before the year ends!"
"Wooo!!"
"Second game to reach ten million sales!"
"We did it!"
After the cheers and laughter finally died down, Ichin continued,
"There's not enough time today, but I've already reserved the banquet hall. Sunday night, we'll hold a proper celebration. Don't forget—details will be posted in the company chat. And after the party, everyone gets a full week off. Once we're back, we'll start preparing to move into our new headquarters building. By then, the renovation smell should have mostly aired out."
At that, everyone's excitement erupted again—almost forgetting that the new building was nearly finished by late March.
"Our own building! That's awesome!"
"I'm calling my parents right now!"
"I'm telling my wife—she'll be thrilled!"
The last remark earned immediate death stares from several single male coworkers.
Regardless, today was definitely a day worth celebrating.
After the announcement, Ichin told everyone to take the rest of the day off, then returned to his office to continue browsing Dark Souls discussion threads and livestreams.
Even though an entire night had passed, many hardcore streamers—those true "grind kings"—were still live, having streamed straight through from launch until now.
He opened one of the streams that had been running since midnight. The streamer had made impressive progress—already reaching the Farron Keep.
Unfortunately, Farron Keep was not a pleasant place. Its map design and enemy placement had been one of Ichin's most painstaking works.
As soon as the stream loaded, Ichin saw a bleary-eyed streamer with dark circles sprinting desperately through the swamp, two Elder Ghru wielding wooden roots chasing after him.
The roots struck the ground, releasing waves of crimson magic orbs that homed in on the fleeing player.
"AAAHHHHH!!!"
After a furious scream, the screen turned black.
> "God, this map is disgusting! You can't even roll properly—and there's poison everywhere!"
The viewers in the chat were having the time of their lives, flooding the screen with laughing emotes and teasing comments.
Despite the suffering and complaints, after respawning, the streamer bravely dove right back into Farron Keep.
> "No way I'm quitting now. I need to pick up my souls—and those glowing items over there too. I'll never sleep if I don't!"
Ichin glanced at the streamer's setup—still wearing the starting knight armor, same old shield, but his right-hand weapon had been swapped for a Dark Sword.
Lucky guy—he'd managed to farm one off a Darkwraith.
In Ichin's version of Dark Souls, the Dark Sword hadn't been nerfed to oblivion like in Dark Souls III. Its stats were excellent, and even after infusions, it remained a powerful weapon.
Rather than weakening strong weapons, Ichin preferred to make all weapons viable—each unique, each with its own charm and potential.
After watching a few more minutes, he sent the streamer a small gift and then hopped to another stream, continuing his late-night patrol.
Watching everyone suffer… was so entertaining.
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