Translated by Coldtaco
Edited by Aelryinth
The consensus on the characters so far was cute and noticeable features, but they weren’t sure how these characters related to one another…
Chen Mo felt that it’d be weirder if they were able to tell the relationship of the characters outside of the show.
Chen Mo asked, “Goldfish, how long will it take for you to finish off the drawings, including filling in details, and color? It doesn’t need to be too detailed; they will have to be the same size as my sketches.”
Su Jinyu gave it some thought. “Umm, these character cards aren’t all that complicated. Four to five days should probably be enough.”
Chen Mo shook his head, “Three days.”
“Huh?” Su Jinyu was a bit conflicted. “I could also do it in three days, but the quality might be lower.”
Chen Mo said, “Don’t worry, these cards will still end up on the phone. It’s fine if it’s slightly worse, as we can improve it later; we can keep it simple for now.”
Su Jinyu awkwardly nodded, “Alright, I’ll try my best.”
Wen Lingwei said, “If it’s just filling in details and colouring, I could do that, too.”
Chen Mo was shocked. “Are you sure? These are the actual resources for the game; they should at least be good enough that the players don’t have anything to nitpick about.”
Jia Peng reminded him, “Manger, senior over here is a top art student. She normally does art commissions too.”
Chen Mo finally understood. Right, Wen Lingwei, Jia Peng, and the others are all in the school’s Publicity Department. They usually needed to make posters and exhibition boards; could they become the president and vice president of the department if they didn’t have drawing or image processing skills?”
“Sure, it’d save me a lot of time if you drew too,” said Chen Mo.
Wen Lingwei said with an evil smile, “Then how much are you going to pay me? I usually charge five thousand per drawing, and that’s the special price.”
Chen Mo murmured, “… I couldn’t tell you were a pro.”
Prices would vary greatly between different artists for drawings like art for cards. Some would charge a thousand, others would charge ten thousand. Of course, the price could still go higher than that.
Obviously you’d get what you pay for for things like this. There would of course be a difference in terms of composition, lighting and color for an average artist compared to a better artist.
Someone like Wen Lingwei, who charged five thousand per card, which happened to be the special price,was a price only a decent artist could charge.
Chen Mo said, “Wouldn’t you usually have to do the design, composition, and finding out the requirements? I already have the sketches and the drawings are way smaller than what you usually do. All you have to do is refine and color it. Can you settle for two thousand?”
Wen Lingwei replied, “Selfish!”
Chen Mo was speechless.
Wen Lingwei said, “Alright, I’ll do it out of pity. Two thousand per drawing, three days each. However, don’t complain that it’s going too slow if it’s just me and Goldfish working on this.
Chen Mo looked at Jia Peng and Chang Xiuya, “If you guys want to draw, I’m fine with that too…”
Jia Peng waved his hand dismissively, “We aren’t nearly as good as senior, I might be able to help you with the normal monsters, but don’t give us any of the main characters.”
Chen Mo nodded, “That’s fine, there’s a few monster cards later, so I could probably send you guys some of those. I’ll pay you guys the same.”
Jia Peng once again waved his hand dismissively,. “Don’t worry, money isn’t that important, you can pay as you see fit.”
Chen Mo distributed the cards.
—
Su Jinyu and Wen Lingwei’s drawing abilities were both very good, and they could take on the drawing of the main characters all by themselves. Moreover, it was easier for Chen Mo to communicate with them, so Chen Mo gave them the most important main character cards to work on.
Chen Mo assigned a few drawings to the other students who were also able to draw the monster cards.
Based on the speed of three days per card, Wen Lingwei and Su Jinyu would take fifty-four days to finish thirty-six of the main character cards. Moreover it was only part of the cards, out of the three hundred cards that were required!
This was completely different from Plants vs Zombies, as many of the zombie assets could be reused, and most of the plants were quite easy to draw, too. For card games however, each card was basically its own entity. If it didn’t look good, the players wouldn’t want to fork out money, therefore it was a point Chen Mo didn’t want to compromise on.
Therefore, in order to shorten this time, Chen Mo had to outsource the drawings.
Chen Mo asked Wen Lingwei and Su Jinyu, “Do you guys know any art outsourcing companies? Something a bit more dependable.”
Wen Lingwei did some thinking and replied, “I know one. I have a few friends that are artists there, its quality is quite decent.”
Chen Mo nodded,” Sure, just send their contacts to me. Also, do you guys know any animation companies?”
Wen Lingwei and Su Jinyu both shook their heads. “I do know of a few, but don’t know anyone personally.”
Chen Mo replied, “Alright, just finish the few main character cards I picked out from before for now.”
Chen Mo started back upstairs.
Su Jinyu said, “Wait up, manager. What type of game is the next one going to be? Do we really need this much artwork for cards?”
Chen Mo answered, “Don’t worry, you’ll find out in a few days!”
—
When he got back to the second floor, Chen Mo started feeling tired; it was probably the side-effects of the Super Accelerator.
Based on the contacts Wen Lingwei provided, Chen Mo found the manager for the art outsourcing company and communicated his specifications.
Chen Mo gave them the sketches, which would save a bunch of money on the design and drafting stages, and would also save on time.
In the end, they agreed on a price of twenty-two hundred per main character card, six hundred per monster card.
As the requirements for the monster cards weren’t as strict, they were reduced by a significant amount.
Using these numbers, Chen Mo would have to spend about 36×3×2200, + 200×600 = 357,600, three hundred thousand-plus RMB.
Of course, there were some monsters that could be reused after being reskinned, but it was probably not possible to reduce it below three hundred thousand.
Although it wasn’t cheap, Chen Mo felt alright spending that money, as it couldn’t be reduced any further. He felt quite happy to be able to finish the entire deck with five hundred thousand RMB.
Chen Mo assigned the more important cards, like MT, Shaman, Rogue, Hunter, Lady, President, and Elder Sister to Wen Lingwei and Su Jinyu. Based on three days per card, it would take about a month to finish all of it.
Su Jinyu also needed to be involved with the game design process, so Chen Mo couldn’t allow her to just focus on drawing cards.
Other than that, Chen Mo also assigned some of the monster cards to Jia Peng and the others, and paid them at market rates.
The other cards were left in the hands of the outsourcing company. It didn’t matter who did them, as long as all the cards were done within two months!