Chapter 1364: With Books, It Is Long; without Books, It Is Short

Morning on March 27.

As the dust settled on the fourth round of the competition, battle reports from all parties were released.

The focus battle between [Warring States] and [Wastewood Alliance] was undoubtedly the top priority of various reports, while the other seeded teams did not receive much attention because they all advanced without any danger.

Of course, like the previous rounds, when the new match list was announced at midnight the next day, people's attention was focused on the new round of lists.

…………

In the fifth round of the Peak Heroes S3, a total of 1,670 teams participated; for the first time since the start of the competition, the number of participating teams reached an even number, which means... no team was given a bye in this round, and all teams had to rely on victory to advance.

However, there was no "focus battle" in this round, and the situation of two strong teams meeting did not occur.

In fact... starting from this round, there was no collision between strong teams for a full five rounds, and no upsets occurred.

These five rounds without any waves turned into a carnival for casual players.

Except for those teams that were unlucky enough to meet the seeded teams, the battles between the folk masters were exciting. Unlike the wins and losses between the top teams, the games between ordinary players had a different flavor... A series of situations that are almost not seen in professional games, such as "low-level mistakes", "coordination mistakes", "wind and waves become wind", "weird tactics", "weird formations", "weird tactics encounter weird tactics", "weird formations encounter weird formations", "low-end fights turn into high-end tug-of-war", etc., are endless in the games between casual players.

If the "strong confrontation" between the seeded teams is compared to the NBA finals, then this kind of "unclear bottom line" and "any weird situation can happen" game is roughly the "mysterious confrontation" you will see when you go to a free street court on a weekend; you will see all professional athletes on the stage of the finals, but you may encounter anyone on the street court... such as the excuse brother, the apology brother, the awkward chat brother, the concave shape brother, the fake cousin brother, the player and coach brother, the foul brother, the no-go brother, the no-pass brother, the tall brother who only shoots three-pointers, the brother who thinks he can dunk but can't, and the mysterious old man who blows up the whole court, etc.... There is always one type you have encountered, or it is you.

A bit off topic...

In short, such a game is also very fun to watch.

…………

With a book, it is long, without a book, it is short.

Although there are no games that need to be written in detail in these five rounds, the elimination process still needs to be explained.

At the end of the fifth round, a total of 835 teams advanced.

In the sixth round, because the number of participating teams returned to an odd number, one team had a bye, and the remaining 834 teams were divided in half.

In the seventh round, 418 teams fought against each other, and no byes were given.

In the eighth round, 209 teams, one team had a bye, and the remaining 208 teams were eliminated.

In the ninth round, a total of 105 teams participated, and one team had a bye.

In this way, by the tenth round of S3, there were 53 teams left, of which professional teams and casual players accounted for about 50% each... and this was exactly what Dream Company expected when it formulated the competition system.

Even though S3 has not yet decided the final champion, from the perspective of business operations, the "full random competition system without preliminaries" adopted in this competition has achieved unprecedented success.

Whether it is the player participation, the popularity of related topics, or the direct or indirect income inside and outside the game... All aspects of the data are exciting; so far, S3 has exceeded the sum of S1 and S2 in terms of user satisfaction and economic benefits, and Dream Company employees can basically celebrate in advance.

Of course, the players don't pay attention to these.

At this stage, the players are most concerned about which team will reach the top of S3.

…………

On April 7, the day when the list of the tenth round of matches was announced, Dream Company updated an announcement on its official website without any warning-"To celebrate the first anniversary of the public beta of Horror Paradise, all RMB items in the online mall will be sold at 50% off for seven days from now on."

Everyone has seen promotions, but this kind of "surprise attack" promotion is really rare; some players did wonder before... Why didn't the game "Horror Paradise" hold a one-year anniversary event? Could it be that the game company forgot about it?

As a result, the players ushered in such a "discount on discount", as if the game company was saying to the majority of players in a perfunctory tone: "There is nothing to celebrate on this day, but since you still remember, I will give you some discounts."

The meaning is unclear...

…………

At midnight on April 8, the tenth round of the game started on time.

Maybe it's because there were no strong teams in the first five rounds, or maybe it's because there are indeed fewer teams now.

Anyway, due to some reasons based on probability that I don't understand very well so I'm too lazy to explain in detail... In this tenth round, "strong confrontations" emerged like a blowout.

First, [Waste Alliance] faced [Hyotei]... Yes, the "Hyotei Cowherd Group" led by [Atobe Young Master] is now a newly emerging first-tier studio. This time, they have easily eliminated three teams from second-tier studios on their way to promotion; judging from their actual performance, [Hyotei]'s combat power is indeed not to be underestimated.

Secondly, it is the battle between [Order] and [Star].

Although [Xingchen] lost a lot of fighting power after losing Xiao Ma Ge, they are still a studio with the purpose of "cultivating star players for external sales". It is difficult to gather seven first-class masters, but it is easy to gather seven newcomers with first-class potential... plus the luck factor of this competition, it is not surprising that they can make it to this round.

But... I am afraid that their luck has run out when they meet [Order] in this round.

Then, there is the duel between [Jianghu] and [Fengyun]; as a first-line studio that I have never mentioned in the previous article but does exist, [Fengyun]'s appearance is destined to be short. For all readers, who will win this game... is clear at a glance, but for the audience in the novel, this is still a very interesting game.

As for other studio teams similar to [Fengyun], although there are a few teams that encounter each other in this round, unfortunately... they have little intersection with the main characters of this book, so I don’t need to list their names one by one.

Next, let's talk about [Hell Frontline]...

This round, Jue Ge and his team's opponent is [Shanhe]. From the overall strength point of view, [Hell Frontline] has a relatively obvious advantage... But the opponent is also a veteran first-line strong team after all, not the kind of team that can be swept by just arranging a lineup, so it needs to be handled with caution.

Furthermore, [Qiu Fengse] and [Matcha Su] in the [Shanhe] team are also candidates for betting, so this will be a direct confrontation between candidates.

Finally... In this round full of various highlights and slots, there is another thing worth mentioning - [Heaven's Gate], a bye.