Chapter 44: Idol Master

  "The Idolmaster" is a raising simulation game of beautiful girl idols, produced by Namdai. It's probably one of the most successful beautiful girl games in history, with many loyal fans. Originally an arcade raising simulation game, it was later ported to Xbox 360, aiming at cultivating beautiful girl idol groups, simply put, a new era "My Star".

  As an otaku, Su Yifan had of course played this game before, in a net cafe. Su Yifan liked this kind of game where one could achieve goals through their own efforts, and he also enjoyed watching beautiful girls being chased by thousands of people.

  Su Yifan is very clear that the so-called "sense of accomplishment" most of the time comes from this process full of hard work that moves people's hearts. Working hard for a beautiful goal and finally achieving results.

  This process is what every young person in this society dreams of as "struggling".

  Su Xiaoqing's suggestion was filled with elements that made people's hearts race, most importantly Su Yifan knew that not only did Zhang Yao have the potential to become a star, but Su Xiaoqing also had the ability to make dreams come true.

  There is no combination more perfect than this one.

  What's more important is that Su Yifan also knew that no matter how casual and careless Su Xiaoxiao's suggestions seemed, she could always make them come true quickly.

  "Qing jie... we're talking about Zhang Yao, I can't treat her life as a game."

  "Isn't life just a game?" Su Xiaoqing said with a smile, "A game with things you like and people who care about you by your side."

  In this way, Su Yifan was also unable to refute her, he could only silently savor in his heart the suggestion that Su Xiaqing had just made.

  It has to be said that this suggestion is full of temptation and overlaps with Su Yifan's previous thoughts in many ways.

  "But... I still think this is too hasty." Su Yifan thought for a moment and still felt a bit worried, "Zhang Yao will definitely not accept this way, right?"

  "This is your job now." Su Xiaoqing smiled and looked at Su Yifan, "As Zhang Yao's best friend, can you persuade her?"

  Su Yifan was taken aback by the general's words, and he lowered his head, hesitating for a moment.

  "Let me think about it."

  For Su Yifan, this decision was not difficult to make. What he found hard was how to convince Zhang Yao and make the matter look less abrupt.

  "I'm still worried that Zhang Yao won't agree," Su Yifan said honestly. "If it's just asking her to sing a song, there shouldn't be any problem, but if we need to commercially operate on her, this is already at the level of changing someone's life."

  "There's plenty of time, think about it slowly." Su Xiaoqing still had an attitude of not caring about anything, "If you really want to do this, just take good care of Zhang Yao, I'll figure out the rest."

  This condition moved Su Yifan even more, he knew that with Su Xiaqing's style of doing things, as long as she did it, she would definitely do her best. In any case, Su Yifan hoped that Zhang Yao could get out of the current state, but he was still uncertain whether this matter was good or bad for Zhang Yao.

  Su Xiaoqing said what she meant and stopped at that, and afterwards they didn't discuss this matter again.

  Su Yifan was worried and thought about it for a whole night.

  At night, Su Xiaoqing sent Su Yifan back home and put the air notebook computer in his backpack from the secret base.

  After finishing his routine exercise and taking a bath, Su Yifan searched online for a long time by himself and downloaded many documents to his laptop.

  The next day, Su Yifan took his laptop to school and found that although it was just a light laptop, running to school with increased weight would actually increase the amount of exercise exponentially.

  Su Yifan panted and made his way to his seat, pulling out his laptop, which was immediately noticed by Zhang Chao, who looked extremely surprised: "What the...? Are you planning on practicing Dota in school or something?"

  Su Yifan smiled and said: "Nothing, I'm just reading some materials."

  Zhang Chao wanted to take a look at the contents of the laptop, but was blocked by Su Yifan several times before giving up. On the laptop, dozens of PDF and TXT documents were scattered on the hard drive, and Su Yifan carefully flipped through them one by one.

  It was as if he had found the greatest pleasure outside of his textbooks, and Su Yifan stared intently at the computer before morning self-study.

  Li Peiran rolled her eyes and said disdainfully, "What's with the act? It's just an Apple computer."

  Su Yifan closed his computer and looked straight at Li Peiran after hearing this.

  "Yes, in your eyes there are only Apple-branded computers. In my eyes, what I want to learn is more important than the equipment I use."

  Li Peiran didn't know why, but Su Yifan's gaze made him feel a chill run down his spine. Facing that gaze, Li Daban shrank his neck and stopped talking.

  When Cheng Shuiheng arrived at the classroom, Su Yifan greeted her while closing his laptop.

  Cheng Shui Xin was slightly surprised: "Bring this to school, aren't you afraid of losing it?"

  Su Yifan calmly said: "I'm afraid, but when I'm in a hurry to use it, I don't have time to think about that much."

  "What's the rush?" Cheng Shuiheng asked, accustomed to being online on the phone, "This is so showy and not like you at all."

