Akihabara, an electrical repair shop that has just been idle for rent due to poor management.

In recent years, such unprofitable electrical repair shops have been quite common in Tokyo.

Mainly because in the 60s, the quality of the products in the home appliance industry was not very stable, so the national income was not high at that time, and everyone's living habits were more frugal, and they were willing to repair TVs and washing machines that only broke one or two capacitors.

However, with the rapid improvement of the quality of Japanese goods in the 70s and the multiplication of the national income level, the home appliance repair industry, which was laid out according to the market size 10 years ago, fell into a cold winter of overcapacity.

He said that he was about to enter a bubble era of daring to wave 10,000 yen bills and take taxis on the streets of Tokyo. Every other month, a repair shop closes in Akihabara and is replaced by a new one.

It was at this time that this place gradually transformed into a sacred place for video game people, and 10 years later, it further became the territory of Heisei anime scum house.

Haruko Sakuragi is a schoolgirl at a nearby high school and, like most middle school girls, likes to buy bags and high heels.

However, she was not as bold as those classmates who made quick money from their original handovers, so she had to choose a conservative part-time job - to work as a waitress in this new shop that had just been renovated by an electrical repair shop. The main responsibilities are to guide introductions, help customers exchange coins, and play games to support the façade when there are no customers.

"This shop is too shabby, isn't it? Even the renovation left by the old shopkeeper who had closed down was not cleared, so he just changed the signboard and opened directly?

Those devices should be electric, and I have seen them in the Gaosha electrical store across the street. Could it be that this store is going to be 100% focused on this kind of entertainment business? That's really bold. If it weren't for the fact that the manager of Shirai is also a woman, I wouldn't have dared to come to work in such a place......"

Haruko Sakuragi was on her first day at work, and after observing the working environment, she couldn't help but complain in her heart.

She was recruited by Han Ting, a female boss in Xiangjiang who has a very light mature woman charm. Although the money was small, only 1,500 yen for a 4-hour part-time shift in the afternoon, the employer itself gave Haruko Sakuragi enough curiosity.

She really wanted to know how to cultivate the intellectual elegance and charm of the other party, so the ghost envoy took the part-time job - anyway, she thought very simply, this is just a temporary job, in case she finds that the other party has nothing to discover, just check out and leave at any time.

In addition to her and the store manager Shirai, there is also a male clerk in the store, but he is just a security guard and handyman, and he is not qualified to command her, and he also has to play games part-time in his free time to support her popularity.

Obviously, the planning of this store is the first step in the promotion of game consoles discussed by Gu Biao and Han Ting.

As mentioned before, according to the research of his peers, Gu Biao already knows that the main reason why Tomohiro Xijiao's "space invader" was killed by the video game factory is that the downstream operators do not buy it - that is, the owners of entertainment venues that also operate video games do not accept the price of this new thing.

Therefore, since Gu Biao has confidence in this thing, he must first run his own one, and put it in Akihabara, so that his peers can see the profitability of this thing, and from the perspective of the most end consumer, he will push back the operators of the intermediate links to realize the sinking of the channel.

The profit of this store itself, Gu Biao can't look down on it, and he doesn't plan to make this kind of business with such a slow recovery cycle. (Compared to selling equipment, the cycle is slow.) But in fact, in terms of absolute speed, it is not slow, but the initial capital occupation of the self-operated model is too much, and Gu Biao can't quickly expand the scale)

However, the profit and prosperity of this store can become a publicity model and attract a large number of peers to become tap water, which is very cost-effective, at least much more efficient than spending money on advertising.

……

Because it was the first day of opening, there was no popularity, the decoration did not change, the business was naturally not very good, in the first hour of the afternoon, not a single guest came to put coins, at most curiously wandered around the door, glanced a few times and left.

Until about 4 o'clock in the afternoon, Akihabara ushered in the peak of customer acquisition in the video game industry every day, and the old store next to it was occupied by regular customers, and others could only queue up or watch.

The capacity of the arcade market in Akihabara has been stable over a long period of time, and it is never possible to ensure that there are no queues during peak hours - no store owner will allocate the number of machines according to the number of customers during peak hours, which is sure to be a loss, because it means that there will be a huge amount of idle machines during off-peak hours.

So no matter how bad and not fun the arcade is, at least it can ensure that it can be full every day for more than an hour from after school to before dinner, and then at eight o'clock in the evening, at least it can ensure that it will explode for more than half an hour.

As for the rest of the time, only high-end and fun game consoles can always have customers.

Several deep addicts rushed into the shop where Haruko Sakuragi worked, their five fingers trembling slightly, like Parkinson's patients, unable to remember the hand they were used to holding the electric waist bar, and they would have unicorn arm seizures at 4 o'clock in the afternoon.

