Chapter 1392 The Short and Powerful "Agents Academy"

A few minutes later, Wu Chuan knocked and entered.

"Boss Pei, this is the first episode of the *Agents Academy* anime, made according to your previous instructions."

As Wu Chuan spoke, he handed over the tablet.

Pei Qian reached out, took it, and clicked play directly.

Less than a quarter of an hour later, Pei Qian fell silent as he watched the video finish playing.

Good heavens, the length!

It was over before he knew it, catching him completely off guard.

When Pei Qian watched *Successor*, each episode was an hour long. He could watch three episodes of *Successor* in the conference room after work in the afternoon and then go home.

But this *Agents Academy* was different. Including the opening and ending credits, the first episode was only 14 minutes long!

In other words, cutting out the opening and ending, this episode was only 10 minutes long.

Although he had expected *Agents Academy* to be short, he never expected it to be *this* short!

Of course, he couldn't blame Wu Chuan, since Pei Qian had originally requested it.

Wu Chuan spent a lot of effort inspecting all the domestic animation studios, but Pei Qian was not satisfied. He felt that there was too much potential for these animation studios to make money, so he slapped his head and decided to do it himself in the way he made games, using real-time rendering to make anime.

Of course, Wu Chuan also offered many opinions, mainly saying that if he wanted to do real-time rendering, the models would have to be remade, he would have to find special motion capture actors, it would not be easy to control costs, the difficulty was too high, and so on.

So Pei Qian was happy, that's exactly what he wanted!

In the end, *Agents Academy* was forcibly made using real-time rendering. Wu Chuan pulled a group of people from within Fei Huang Workshop and poached a group of people from outside, and started production with a stiff upper lip.

Of course, Pei Qian also provided the greatest financial support. How could he stand by when there was such a good thing to burn money?

Pei Qian's original request was that each episode should be fifteen to twenty minutes long, which was a good length.

As long as an episode was made before the settlement, it would be considered a completed task. At least the project would be considered launched, and the system couldn't find fault with that, right?

Now it seemed that Wu Chuan had completed the task ahead of schedule, but the completion of his task was a bit discounted.

What about the promised fifteen to twenty minutes? This was clearly only ten minutes!

Short and weak!

Pei Qian said, "It seems to be... a little shorter than I imagined."

Wu Chuan quickly explained, "Actually, I originally planned to make it more than fifteen minutes long, but in the actual production process, I found that the original *Agents Academy* itself is a relatively fragmented story. Ten minutes is more suitable. With fifteen minutes, it's hard to end in a particularly perfect place."

"Moreover, after all, this is a new way of making anime, full of risks. It's better to make the first episode shorter, and release a finished product to see the effect. If any problems are found, they can be corrected in time."

"Of course, if Boss Pei thinks the time is too short and the audience may not accept it, then I can go back and cut it again, cut in some of the content planned for the second episode, to make up fifteen minutes, or simply combine the two into a twenty-minute episode."

Pei Qian raised his hand, "Forget it, actually, looking at it this way, a length of ten minutes is also acceptable."

He suddenly realized that the shorter it was and the more it ended on a cliffhanger, wouldn't the audience dislike it more?

Being shorter wasn't necessarily a bad thing.

The quality of the first episode was, in all fairness, alright.

Not particularly good, but not particularly bad either.

Although there were ready-made hero models in GOG, and the models were very detailed, it was still not enough to directly use them to make anime. After all, GOG's perspective determined that it was not necessary to achieve the level of detail of a single-player game, as that would take up more resources and cause lag on some low-end computers, reducing the player base.

Therefore, although the *Agents Academy* production team could directly use the hero models and some scene materials from GOG, they still needed to refine and adjust them.

From the finished product, *Agents Academy* was definitely a qualitative improvement compared to some amateur-made anime and short dramas.

After all, the entire anime production team was transferred from Fei Huang Workshop, and some professionals were poached from outside. This regular army was by no means comparable to ordinary amateurs.

But on the other hand, the production level of the first episode of *Agents Academy* was still far behind some foreign anime and the works of domestic first-class anime production companies.

Considering the large amount of resources that Tenda Corporation invested in *Agents Academy*, and the speed of content production...

This project seemed alright? Could it lose money?

Pei Qian calculated that the last time Wu Chuan came to him to formally finalize *Agents Academy* was at the end of October last year, so formal production should have started in early November, which was about two months.

Only one episode in two months? Ten minutes?

That efficiency was truly touching.

