Chapter 123 27. Combine vertically and horizontally

Author: Pure Miwan

Chapter 123 27. Combine vertically and horizontally

In the evening, Chigen Ao, Nao Tsuda, and Ken Kutaragi of Sony had dinner with Tom Kolinsky.

A few full glasses of dark beer, steaks and meat.

Eat heartily.

Speaking of what happened at the press conference today, until now, Kolinsky still feels scared.

"I was really shocked at the time," Qing Zhiyuan said. "The screen was burned, and I didn't know how to get it back. Mr. Kolinsky's on-site reaction ability was really great."

"Haha, did you see it?" Kolinski laughed.

Qing Zhiyuan said, I am also a person who has gone to school, okay? Some simple magic tricks are easy to see through.

"Fortunately, things are over now, so things should be going smoothly." Collinski said with a smile.

"Of course, not only was it smooth, but with all the twists and turns, today's press conference will also become a classic in a few years," Kutaragi said.

It wasn't until now that he realized that something had really happened after a long time.

"But, Mr. Kolinsky, can I bring back Neon with this broken machine? The Sega staff and I need to repair it and figure out what went wrong."

"good."

Kolinski didn't care that much and handed the game console to Kutaragi Ken.

"But, Mr. Kolinski, are you not worried at all about being exposed by the media in the future?" Ken Kutaragi asked, "After all, this magic trick is too simple. As long as there is a video, you can find it by comparing the positions of the front and back pockets.

Bar?"

"It doesn't matter." Collinski said with a smile. "At most, it proves that I used two different game consoles, but it cannot prove that there was a problem with the original game console. Unless you send the evidence to them."

Kutaragi Ken lowered his head and glanced at the game console in his hand, and smiled knowingly.

"Hahaha……"

"Hardware has a yield rate. If the yield rate is not 100%, then there will definitely be problems." Collinski cut a small piece of steak and chewed it twice. "But at the press conference, I encountered real problems.

It's unlucky, but as long as the problem can be solved and the failure rate of the machines that players get after the game console is released in August is low enough, it will be fine."

"Yeah." Everyone nodded.

…

Everyone chatted for a while and got to know each other better. During the meeting, Qing Zhiyuan also acted as a translator.

Kolinski recalled a past incident and laughed.

"Do you know?"

"The Sega Genesis (called MD in Neon), like the Commodore Amiga, also used the Motorola 68000 as its central processor.

In the United States, there is a company called Electronic Arts.

This company has extensive experience in game development on this processor.

The first thing they did was not to apply to become a third-party game company of Sega, but to quickly reverse engineer the Sega Genesis and develop games that could run without Sega's authorization.

It’s really off the mark. If you have the skills, why not crack the Nintendo 10NES? What’s the point of cracking down on Sega?”

When he said this, Kolinsky's expression was very exaggerated, and everyone also laughed.

“Sega’s charging standards for third-party games are much lower than Nintendo’s, not 30%, but around US$8-10, which is equivalent to 20% of the selling price.

Then the year before last, in 1990, Hawkins found me.

Come up with EA's reverse engineering and make a request for cooperation: you can only charge $2 per game card, plus a $2 million licensing fee cap for a single game, otherwise EA will spread its technology.

Hawkins told me, 'We have successfully reverse-engineered Genesis, and if the contract is not signed, we will make and sell the game software that operates on Genesis.'"

Kolinski put down the knife and fork in his hand, puffed out his chest and looked at Qing Zhiyuan and Tsuda Nao, "Can you imagine, these are all rude requests."

"I took a closer look at the young and handsome guy in front of me and wondered if there was something wrong with his brain."

"Haha, indeed."

Qing Zhiyuan smiled and nodded.

EA is indeed a gangster, but gangsters know martial arts and no one can stop them.

There really is no such thing as this kind of rogue logic.

It can only be said that it is really difficult for Westerners to understand the brain circuits of Westerners. They obviously want to rob you, but they still want you to thank them.

"What Hawkins is playing is a very high-risk operation. Once Sega files a lawsuit against EA's behavior, Hawkins will most likely be left with nothing to gain.

But what I thought at the time was that there seemed to be nothing wrong with cooperating with EA.

After all, we are facing a god-like opponent, the Nintendo NES.

The fewer enemies the better, the more teammates the better.

Just think he has a problem.

EA wants a free console platform.

We need third-party games that can compete with Nintendo, and our interests are aligned.

If such an opponent turns to NES, the consequences will be disastrous.

I said, 'Okay, but there are some conditions to add.

I want you to sell EA's rights to John Madden Football. I want to change some things and market it as a different game. We will release two games, John Madden Football and Joe

Montana Football".

Of course, we’ll pay for promotion and we’ll pay you a fair royalty.’

Hawkins seemed a little shocked.

Two rugby games are released at the same time, which should cause a lot of trouble.

Adult sports games happen to be Nintendo's shortcomings.

'Okay, we're partners. Let's beat Nintendo together.'

Hawkins and I shook hands and reached a consensus.

Later, EA ported "John Madden Football" to the Sega Genesis.

No one could have imagined that a game originally planned to sell 70,000 copies would actually sell 400,000 copies on Genesis.

Isn’t it amazing?”

Kolinsky asked with a smile.

Everyone nodded.

What Qing Zhiyuan is thinking about is——

Although both Nakayama Hayao and Yamauchi Hiroshi had bad tempers, they both wanted to establish a dominant company and create a monopoly.

But Sega is really lucky to have a US branch sales manager like Kolinski.

Is the console war essentially about consoles?

No, it's a game.

Take the loss of Sega GG to Rentendo GB. On the one hand, it is because the battery life of the hardware is too short, the power consumption is too high, and the body is relatively bulky.

But in terms of performance, Sega's GG handheld console has to crush Rentendo's GB.

And the most critical turning point is——

Rentenda and Sega both launched the Tetris game on handheld consoles at the same time, but later Rentenda obtained the Tetris license and sued Sega.

As a result, Sega's Tetris was forced to be removed from the shelves.

A game determines the outcome.

…

From this perspective, instead of taking EA to court because of its rogue behavior, it chose to cooperate with Kolinski to jointly fight against Rentian. This pattern is really much bigger.

"Then Mr. Kolinski, can you give us the same discounts as EA in the future," Qing Zhiyuan said with a smile, "otherwise we will have to reverse engineer Sega's game consoles."

Hearing Qing Zhiyuan's words, Kolinsky was stunned for a second and almost spit out the beer in his mouth.

"Hahaha...Qing, you really know how to joke."

The atmosphere was relaxed and warm.

…

After chatting with Kolinsky, Qing Zhiyuan still gained a lot.

American players and Neon players are basically two different species.

The American market is also very different from the neon market or the Chinese market.
To be continued...