The Game of Life-Chapter 803 - 802 Making Trouble

Chapter 803: Chapter 802: Making Trouble

Chapter 803 -802: Making Trouble

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Given the one-week break and adjustment time provided by the show’s production team, the Tai Feng Building Quartet unanimously chose to do one thing — slack off.

Though in theory the two-week competition process was no different from their regular work, there was no performance pressure in usual work. No matter the outcome, the mental stress during the competition was always immense. Now, with the chance to catch their breath, nobody wanted to go to work; they all just wanted to happily slack off for a week.

Even though Jiang Feng and Sun Maochai, the two signature chefs, didn’t show up for work, business remained as booming as ever, even reaching the peak levels seen when “Taste” was first published.

The simple reason for such a result was that the second episode of the “Good Taste Sino-US Chef King Challenge” became a hit, quite inexplicably so.

Despite good reviews, the first episode had only modest viewership, managing to just barely break ten million after a week, and that was with purchasing recommended slots. Compared to other variety shows on the market with hundreds of millions or even billions of views, this was akin to a complete flop.

In the second episode, Tai Feng Building managed a spectacular comeback during the Sunday street food test, which definitely had a compelling hook, and even felt like something out of a wish-fulfillment story. But the reason for the episode’s popularity wasn’t this; instead, it was because many viewers realized—

Wow, I was at the snack street that day!

Nothing is more heartbreaking than having been personally present but missing the opportunity.

Perhaps because four of the eight competing restaurants were located in Beiping, a good portion of the “Good Taste Cook-Off” audience and fans were from Beijing locals. As the snack street had become a newly popular hotspot in Beiping, even if the locals claimed to loathe it, they still did what was trendy, shared the obligatory social media posts, and continued their weekend routine of strolling and flaunting their relationships there.

So, many viewers watching the show began to realize, hey, wasn’t I there that day?

And then on a closer look, hey, I passed by this restaurant, but I didn’t join the queue because it was too long at that time.

There were also a few lucky viewers who while watching discovered, wow, I ate there, no wonder I thought it tasted so good.

The post-production of the show was also quite interesting. In the first episode, when each chef appeared, there was a five-second pause before their name flashed on the screen along with a subtitle introducing their background.

For example, Pei Shenghua was introduced as the head chef of Huaiyang Building, with experience as a chef for state banquets. Sun Maochai was one of the head chefs of Tai Feng Building, also with state banquet experience, ranked eleventh on the “Famous Chef List,” and a featured interviewee in the third issue of “Taste,” among other impressive credentials. These introductions were indeed for truly accomplished individuals.

But ordinary viewers weren’t swayed by this.

The majority of viewers didn’t even know what “Taste” was, let alone felt much when they heard someone was a former state banquet head chef. They just thought it sounded quite impressive without feeling deeply about it, especially since there were several contestants who had held that prestigious title, making it seem somewhat commonplace in the show.

Experts of course understood the high value of these brief introductions, but real insiders didn’t need any direct introduction. Just seeing the names was enough to recognize the stature of these chefs. However, to the laymen, no matter what you said, it just didn’t impress much.

It seems that the idiom “a layman is in a different world from an expert” applies here.

For the second episode, the production team learned from their previous failures and used a more direct approach to show ordinary viewers just how remarkable the contestants were.

They displayed the prices of the dishes.

For instance, when the contestants chose a restaurant and went inside to prepare their dishes, the show would zoom in and thoughtfully display subtitles.

If Jiang Feng was preparing porridge, the subtitle next to Jiang Feng would read—

Jiang Feng: Signature dish, Chicken and Tofu Flower Porridge, priced at 1288 per serving, must be ordered three days in advance.

The price of the congee being simmered will then appear below: preserved egg and lean pork congee, 10 yuan per bowl.

What a stark disparity, such a shocking experience.

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For Jiang Feng, this is nothing. The real shocker is Chef Arno, who among all the contestants has the most expensive set meal for sale. A sharp contrast between the 12,888 yuan set meal and the 35 yuan cake slice, who wouldn’t think, damn, that’s real value, I wish I’d had a taste.

Those who missed out feel like they lost 12,888, while those who had it feel like they earned 12,888. Whether late or missed out altogether, as twenty-first-century netizens, they always have to share their joy or regret on social media with a few words.

And then, somehow, they blather their way onto the trending search list.

The name of this trending search is also very odd.

#12888#

At first, passersby thought it was the name of a group. When they clicked in, they found out it was a price. Initially, everyone was angry, thinking which unethical restaurant was selling a slice of cake for 12,888 yuan. On closer inspection, they realized it was about getting a 12,888 yuan experience for just 35 yuan.

After the variety show finally took off, Chef Arno’s decade-long fans started showing up uninvited, and some previously missing industry insiders began to explain just how impressive the contesting chefs in this program were. With a bit of money spent appropriately by the production team to stir things up, the show’s total viewership soared, quickly breaking the 100 million mark.

Although it was Taifeng Building that turned the tide in the second episode, it turned out to be Chef Arno who exploded in popularity across the internet.

All one can say is, Jiang Feng lost to the number 12,888.

This time, Chef Arno didn’t succeed by relying on his shit, but on his effort, his dish prices, his exquisite pastries, and the trending searches bought by the production team.

No matter the process, the result is good in the end. Whoever becomes famous, everyone benefits more or less. With popularity comes business, and good business is the icing on the cake for Taifeng Building, Yonghe House, and the top-floor restaurant, which are all accustomed to thriving business, but for a restaurant like Eight-treasure House, which was nearly pushed to closure by the top-floor restaurant, it was like providing timely help.

By the way, Eight Immortals Restaurant’s disqualification for cheating was not broadcast in the variety show, probably due to some money changing hands, and the production team lightly edited it to appear as if Eight Immortals Restaurant had withdrawn from the competition for some reason. Since they weren’t doing well to begin with, it didn’t attract much attention or discussion, and the other restaurants had no interest in kicking them while they were down, so the matter was glossed over.

Jiang Feng also stayed home quietly and idly, waiting for notification from the production team.

At the end of the test, the staff said that there would be a draw on Wednesday, and the relevant rules would be notified within the week. Jiang Feng originally thought the rules would definitely be announced after the draw, but to his surprise, the production team was efficient enough to announce the rules for the second stage of the competition on Tuesday morning, even before Wednesday.

Jiang Feng wasn’t wrong, the production team was indeed up to something.

The rules for the second stage of the competition were very interesting, to say the least, they were quite challenging.

The second stage was a swap competition. The existing seven restaurants would draw lots to determine which restaurant they would go to. During the swap, the four contestants could only make the dishes on the original menu of the drawn restaurant, with no alterations allowed. Moreover, before the swap, each contestant could select one dish from their own menu as a mandatory dish to make.

Contestants must sell a hundred of their mandatory dishes each week and acquire at least fifty positive reviews. If not completed, they would lose a penalty of two thousand points.

The drawing time was set for Wednesday night at eight o’clock, while the submission time for the mandatory dishes was seven o’clock the same evening, meaning everyone had to choose the difficulty for their opponents before the draw.

Each restaurant has several signature dishes that are unlearnable by outsiders. If one were cruel enough to choose five signature dishes, it would certainly be hellish.

The production team was indeed causing trouble.