The Lead Planner's eyes lit up.
This was no mere disaster drill; it was a full-blown strategic survival game.
"Phase three: Rescue and Settlement," Takuya continued. "After surviving 72 hours, the Self-Defense Forces will enter. The system will assign a comprehensive rating based on player survival status, remaining supplies, and number of people rescued. Different rewards will be given according to these ratings."
"Don't make the first level too difficult," Takuya Nakayama said, flipping through the proposal and pointing to the difficulty curve graph. "We need to let players get familiar with the gameplay and core elements—understand and interact with everything. Starting with a magnitude 8 earthquake and a tsunami would just drive players away. Lower the initial magnitude to give them time to react. No one wants to be crushed by a falling ceiling right at the start. Also, suppress the probability of secondary disasters initially. Let everyone practice hiding under tables."
The Lead Planner ran a hand through his still-damp hair, clearly not fully recovered from the Okinawa sea breeze. He stared at the flowchart on the whiteboard. "Managing Director, if this is a survival game, shouldn't we include basic needs like eating, drinking, and sleeping? Hunger, thirst, bladder level... How messy will the UI interface become?"
"Let's simplify," Takuya Nakayama said, holding up two fingers. "Just two stats: Energy Value and Health Value."
He picked up a marker and drew two long bars on the whiteboard.
"Eating and sleeping restore Energy, but to prevent players from turning this game into an eating contest, we'll add a CD. Repeated eating or sleeping within a four-hour window won't restore Energy. This is a survival game, not a buffet."
"What happens when Energy is depleted?" a programmer chimed in.
"They slow down, they get stupid," Nakayama said, tapping the whiteboard. "Actions become sluggish, QTE timing shrinks. If the bar turns red, they can't even run—only crawl."
The Lead Planner stroked his stubble thoughtfully. "That makes sense. But Managing Director, you mentioned rescuing people earlier. In that environment, rescuing is just a waste of resources, isn't it? The motivation to save someone for a high score isn't strong enough. Players are very pragmatic."
"Who says there's no reward for rescuing?" Nakayama smiled, the expression of a hunter spotting prey caught in a trap. "For every neighbor saved, the player gets a 'Mood Boost' that directly restores Energy."
"Mana?" The Lead Planner's eyes widened.
"Yes, it replenishes Energy. But don't get too greedy. We'll only grant extra Energy for the first three rescues. We don't want people digging through the ruins just to grind for it." Takuya Nakayama paused, then dropped the bombshell that made everyone in the room sit up straight: "And these NPCs aren't just set dressing. We need to write them some simple AI."
"That beam you would have spent ten minutes moving? If you rescue a strongman, the two of you can move it in three minutes. Rescue a nurse, and she can treat your wounds. Rescue an elderly woman, and she can help you organize food supplies."
A few soft gasps rippled through the conference room.
This was the snowball effect.
Invest resources to save people early on, and later, their numbers would become a force to be reckoned with.
"That's up to the player to decide," the Lead Planner's mind raced, his pen twirling excitedly. "Do they save the doctor trapped with a crushed leg first, or the crying elementary school student? It's not just a moral dilemma—it's a math problem."
"Exactly," Takuya Nakayama nodded in approval. "And Health Value isn't so simple either. It's not like eating a first-aid kit instantly restores you to full health. Injuries need proper treatment: stopping the bleeding, immobilizing the limb, bandaging it. If they're caught in the rain, they need dry clothes. If they've inhaled smoke, they need fresh air. Only after all that does Health Value slowly recover. Don't expect a wounded person, fresh from being bandaged, to immediately start helping clear rubble. They're survivors, not superheroes."
He tossed the marker back into its slot with a crisp clack.
"Overcooling, overheating, injuries, and energy depletion all reduce Health Value. The core of this game isn't about being a hero; it's about surviving in this mess, like a tightrope walker, by carefully managing every resource."
The Lead Planner stared at the whiteboard, covered in a dense web of game mechanics. The perfunctory expression he'd worn earlier had completely vanished.
This wasn't some public service software; it was a rigorously logical resource management game with even some hardcore gameplay elements.
If the numbers were balanced right, making it easy to learn but hard to master, it could be absolutely addictive.
"One more thing: the art style." Takuya Nakayama tapped his fingers on the table, drawing everyone's attention back from the numbers to the visuals. "No next-gen lighting effects. We need 'foolproof' clarity."
The Lead Planner was about to protest that they could squeeze even more out of the MD's capabilities, but he froze. "Managing Director, wouldn't a crude visual style be accused of being a scam?"
"You still don't get it," Takuya Nakayama said, pulling a hand-drawn sketch from the paper bag. It featured bold, simple outlines of a fire extinguisher and a flashlight. "If you try to cram realistic textures onto a palm-sized, monochrome screen, players won't be able to tell the difference between a life-saving compressed biscuit on the ground and a inedible piece of rubble in a crisis."
He slapped the sketch down in front of the art team member. "I want high contrast, high visibility. The fire extinguisher needs to be blindingly red, the emergency exit sign blindingly green. Kids should be able to glance at it and instantly know—Oh, that red cross means life-saving, that skull means danger."
The art team member picked up the sketch, his brow smoothing.
This design was actually more challenging. Squeezing maximum accuracy into just a few pixels was far more demanding than drawing high-definition textures.
"This is the core," Takuya Nakayama said, surveying the room. "This isn't about appreciating the aesthetics of the ruins. The goal is to burn these icons and control logic into their brains. When a real earthquake hits, they won't need to think—muscle memory will tell them exactly what to do."
The conference room fell silent for a few seconds.
Initially, everyone had assumed this was just a perfunctory political task or a get-rich-quick gimmick.
But now, seeing the interlocking logic of the gameplay mechanics on the whiteboard and the compromises and compromises made for the sake of ultimate usability, the atmosphere had completely changed.
This wasn't just a fun game; it might actually save lives.
The Lead Planner snapped the cap back onto his ballpoint pen with a crisp click.
He took a deep breath and solemnly placed the proposal, which he had initially dismissed as trivial, in the center of the table.
"Managing Director, we'll take on this project," he said, a grin spreading across his face. "And the numerical tuning might take quite a while."
"As long as we make this game right, the timeline isn't a concern," Takuya Nakayama said, standing up and smoothing the hem of his suit jacket.
"Understood!"
The response was unified and even louder than when they had been discussing where to go for drinks earlier.
These tech-savvy guys, who usually only cared about games, now had a light in their eyes—the light of mission.
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