On October 21, a few weeks after resolving the dispute over the adaptation rights of the game "Cube" on the portable handheld, Zhang Lexing was still urging the operating system project team to work hard and prepare to meet the challenge of IBM. News came from Japan,Nintendo's new generation of 16-bit console SFC (Super Nintendo) officially landed in the Japanese market,At the same time, KF-Panda's first SFC game "Armored Mekkaku" (that is, the immersive mecha action shooter game that was shown at Nintendo's internal meeting three years ago) was also launched at the same time, and the perfect combination of armored body and multi-layered background to achieve a pseudo-3D effect, fully demonstrating the powerful function of SFC.

Relying on the quality of the SFC console itself and the good performance of the first game, the Sega MD console, which has been heavily suppressed in the Japanese market, has been hit hard again, and sales have been further sluggish. But the U.S. market is very different, under the leadership of the new president of Sega America, Tom, through the overwhelming advertising campaign, a unique game development model (developing faster and cooler titles than Nintendo, which is very popular with North American users), coupled with console price sales and bundling "Sonic Hedgehog (Sonic)" and other methods, the American version of the MD console Genesis began to conquer the city in a big way, and many users of the original Nintendo red and white machine (FC) era have thrown themselves into the arms of Sega.

This trend of switching doors has no signs of convergence even after the SFC console is listed, in fact, this is mainly related to the characteristics of players in the United States, their favorite is shooting, action and sports, which require a high sense of speed, and Genesis (MD American version of the console) is a speed-oriented console, even if the SFC console is listed, it can't shake its position in this regard. This has led to many American game manufacturers trying to develop games for Sega's consoles, including major software companies in the North American market such as ACCLAIM, and even Hawkins' EA has begun to be eager to try.

However, these things have nothing to do with Zhang Lexing, so naturally they won't care too much, and now what really attracts Zhang Lexing's attention is the team of hardware engineers who support Nintendo, because they have finally completed their mission and come back.

A week later, San Francisco International Airport ......

Zhang Lexing took a few people to pick up the plane, waited outside the terminal exit for almost an hour, and finally appeared after completing the research and development work. After getting in the car, Zhang Lexing sat next to Chen Zhipeng (Chinese, English name Rick Chen), who led the team this time, and learned about the process of game console development from him on the way.

According to Chen, it wasn't too difficult for those engineers who had designed computers to develop a game console. The real challenge is how to control the cost of the main machine, how to balance the various components under the limited cost, how to make the cost of each component as low as possible after mass production, and so on.

"This experience is also a good opportunity for us to accumulate experience," Chen Zhipeng said with a little regret at the end: "Unfortunately, there are not many opportunities to use it directly in the future." ”

"Who said there was no chance, but soon a new task will be handed to you, and you will be able to get what you want right away. ”

"Really, what is the mission?" asked Chen Zhipeng with some surprise.

"But it's too late today, you go back to rest first, and come to the company tomorrow, and you'll know when the time comes." Zhang Lexing pretended to be mysterious and didn't tell the story.

……

The next day, as soon as Zhang Lexing arrived at the office, Chen Zhipeng had been waiting there for a while, and it seemed that his mood was still very urgent.

"Since you're so anxious to know, take one and take a look. Zhang Lexing took out a piece of technical information from the safe and handed it over.

Chen Zhipeng picked it up and flipped through it and indulged in it, Zhang Lexing was not in a hurry, and slowly tasted the coffee sent by the secretary. After Zhang Lexing drank three cups of coffee, Chen Zhipeng came to his senses after reading the information.

"I feel that this design drawing is very familiar, a bit like the MIPS R3000 CPU that I have seen before. ”

"That's right, this is the new CPU based on the MIPS R3000 with enhanced multimedia processing capabilities, which we call MIPSR3000A. ”

"No wonder I look familiar, this information has something to do with our new mission?"

"Do you think it's possible to design a game console with this CPU?"

Chen Zhipeng pondered for a while and said: "There should be no problem, but this CPU is much stronger than the current two 16-bit game consoles, and the relevant supporting parts must be selected to give full play to the processing power of the CPU. ”

"It's okay, I'll give you full support, there's another document here, you don't think you need it. Zhang Lexing took out a piece of paper from the drawer and handed it over.

