Only After I Was Reborn Did I Realize That I Had Childhood Sweethearts
Chapter 135: Studio NamingIn early 2011, Weixin[1] had just emerged, and mobile payments were still in their early stages. Setting up online mobile payment wasn’t an easy task; one had to go to the bank.
Mei Fang had taken care of this matter during the summer vacation, so he could use Taobao[2] to order his laptop online.
However, logistics in this era weren’t particularly fast. It took a whole week for the three Alienware M11X laptops Mei Fang had purchased for 40,000 yuan to be delivered from Shanghai to Jiangcheng. They arrived on the first weekend of the first week of summer camp.
The task of informing Liang Meijuan about the “school-provided laptops” was assigned to Lin Youxi.
In the eyes of her stepmother, Lin Youxi had always been an exemplary and hardworking child, so she had always trusted her words. This made Lin Youxi feel a bit guilty.
To reassure Liang Meijuan, everyone’s laptops were usually kept in the living room. This also involved setting up a network broadband connection, and Mei Fang managed to convince Liang Meijuan to apply for the 10 Mbps internet broadband, which was extremely rare at this time.
In this era, the bandwidth for home computers was mostly around 2 Mbps, which meant a download speed of 200 Kbps. From Mei Fang’s perspective who came from the year 2022, this was incredibly slow. But the 10 Mbps broadband could guarantee a download speed of around 1 Mbps.
Of course, the price for this was about four times that of a 2 Mbps connection. The annual internet fee was 3,200 yuan, which could be considered a substantial amount, almost equivalent to Liang Meijuan’s monthly salary.
Although Mei Fang and Xia Yuan said they could pay for it themselves, Liang Meijuan was worried that the children wouldn’t have enough living expenses, so she reluctantly paid the money.
Liang Meijuan didn’t interfere too much with what the children were doing. She trusted Mei Fang and the others quite a bit, much more than the trust Mei Fang and the others received from the other five parents of the three families.However, keeping their actual actions hidden from Liang Meijuan all this time made the trio feel guilty.
So on weekends, they would help Liang Meijuan with household chores. Xia Yuan would clean the house, and Lin Youxi would accompany Liang Meijuan to buy groceries.
Only Mei Fang, the little computer geek, was busy setting up the laptops and configuring the internet connection. He would lend a hand only when Xia Yuan needed help with cleaning.
“We don’t need these cardboard boxes anymore, right?”
Xia Yuan put down the broom and held the unpacked laptop packaging, asking Mei Fang, “Should I throw them away?”
“We don’t need the boxes, just keep three warranty certificates.”
“Is it these?”
“Mhm, mhm… just put them on the coffee table, I’ll take care of them later.”
Mei Fang glanced at Xia Yuan and continued to busy himself with setting up the laptops. As he was working, Xia Yuan suddenly pinched his shoulder from behind and leaned in close to him. “Is it done?”
“Mhm… almost.”
“So from today onwards, are you going to code together with Youxi again?”
“Besides coding, I need to check the planning document written by Zhang Ming and the text written by Yue Xinyi.”
Xia Yuan asked in surprise, “Is he really helping you now?”
“Yeah… but it’s probably only during the summer break when he has more free time. Once school officially starts, he probably won’t have time. After all, I gave him such a good car, so I have to make good use of him.”
While Mei Fang was talking, Xia Yuan had been leaning on his shoulder, looking at the screen. However, she only behaved so freely when Lin Youxi and Liang Meijuan were not around.
Of course, Mei Fang was unaware of the agreement Xia Yuan and Lin Youxi had about not taking their relationship with him further. He was still focused on balancing his affection towards the two. As long as Yuan Yuan didn’t cross any boundaries, he wouldn’t resist.
“Is there anything I can help with? Everyone is currently helping you with work. I’ve handed over all the game’s copywriting to Yue Xinyi, and she seems happy to do it.”
“Well… you could learn music arrangement software, not just for creating game music and sound effects, but it will also be helpful for your future in music! How about trying out FL Studio? It’s a powerful music production software.”
“Okay, I’ll search and download it, then I’ll study some tutorials.”
Xia Yuan wiped her hands to dry them and took a seat nearby.
Mei Fang saw her mop placed aside, indicating that only the last bit of mopping was left, so he took the initiative to finish the task.
“Shall I finish mopping the floor for you?”
“Yes, please. Thank you, Ah Fang!”
When Mei Fang was almost done mopping the floor, Liang Meijuan and Lin Youxi happened to return and knock on the door. Xia Yuan immediately got up from her chair as if she had been shocked.
Wearing her slippers, she quickly urged Mei Fang to open the door, while she took the mop pretending to finish the last touch-ups.
“We’re back.”
“Mhm… Yuan Yuan is mopping the floor, working so hard.”
Xia Yuan smiled guiltily at Liang Meijuan, “It’s nothing, it’s what I should do… Oh, oh, don’t walk too fast, the floor isn’t dry yet.”
“Alright.”
Lin Youxi carried the groceries and went to the kitchen with Liang Meijuan. Liang Meijuan nudged Lin Youxi and said, “You can go watch TV or play computer with Ah Fang for a while. I’ll handle the cooking.”
“It’s alright, Auntie. Let me help you——”
Liang Meijuan became unhappy: “My job is to take care of you three. Why do you always have to help me with everything?”
She continued, “You’re all good kids, that’s for sure. But usually, you eat at the school cafeteria, so practically, I only have work on weekends. You can’t take over all my tasks. I also need to make my life not boring, you know?”