Of course, Pei Qian had no intention of blaming him at all, but felt that Wu Chuan had done a great job.

There had to be more employees like this in order to lose money!

Even if the process became more skilled later and the production speed increased, the efficiency would at most double, right?

One episode a month, no more than that.

As a result, each episode was only ten minutes long. Even if the viewership went through the roof, how much money could it make?

Since *Agents Academy* was a short-form anime, it would inevitably have to negotiate cooperation with video websites like *Successor*, either a one-time buyout or a split based on viewership and popularity.

But *Agents Academy* was not as good as *Successor*!

No matter how much *Successor* was criticized now, it was still a high-standard, big-budget production, and there were cameos from movie stars like Lu Zhiyao, which could fool Aili Island website.

But what did *Agents Academy* have to offer? At most, it would receive the same treatment as other domestic anime.

Whether it was a buyout or a split, it wouldn't make much money.

Considering the production cycle and the quality...

Steady!

Of course, there was also the plot of *Agents Academy* that had to be considered.

Pei Qian felt that the plot was alright, it was a good reproduction of the original work. In short, it used the hero characters in GOG as the background and told the funny daily lives of a group of Agents (that is, players). Many of the memes used were relatively widespread in reality, and some original jokes were created. It was more than enough to be a video to watch while eating.

But was it particularly, particularly wonderful?

Just so-so.

In short, this was an anime with a decent plot and quality, but factors such as time, investment, and update frequency determined that it would definitely not be a big hit.

That was reassuring.

"Okay, I think it's pretty good, just release it!" Pei Qian handed the tablet back.

Wu Chuan was stunned for a moment, "Release it just like that? Boss Pei, won't you give some advice or make some changes?"

Pei Qian shook his head, "What's there to give advice on? I don't understand this stuff very well. You're all professionals, you'll definitely do better than me."

"Besides, from the perspective of a senior Aili Island viewer, it's well-made, and it's completely fine as a video to watch while eating. Since the quality is already at this point, there's no need to go any further."

"Seize the time, speed is the most important thing!"

Pei Qian tried his best to instill the idea of "good enough is enough" in Wu Chuan, hoping that the quality of *Agents Academy* would stop here and never improve.

Even if there were any small problems, don't change them, good enough is good enough.

Wu Chuan nodded, "Okay, Boss Pei, I'll do as you say, I'll contact the video website."

"Then... what kind of charging model should we use for *Agents Academy*? If it's a buyout, I'm afraid that since this is the first time we're making anime, the price won't be very high..."

Pei Qian waved his hand, "That's easy to handle. You go find Huang Sibolan and talk to Aili Island website again. Just like *Successor*, calculate the split according to factors such as viewership and ratings."

"But it still has to be a bit different from *Successor*. The influence of the rating factor should be as low as possible, and the influence of total viewership and total viewing time should be higher."

Pei Qian thought that the production level of *Agents Academy* itself was acceptable. Although it couldn't compare to some of the top domestic animated films, it could be considered one of the best in the domestic anime section of the Aili Island website.

Considering the GOG players' love for this theme, and the fact that comedy short dramas might naturally have an advantage, the rating might not be low, and the situation was completely incomparable to that faced by *Successor*.

Since that was the case, then shift the focus of the split towards total viewership, especially total viewing time.

With the turtle-like update frequency of *Agents Academy*, and the short and powerful length like an embroidery needle, how much viewership could 10 minutes of main content a month get?

Even if the viewership was good, the total time wouldn't be a problem, right?

Wu Chuan was stunned for a moment, but he didn't say anything and nodded, "Okay, Boss Pei, I'll arrange it."

Watching Wu Chuan leave, Pei Qian couldn't help but feel a little happy.

Double happiness!

*Successor* aired two more episodes last weekend, and Meng Chang's publicity resources were still being poured into it, but the situation was still not getting any better. The ratings fluctuated, but overall they were still very low.

Now, while the iron was hot, *Agents Academy* was released. Even if the word of mouth was good, as long as it didn't make money, everything would be fine.

Counting it like this, of the three copyright adaptation projects from the Inspiration Class of Qidian Chinese Website, two lost money and one made money.

Only *Eternal Reincarnation* made money, which was completely acceptable.

After all, with the popularity of *Turn Back to the Shore* first, and the fact that it was developed by Tenda's game department, it was reasonable to make money.

What's more, he also gained Yu Fei as the chief designer and arranged for Hu Xianbin. All in all, it was not a loss.

Thinking about it this way, it was still quite optimistic!