This is actually a game console design sketch drawn by Zhang Lexing, and it's really a very rough drawing, basically only the appearance of a console, and then some annotations densely written next to it. For example, the game reading device uses an optical drive, the game storage uses a CD-ROM, there is a dedicated 3D graphics processing chip (GPU), the CPU and GPU have their own responsibilities, the screen resolution supports a maximum resolution of 640×480, and the sound must be able to reach the sound quality of a music CD.

In fact, Zhang Lexing also knows that the pile of things he wrote may not be of much help, and it would be good if he could directly take out the internal design drawings of the game console, but it's a pity that Zhang Lexing is not so powerful, and he has never been exposed to this aspect of content before, at most, he has seen a few disassembly pictures. Therefore, I can only draw a simple sketch, hoping that Chen Zhipeng's upcoming R&D team will have a certain guiding role in the design and configuration selection of game consoles, at least to avoid the detour of Nintendo's clinging to the cartridge.

Looking at Chen Zhipeng's expression, Zhang Lexing was very worried that he would turn his back and throw it into the trash, so he had to explain a few words: "This drawing is a little sketchy, but there are many points of view that I have summarized after consulting many industry experts, which should be helpful to your design tasks, don't just throw them away." ”

……

In this way, Zhang Lexing's own first-generation console design journey began with the help of such a sketch. A few days later, the research institute of Dongfang Microelectronics added a mysterious research team, which was based on Chen Zhipeng's group, supplemented by operating system developers from Rising Sun Software, graphics from the Audiovisual Research Institute, Researchers in audio processing technology and other forces were established, and their research goal was to design an epoch-making game console with MIPSR3000A as the core, for which Zhang Lexing also allocated 80 million US dollars of special research funds to ensure the smooth progress of the research work.

In fact, Zhang Lexing also imagined that after the successful development of the console, he would promote the console by himself, but when he thought of the domestic poor and white game development strength, coupled with his own insufficient preparation, he had to give up this tempting idea. The idea of self-promotion was abandoned, but the research funds of the game console could not be wasted, so Zhang Lexing specially formulated a "bait" plan for a future wronged leader, and only waited for the right time to start it.

After arranging the main engine development plan, the staff sent to the UK in the early stage came with good news that they had completed the investment in several enterprises that Zhang Lexing was concerned about. Acquired Rare, a small British game development company, in the name of Oriental Holdings, and plans to merge it into the home console game development system of Tianzhien in the future, further strengthening its development capabilities on console platforms. Through Dongfang Microelectronics Co., Ltd.'s participation in the newly established British ARM company, ARM's main business is the design of high-performance, low-cost, low-energy RISC processors, related technologies and software, and then make profits through chip technology licensing. ARM's future name Zhang Lexing knows that the vast majority of handheld devices (handhelds, smartphones, portable handhelds, etc.) use various models of ARM processors, and Zhang Lexing decided to establish contact with them as early as possible, so that it will be much more convenient to develop the operating system of handheld devices and develop his own portable handheld computers in the future.

……

Time continues to move forward, and in mid-December, the newly established GB business unit of Tianzhiyuan launched "GB Cube", which can be regarded as the completion of its commitment to Nintendo. After the launch of "GB Cube", the simplicity of the game, coupled with the portability of GB itself, quickly became popular. For a while, almost every player who owns GB has a copy of "GB Block", walking on the road and sitting in the car, many people always have a GB in their hands, and the game screen that appears on the GB is almost all constantly moving blocks. Those who haven't bought GB yet are attracted to GB Blocks and are quick to add them to their knazzy gadgets. In just one week, GB Blocks sold more than three million units, and GB's sales have grown rapidly on the back of this gaming boom. Shinji Hatano, the head of Nintendo's sales department, looked at the upward sales curve every day, and his heart blossomed, and the status of Tiannoen in the eyes of Nintendo also rose, and the cooperative relationship between the two sides was greatly enhanced.

On Christmas Eve, VisualSystem released the latest version of its operating system, KylinWindows 3.1, and to the company's delight, sales of VisualSystem's operating system had risen to four times that of IBM's OS/2 sales, and the pressure began to shift to IBM. In this atmosphere, Zhang Lexing is also in a very good mood, and even happier is that the development team led by Zhan Jun has successfully completed the development of "Age of Discovery", and the English version will be on sale during Christmas. With Zhang Lexing's care, "Age of Discovery" enjoyed the attention of EA in publishing and successfully entered the Christmas sales list, of course, the main role in this is the quality of the game itself.

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