Chapter 610: Communication? Negotiation!

Liang Yan still underestimated their influence.

The day after streaming PUBG, Riot sent VG a formal email.

The email came from the head of Riot's Balance Design Department, who, under the pretense of publicly soliciting feedback on version changes, invited the entire VG team to a seminar on the future direction of League of Legends version changes, and bolded the following in the email:

【This meeting, from its convening to its content, must be kept strictly confidential.】

Well, secretly soliciting opinions publicly.

Gao Jun, the first to receive the email, couldn't help but laugh.

After reading the email, Gao Jun immediately forwarded it to Lu Wenjun.

A few minutes later, Lu Wenjun appeared in Gao Jun's office, his face full of surprise.

"Is the email you sent me really from Riot?!"

"Confirmed, boss—it really came from the head of Riot's Balance Department!"

……

Lu Wenjun fell silent for a moment, then couldn't help but exclaim:

Looks like they value Liang Yan far more than we expected. Liang Yan really hit the mark this time…… Riot is panicking.

Gao Jun was more direct, chuckling:

"I think Riot has backed off and is proactively reaching out to us!"

Lu Wenjun nodded, smiling, thought a moment, then added:

"Like this, you notify everyone—after lunch we'll hold a meeting to discuss what we should say and prepare."

Okay!

Actually, it wasn't a lucky accident; Liang Yan did it on purpose, but he doesn't need to explain this to anyone.

……

That afternoon, Gao Jun called the entire team to the meeting room.

"What? Riot wants to hold a meeting with us?"

"Holy shit!"

"Is this for real? It can't be a scam, right?"

"Scam your ass!"

"But why?" Easyhoon asked, baffled—he had never heard of a game company summoning a team to talk about game balance.

Still, Gangzi, with his broad perspective, instantly grasped the key point, speaking in a slick tone:

"Last night Jiao Shen streamed a bit of PUBG, and today Riot comes to us for a meeting—obviously they're scared Jiao Shen will switch games and steal their audience~"

Xiao Duan instantly got excited: "Holy shit, Gangzi makes sense!"

Everyone agreed, instinctively turning to look at that insanely flashy blue guy.

Liang Yan sat in the meeting room chair, showing some surprise; facing everyone's gaze, he feigned innocence by spreading his hands.

"What are you looking at me for? I don't get it either."

Everyone raised their middle fingers in unison.

Even Sima Laozei couldn't help but say: "You're definitely doing this on purpose—I felt last night that teaming up with you in a shooter wasn't with good intentions."

Liang Yan: ……

Alright, he indeed intended to put pressure on Riot by streaming PUBG, but he truly didn't expect their response to come so quickly and formally.

Alright, alright!

Gao Jun pressed down his hand to quiet the crowd, then spoke solemnly:

"Calling everyone here is to discuss what we should say when we meet with Riot, or more bluntly, what we want to gain and what demands we should raise. Now let's discuss these points—feel free to speak your mind……"

The VG team meeting began.

Zhu Xiaolong pulled out his notebook packed with dense notes, while Tabe pulled up the recent version updates; the meeting room grew noisy again as everyone chatted over each other.

Liang Yan also offered some opinions:

"……Specific hero buffs or nerfs don't need to be mentioned; they don't affect us."

"……They'll definitely nerf the jungler's role; they could cut Wild Core or buff utility players, but the jungler must never become a support—that's the bottom line……"

……

The next day, 9 a. m.

The opinion exchange meeting between VG and Riot on version change direction was held via video link, with each side in their own meeting room.

The connection used Gao Jun's laptop, which he projected onto the meeting room screen.

When the screen lit up, the view of Riot Headquarters' Design Department meeting room appeared before the VG members; over ten people attended, the lineup was impressively high-ranking—not only Riot's current Design Department head Maikesi, but even one of Riot's bosses, Ta Da Mi Er, appeared on screen.

Ta Da Mi Er sat at the end of the table facing the camera; after the video link connected, he smiled and waved at the VG crowd.

"Hello, VG friends, I'm Tryndamere."

"Today's meeting was supposed to be hosted by Maikesi, but I heard Fire has been playing another game lately……"

"Oh, please relax—I'm not here to accuse you; I just want to confirm whether our top player is considering a career change……"

"Yes, I know—PUBG is a game many of our employees are addicted to; it's indeed very appealing, but I also really don't want it to lure our best player away from Summoner's Rift……"

Wow, he got straight to the point right away.

After finishing his opening remarks, Ta Da Mi Er moved on to the main topic:

"Today's meeting is to hear VG friends' opinions on the future game version direction, but first I want to make one thing clear——"

"VG is too strong; to avoid making the S7 World Championship boring, we must necessarily weaken VG's strengths in the game environment, and I believe everyone here can understand and accept that."

"Based on this consensus, let's discuss the 'extent' of the issue……"

Everyone present, whether they understood English or not, looked baffled; even the translator kid was dazed, grasping only half, because Ta Da Mi Er's speech was overly professional, packed with advanced vocabulary.

So Liang Yan had to act as the interpreter.

Then everyone on VG's side immediately understood; today's meeting, rather than being an exchange of opinions, is more accurately described as a "negotiation."

Gao Jun felt a bit uncomfortable after hearing that.

What does it mean that weakening VG is necessary? I'm strong, so I deserve to be nerfed? Where in the world is there such reasoning! We anticipated it and could accept it, but that doesn't mean you can just say such things to our face so recklessly!

But wait……

If we view this meeting from a negotiation standpoint, could the other side have said that on purpose to probe VG's bottom line?

How sneaky, I almost fell for it!

Gao Jun instantly calmed down, smiled at the camera, and spoke in Chinese:

"Yes, thank you very much for inviting us to participate in this exchange conference..."