Yesterday, Maxim, Ian, and I had several tasks related to the game. We met at Maxim’s place. Elena’s part was finished, and she focused on her exams. We had never worked with such large software before; it was nearly fifteen thousand lines. We made sure to be cautious with any changes. Additionally, we needed to exchange several emails regarding promotion and potential investments. These were things we had never done before. No one in our circle of family or neighbors had done anything similar. We didn’t have anyone to ask for advice.
Everything is much simpler when working on something that previous generations have already done. The wisdom accumulated over decades or even longer. The experience that has built up through countless iterations. Usually, it’s enough to just look at tradition, listen to how the majority works, and simply do the opposite. Then we’d know we were doing it right.
But now there was no reference experience. We had to do everything ourselves.
The first two tasks were changes to the htaccess file. Any modification of this file could cause the game to stop working entirely, so we were careful. Ian wrote the instructions in the file, and Maxim and I tested the changes. The first change was successful.
“I didn’t screw it up, did I?”
“No, you didn’t.”
“Okay, but there’s another one I could screw up.”
Surprisingly, both changes worked on the first try. Usually, nothing goes according to plan, and nothing can be finished without difficulty.
We decided that starting today, we would be in closed beta testing. We’d invite about thirty of our acquaintances who play games to try Camp 16. Max and Ian would invite their friends from the server, as they play a lot of online games.
Then I read an email from Mr. Jovanović, Marko’s acquaintance and investor. He was coming to Novi Sad, and Marko had mentioned our game and our team to him. We had earlier sent him a description of the game, some graphics, and a video showing the basic functionalities. He wrote that he was thrilled with everything he had seen and wanted to meet us tomorrow.
I read the email to Maxim and Ian, and we informed Elena. Everyone was happy.
We reviewed the presentation that the three of us had made for Mr. Jovanović yesterday, and we didn’t find anything to correct. We needed to send it to Elena for review. Maxim noticed a problem.
“Elena is going to read this ten times to find a mistake. It’s better to put an obvious one so she can find it right away, then she won’t suffer.“
Ian said we should definitely do that.
“It will be better for her health if she finds we made a mistake.”
He changed “All the time during testing…” to “The whole entire time during testing…” and saved the presentation.
We hadn’t finished all the tasks; we had only worked for about half an hour. Maxim suggested that we go play tennis.
“We’ve done enough work today, and we have good news. I’m done working.”
Ian was up for it, but I still felt like working. Things had started well, and it wasn’t the right time to stop. Maxim insisted, so I eventually agreed. I definitely needed to practice and stretch my arm. Yanko had been playing since April with Lazar. He’d probably beat me now. He’ll call me soon because he knows I’m out of shape.
We headed to the tennis court. Maxim hadn’t been there in more than ten years, but he decided to start playing again this year. He pulled his racket bag out of the basement. Inside the bag was the membership card for the tennis club with stamps for the 1993 and 1994 seasons. Also, there was a metal tube with tennis balls. I opened it to see what condition the balls were in. The air that had been trapped in there since the time of sports sanctions came out. It didn’t smell good.
We picked up new balls on the way, and Ian and I stopped by our apartments to change clothes.
On the way, they told me they were going to kick me out of the company because of my excessive enthusiasm. I said I’d sue for a million-dollar settlement and that it wasn’t a problem for them to pay in installments. They didn’t like the idea.
We finally arrived. Next to us, some guys were playing, and one man, about ten years older than them, was winning, so the others kept rotating. They were talking loudly, and we later realized they were state oil company workers playing with their boss.
Maxim and Ian played first, and I ran after the balls to warm up faster.
“Starting today, we’re officially in closed beta, let the games begin.” I opened the match with my hands in the air.
The first point: Ian hit the ball three meters behind the baseline, so I ran to get it. On the other court, the boss also hit the ball out, but by no more than one meter.
“Good one, boss,” yelled the guy playing against him.
We stayed on the tennis court for almost two hours, and we didn’t tell Elena where we had been. Maxim gave me one of the two old rackets because I was about to play with Yanko, and my racket was in Banja Luka.
“Don’t return it, let it be compensation from the company. Is it okay now?”
During the tennis match, I had trouble focusing, as usual. I kept thinking about the situation from Friday. The plan was to sit at Maxim’s place before going out to the city. We were drinking rakija. Suddenly, I realized I couldn’t get up. While I was sitting, everything was fine, but I couldn’t get on my feet. Max helped me to another room, and I lay there. I thought I’d fall asleep soon. Elena thought it was a good opportunity to find out what curse word my uncle’s clubmates used. She appeared above me and started questioning me. Of course, even drunk, I couldn’t tell her. I remember that she insisted I tell her, but I don’t remember all the parts of the conversation, maybe just the first few minutes. The problem is that later she slapped me, and I don’t remember why. I remember the slap vaguely. It seems like I only heard it; I didn’t really feel it physically. I wonder if I did something completely inappropriate. I mentioned it to Ian and Maxim. They both heard the slap, but they say Elena wasn’t upset. They think everything is fine. Max says he saw her holding my shirt with both fists while demanding that I admit what my uncle had said.
“Gari, I think that slap had been building up for a while, judging by the sound. I don’t think it was because of anything you did then. It was probably just a method of interrogation.”
I had to call Elena after tennis. She doesn’t believe that I don’t remember why she slapped me. I could hear in her voice that everything was fine between us, but she wouldn’t tell me what I had done wrong.
The next day, we all met with Mr. Jovanović and presented what we were working on. He was even more impressed. He had no remarks.
After the meeting, I spoke with Marko and told him the impression from the meeting was pretty good. Marko laughed.
“He tells everyone that. That’s how he communicates. He rarely invests in teams, but now that you’ve met him, you never know.“
My optimism about the project decreased.
Where is that Boyana Dosen now? Why she hasn’t been contacting me?