  Su Yifan suddenly realized that the beautiful woman in front of him, who was used to all sorts of scenery, was the real person he should consult. But thinking about it, Zhang Yao hadn't agreed yet, and he couldn't say too much to Cheng Shuiyan, so he hesitated a bit.

  After some deliberation, Su Yifan still decided to swallow his pride and ask.

  "Do you have time at noon? I'll ask you a few questions."

  Cheng Shui Xin was surprised again: "So formal... why are you still being polite with me? Go ahead and ask, I'll answer whatever you want."

  The two of them being so affectionate made Li Pei Ran grit her teeth in annoyance.

  After school in the afternoon, Su Yifan first took Zhang Yao to eat, and then rushed back to the vicinity of the school before class, called Cheng Shuiheng to make an appointment.

  The two went to the coffee shop with Su Yifan's membership card again. Cheng Shui Xin liked this place very much, after ordering a cup of coffee and sitting on the warm sofa, she stretched her waist: "This place is really too expensive, I don't even dare to let you pay... what's going on, just ask me directly."

  Su Yifan thought for a moment before speaking: "I want to ask you, if I plan to package a singer who is extremely introverted... what should I do?"

  Cheng Shui Xin was even more surprised: "How did you suddenly think of this question? And shouldn't the answer to this kind of question be asked of me?"

  "It suddenly occurred to me."

  Su Yifan concealed part of the truth and told a partial truth. He even didn't realize that he had started to get used to this set of behaviors.

  "Can you elaborate?" Cheng Shui Xin was quite interested in this topic.

  Su Yifan thought for a moment and said: "Actually, I just want to ask you, how can we prevent an artist from being ruined by commercial operations while still showcasing her unique qualities and creating commercial value?"

  Cheng Shui Xin shook her head: "What you said is still too vague. Actually, the road to packaging and cultivation is very simple nowadays, of course, on the premise that one has money or power. If one has money, as long as they keep buying charts and advertising, it's fine; if one has power, they need to open up the situation through many economically viable means. Of course, if the singer looks too ugly, it can't be helped but to consider the audience's psychological drop at the beginning, so it's best to show their true face directly from the start and not do those mysterious promotional things."

  "What if the singer already has some fame?"

  "It depends on the specific extent of fame and how to utilize it." Cheng Shuiying stirred her coffee with a small spoon, answering slowly, "Strictly speaking, as long as business operations are involved, there will definitely be some damage to the singer themselves. Unless the company can ignore costs, there will be many troubles... look at Xu Jia Chun, even she has to put on a smiling face for Vice Mayor Wang."

  Su Yifan smiled bitterly: "This is indeed a terrible industry."

  "There's no industry that isn't terrible." Cheng Shuiyi sighed, "But it can't be denied that the entertainment industry has a lot of terrible aspects. Now the record industry has been completely destroyed by electronic downloads, and apart from commercial performances, there is simply no better way for Chinese singers to make money for companies."

  "Isn't downloading itself also a certain market?" Su Yifan already had some understanding of this aspect, "ringtone downloads and whatnot."

  "What you said is the old almanac of a few years ago." Cheng Shuiheng did not mean to mock Su Yifan, but replied seriously, "Now the mobile music market has begun to degenerate, and ringtone downloads are being replaced by more convenient MP3s. The truly valuable part is still in physical form."

  "In other words, if you want a singer's song to truly create value, commercial performance is unavoidable?"

  "It's not necessarily the case." Cheng Shui Xin didn't thoroughly refute Su Yi Fan, "Under various modes, some top-notch existences can emerge, but looking at the current market where songs are becoming more and more vulgarized, wanting to succeed still requires relying on a certain kind of power."

  Su Yifan nodded thoughtfully: "I see... So, it means that the past experience is no longer useful for now?"

  "It's either that, or take the most primitive and old-fashioned route," said Cheng Shuiying. "Now there are probably only these two options. In a situation where the propaganda battlefield is divided by various media and networks, burning money is the safest approach."

  Su Yifan believed Su Xiaqing definitely had enough money to burn, but he didn't want that.

  "Thank you, I really learned a lot today."

  Cheng Shui Xian smiled and said: "You haven't told me why you're suddenly interested in this."

  "While playing 'Idolmaster', I thought of a question." Su Yifan said half-jokingly, "I just want to know if the training methods and ideas in the game are really useful when applied to the real world."

  Cheng Shui Xin laughed upon hearing this: "The conclusions drawn from the game are actually not wrong, it all boils down to those things that need to be done. It's just that strength, luck and methods have a huge difference, which is why the results are different."

  "Yes, but the probability of a person's life being ruined is also very high." Su Yifan said, "There are many examples of stars being inflated, being killed by praise and being blackened to the point of mental collapse."

  "The road to the public will always face these things." Cheng Shuiying said with a sigh, after all, she was also blackened many times in school, "This is also an unavoidable thing."

  "This world is really scary." Su Yifan shook his head with both hands holding a cup of coffee.

  "It's always been this way." Cheng Shui Xin looked at him and said, "That's why we need to become stronger."

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  Today's three shifts are over, I want to go home!