"Isn't this a racing machine? It turns out that this store is still specialized in electric vehicles? It doesn't even sell home appliances, I like it. However, it is too arrogant to rely on a few racing machines to dare to support the whole stadium and not operate anything else. ”

Those addicts are obviously regular customers, and they have played all the models in Akihabara, so they are very experienced.

"It's not a racing machine, it's a shooter — you see, it's going to be a Nintendo beam gun. Haruko Sakuragi, who was in charge of the introduction, saw that it was finally open, and immediately ran over and raised the beam gun hanging near the coin slot.

"Gun games with electric rails? Then give it a try. A few delinquent teenagers walked over, and each threw a 50 yen coin into it with a few clicks.

The machine didn't move.

"What's going on? What about us? If the machine breaks down, it won't be repaired?" the delinquent teenagers immediately lost their patience, and one of them kicked the machine base.

Fortunately, he himself was afraid of foot pain, just to put on an arrogant posture, so he didn't kick the machine.

"It says it's 100 yen once, and you can just throw 50 without looking at it - but the machine can recognize 50 twice, and you can play with another one. Haruko Sakuragi hurriedly explained aggrievedly.

Even the manager of Shirai came to mediate.

"No wonder no one dares to charge 100 yen once, other people's old machines are all 50!" The bad boys have already made up their minds to only be the last one, lose another 50, and then stop playing this game.

When the coin is full, the motor squeaks, rows of LED indicators light up on the belt track, and then the plastic pieces of the Q print-style zombie map made of two red LEDs in both eyes are erected and slowly rush down the track in the direction of the player.

"Take the light gun and move sideways along the rail, then shoot the zombie in the head, kill it and it will fall, let him rush to the point and your sunflower will be eaten!" Haruko Sakuragi explained loudly from the side.

"Don't stop, one shot is not enough, if you don't fall, you have to continue fighting, two shots for ordinary zombies. ”

"A zombie with a barricade on his head is equivalent to having helmet protection, and it costs three shots!"

"The head of the iron bucket zombie is particularly iron, and it takes five shots!"

Because everyone is not familiar with each other, and they are still underestimated, so the sunflower was quickly eaten a few flowers, and after a while, a second zombie ran to the bottom line on a certain line of motor tracks, and a "GAME OVER" sign popped up in front of the player, and it was written in Japanese "Zombies ate your brain".

The whole process didn't survive for less than 30 seconds, and the machine earned 100 yen.

One of the delinquent teenagers was immediately upset: "I obviously hit it! Why didn't the iron bucket die in the end?

Haruko Sakuragi: "The instructions on the fuselage say that you must protect the sunflowers, and each sunflower will produce new jelly bean ammunition for the pea gun photosynthesis during its survival. It's because you didn't protect the sunflower, and the bullets are over!"

"Hahaha, little man, it turns out that you can't do it, you will be out of stock after a while, and you can't!" The other bad boys next to him who had lived longer than him were also killed one after another at this moment, so they began to mock the one who died the fastest.

How can a man suffer such a great humiliation? Of course, he must protect his kidneys, not the sunflower!

"Come again!" the mocker didn't say a word, and took out a 100 yen coin and slapped it in.

This time he barely survived for 1 minute, and finally perished under the increasingly surging tide of zombies.

"My sunflower is well protected, why do you still die so quickly!"

"You have too many empty guns in front of you, there is too much firepower, the number of bullets in this game is to be counted, and the zombies fall down and continue to sweep, of course not. The waiter could only continue to explain patiently.

After a few minutes, the people understood the rules and could finally explain to each other. So even though new guests are coming in one after another, there is no need for the narrator to keep an eye on the lips all the time.

Some people didn't have enough 100 yen coins, so Haruko Sakuragi obediently went back to the cashier to exchange them.

At first, after no one lost 500 yen, they finally figured out the way, and they didn't want to be the boss anymore, they just wanted to see if there were any other novelties, and then they would be able to experience it - other stores were cheaper than this one, and as long as they survived the prime time and the seats were vacated elsewhere, they wouldn't continue to play here.

So, of course, in the limited time and money, I saw all the new things.

"Why does this big guy still have a TV? How do you play?" they quickly noticed the cabinet machine with the big picture tube on its back.

"This is an electronic machine, and the game inside is 'Thunderbolt Fighter', manipulating a space fighter to fight aliens. ”

The delinquent teenagers were stunned: "Do you mean that my manipulation will be displayed on the screen?"

Before Haruko Sakuragi could answer, a person with the best family in the crowd, that is, the little man just now, jumped out:

"Ah, I know! This is what I used to play when I traveled to the United States! Electronic arcade machines are very popular in the United States, and we are still working on electric arcade machines here. I didn't expect that there was finally a bold boss who was willing to spend money to introduce rice products. ”

Several other teenagers had never been to the United States, and they were suddenly a little envious.

But it also strengthened their mentality of at least giving it a try: Finally, you don't have to go to the United States to play, it's only 100 yen, so why not do it, at least try it once.