Liang Meijuan intentionally spoke loudly so that Xia Yuan could also hear, indicating that the children didn’t need to be too sensible or obedient.
“After finishing the meal, the three of you should go out and have some fun. Don’t stay at home all the time, it’s so boring.”
“Okay…”
So Liang Meijuan kicked the three kids out of the house in the afternoon.
“Where should we go? Where should we go?” Xia Yuan became excited as soon as she stepped out. “By the way, we haven’t watched a movie together in Jiangcheng. Should we go to the movie theater in the city center?”
Mei Fang shook his head. “It’s quite far from here to the city center. It would take a two-hour drive back and forth.”
“Ah…” Xia Yuan wore a disappointed expression. “That’s too far, we won’t make it back in time for evening self-study.”
“It’s so hot outside right now. How about finding a milk tea shop to hang out for the afternoon?” Lin Youxi suggested. “And then we can find something to do.”
“Well… what can we do outside?” Xia Yuan thought for a moment. “Ah Fang, do you have any good ideas?”
“Oh, I actually have something to ask for everyone’s opinion,” Mei Fang explained. “It’s about naming our game studio.”
When Mei Fang released Flappy Bird on the international internet, 【ClaringMay】 (CleverMei) was the one he used as its game development team name. Next, he planned to take advantage of the release of the iPhone 4 and start accumulating a reputation and fame in the local game industry.
Life Restart Simulator and Reigns were the games he intended to release on the App Store during the National Day in October. Because they were text-based games, the programming and art resources were already done, and they were just waiting to finalize the game balance and test for bugs. Therefore, they needed a name for their studio.
The name of this studio would hold special significance for Mei Fang. The mentioned games were merely remakes of other people’s successes, but creating a studio would be the first step for Mei Fang to expand his own game territory and establish his presence in the industry.
The three of them found a milk tea shop across from the Jiangcheng NOHS. Since it was a weekend of summer vacation, there were some students from their school who were living on the campus gathering here. Mei Fang and his friends didn’t mind and found a less noticeable corner to sit in. Xia Yuan brought stickers and pens and distributed them to Mei Fang and Lin Youxi.
“Ah Fang, before we think of a name, I have a question to ask,” Xia Yuan said, rubbing her hands together. “Um… my contribution to the game is minimal right now, even less than Yue Xinyi and Guo Yun. Is it really appropriate for me to participate in choosing the name?”
“What’s inappropriate about that? We are a startup team of three, and it’s not determined by the amount of work each person does. Besides, Yuan Yuan, your role will become more and more important later on. Be prepared, because I will be strict with you.”
“Okay… that’s good.” Xia Yuan smiled and stuck out her tongue. “Actually, I’m just being considerate…”
Lin Youxi suggested, “Since it’s a studio founded by the three of us together, a common naming method is to take one character from each person’s name to form the name of the studio, right?”
“Then it would be called ‘Mei You Yuan Studio,’ which sounds quite attractive.” Mei Fang often liked to use this combination to tease her, and this time he was knocked hard on the head by Xia Yuan.
“You’re not allowed to use such an inauspicious name! Your surname is too difficult to work with! Don’t use ‘Mei’ in the name!”
“Fang Xi Yuan, Xi Yuan Fang, You Fang Yuan, Yuan You Fang…”
Lin Youxi wrote down all the possible combinations, and Xia Yuan watched her from the side, unable to help but sigh.
“This won’t work either… We can’t come up with fitting words by combining the names of the three of us!”
“Then let’s think of other combinations.”
Mei Fang suggested, “Let’s take the initials of our names in pinyin and recombine them to form the name of the studio. For example, ‘M’ for Mei Fang, ‘L’ or ‘Y’ for Lin Youxi, and ‘X’ for Xia Yuan, combined together.”
As Mei Fang spoke, he straightened his waist, looking quite pleased with himself. “This way, we can be called MiXi Games or MiLe Games. When we become famous in the future, we’ll be known as the three giants of MiXi Games.”
“That method is indeed a good one, but that title, the three giants of MiXi Games——'”
Xia Yuan expressed her disdain, “It sounds too strange! Whether it’s MiXi or MiLe, it doesn’t sound good, it’s quite forced.”
“I also think so.” Lin Youxi nodded.
“To think you would dislike it, I thought it was not bad…”
They found themselves in a predicament.
They didn’t expect naming a game studio to be such a troublesome task.
“Let’s have some milk tea first and then think about it!”
While sipping their milk tea, the three of them brainstormed for new ideas, and Xia Yuan was gradually conquered by the sweet pleasure brought by the milk tea.
“Oh! This milk tea tastes so good! Besides the pearls, it also has many toppings like pudding, coconut jelly, and sago!”
“Sago… sago…”
Mei Fang slapped his forehead, “I have a good idea! Xia Yuan’s X, my name’s M, and Lin Youxi’s L. With just the initials of our surnames, couldn’t we form the name Ximilu Studio[3]?”
“Hey hey! That sounds good, I like it!”
Xia Yuan raised her hand to express agreement, “I like this name, Ximilu Studio. It sounds sweet at first listen!”
Lin Youxi added from the side, “I remember the English word for ximi is sago. It sounds a lot like saikou[4] in Japanese. Using it as the English name and name for the studio is also a suitable choice. It’s simple, easy to read, and rolls off the tongue.”
“Mhm, mhm! Let’s settle on this! Ximilu Studio, mmm, it really sounds sweet!”
Sipping her milk tea with added sago, Xia Yuan had a very happy smile on her face.
Translator's Notes:
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