A Snapshot of the Life You Just Lived

Hello everyone, this time I want to talk about an update that doesn’t seem so “core gameplay”: the ending poster.

At the end of each game of International Student Simulator, an ending will be given. This ending may be decent, it may be embarrassing, it may be like a memory of joy in suffering, or it may make people unable to help but say, "Why is it me again?" It turns out that the ending page mainly provides copy text to facilitate players to save the story of this round.

But copying text is a bit too light.

After finishing a game, especially a text simulation game, players actually need something more like a "souvenir". Not to show off, not to prove anything, just to keep this round. Just like looking at an old photo many years later, the photo itself may not capture anything major, but you will suddenly think of the weather, that person, and the unspoken words that day.

So we added "generate ending poster".

The poster is a vertical picture, which contains the most important things of this game: ending title, ending content, route and character design, final five dimensions, illustration progress, and an achievement summary. It is not a report card, nor a certificate, but more like a small card for this random period of life.

This time, a QR code pointing to `/liuzi` was added to the bottom of the poster.

This change is small, but I quite like it. Because if an ending picture is really saved or shared, it shouldn't just stop at "This is my ending." It should also bring the other person back to the game entrance so they can try their hand.

Of course, when the QR code fails to load, the poster cannot be generated. Then the bottom will fall back to display `vibesims.com/liuzi`. This is the truest aspect of many small features: ideally it is beautiful, but in reality it at least cannot be too ugly.

In order to make the poster more stable, the layout has also been recompressed this time.

The ending title, main text, five-dimensional attributes, achievement summary, short description and QR code are all packed into a 600×960 vertical image. It sounds like a lot of space, but it quickly runs out of space. In particular, the ending text of International Student Simulator is not always very short. Some endings are inherently talkative, like a person who has finally graduated and has been holding back for several years and has to say a few more words.

So we removed some of the instructions under the final attributes, leaving more space for the ending itself and the bottom information. The poster does not need to explain everything, it only needs to let people see at a glance: what happened in this round, who you became, and what you took away in the end.

Generating posters and copying ending copy are two independent paths.

I deliberately didn't rub them together here. Copying copy is copying copy, and generating posters is generating posters. If the poster fails, copying should not be affected; system sharing is not supported, and the image preview should not disappear.

So the current process is: click Generate, open the preview after success; if the device supports system sharing, try to share; if not, keep the image, you can long press to save or share manually. When the build fails, it only prompts to try again, the button restores, and the original ending is still there.

I really like this "do not disturb the original function" update method.

Many times, the biggest problem with a new function is not that it is not strong enough, but that it breaks the old function in order to express itself. The ending poster should be an extra souvenir and should not become a new burden on the ending page.

When I was making the poster this time, I also rethought the ending of "Ryuko Simulator".

It's not victory or defeat in the traditional sense. You may have a high GPA but low spirit, you may have good money but loose connections, you may not seem to be doing anything well, but there is an additional route in the illustrated book that belongs only to this round.

Therefore, the poster does not want to package players as "successful people". It's just an honest record of what you went through in this round, where you arrived, and in what state you stood on the checkout page.

Some games are brilliant, and some games are broken.

But I think they all deserve a photo.

If you generated the ending poster, please save it. When you see it one day in the future, you may think that scene was outrageous, or you may think of an even more outrageous moment in reality.

May every ending be more than just an ending.

I also hope that many years from now, when you look back at this game, you can smile and say: It was really difficult at that time, but I actually made it through.

VibeSims / International Student Simulator