On the second day of the launch of the N64 American version of the console, Zhang Lexing came to the office on Lockhart Road in Wan Chai as usual, intending to deal with daily affairs first, but he didn't expect to receive a transatlantic call as soon as he sat down.

"Mr. Zhang, I'm Tom, I don't know if I'm late for this call......" came the voice of Thomas Karlinske, president of Sega North America, on the phone.

Hearing the familiar voice, Zhang Lexing suddenly became happy: "It's not too late, Tom, it's not too late for you to call at any time." ”

"Mr. Zhang, I wonder if your proposal from last year is still valid?" continued Thomas Karlinsk.

"Of course, you're always welcome. Zhang Lexing estimated that it was probably Sega North America that there was going to be a personnel turmoil, but it was also a matter of time, but this must not be said to Thomas Kalinsk, so he deliberately asked: "Tom, is something happening?"

"Hey!" Thomas Karinske sighed on the phone and began to talk about the current situation in Sega North America.

At last year's E3 exhibition, after Thomas Karinske got Zhang Lexing's promise, he had no worries, and as soon as the exhibition ended, he immediately flew to Tokyo, Japan, intending to make a proposal to President Hayao Nakayama again, persuading him to give up the idea of terminating the 16-bit host. Unfortunately, it backfired, and all Tomas Karinske received was a scolding, and President Hayao Nakayama didn't listen to his advice at all, but thought that he was too unruly and dared not listen to the instructions of the headquarters. So not long after Thomas Kalinsk returned to the United States, the headquarters parachuted a Japanese named Yuji Nakayama as his deputy in recognition of his contributions, but in fact he began to gradually take over the power of the company, and Thomas Karinsk was slowly overlooked. Sega's 16-bit console, Genesis, was discontinued, along with 30 million Genesis users, including new users who had just purchased Genesis for a week, and Sega's focus shifted to SS consoles.

It's a pity that at this year's E3 exhibition, although Sega launched a lot of masterpieces, the limelight was still stolen by Sony. The price reduction strategy that was pinned on by Nakayama Yuji also failed, and the SS game console was reduced to $200, but the PS game console was reduced to $199, a difference of only $1, and the feeling brought to players was very different.

But these have nothing to do with Thomas Karinske, since Zhongshan Youji came, he has nothing to manage, and there is nothing to manage, this price reduction actually he also feels that the price of 200 US dollars is inappropriate, but unfortunately what he said Zhongshan Yuji didn't listen at all, so he was calm. After that, the SS game console was gradually pulled further and further away by the PS game console, and gradually began to show a decline, and Thomas Karinske was also completely discouraged, and simply submitted his resignation to President Hayao Nakayama, but he didn't expect to be approved immediately without even retaining it, and his heart was even colder.

"Mr. Zhang, I have resigned from Sega, I wonder if you have a place for me here?" Perhaps remembering the desperation of Sega, Thomas Karinsko's voice carried a hint of sadness.

"I'm glad you out, Tom. Zhang Lexing was relieved: "Our company's Jiamei Toys is ready to expand its business in North America, and intends to set up a U.S. branch. ”

"Mr. Zhang, there is one more small question. Thomas Karinsko's voice came from the phone with a slight hesitation.

"Oh, what's the problem?" Zhang Lexing couldn't help but feel nervous in his heart, could it be that Thomas Kalinsk was in some trouble.

"Mr. Zhang, in addition to me, some colleagues who have worked well with each other have also left Sega, I don't know if you are willing to accept it. ”

"So that's the kind of thing, there's no need to ask me, you're now the president of Camry Toys North America, who you need, you decide for yourself, I believe in you." Hearing Thomas Karinske say this, Zhang Lexing finally relieved, although he didn't know what the level of Thomas Karinsko's colleagues was, but he knew that after Thomas Karinsk left Sega, he had built a small company into the third largest toy company in North America.

I didn't expect Zhang Lexing to be so generous, Thomas Kalinsk's heart felt a burst of warmth, just like when he was just appointed as the president of Sega North America by President Hayao Nakayama, he felt that he had taken a wrong step, since the boss trusted him so much, he secretly made up his mind that he must work hard for Camry Toys North America to create a good result. This can not only repay Zhang Lexing's trust in him, but also let the discerning guys of Sega see what kind of ability Thomas Karinsk has, and who is inseparable from Sega and Thomas Karinsk.

Thinking of this, Thomas Karinske excitedly said into the phone: "Mr. Zhang, thank you for your trust, I will not let you down!"

"Very well, I look forward to your excellent performance at Camry Toys. Zhang Lexing also sent his best wishes, but he is still very confident in Thomas Kalinsk's future performance.

Putting down the phone, Zhang Lexing called Shen Meiqin, the head of the consumer goods business department, and told him about Thomas Kalinsk. Of course, Shen Meiqin will not have any opinions on Zhang Lexing's decision, anyway, she has not selected the right person to develop the North American market, since the boss personally recommends people, she has to give face. After explaining to Shen Meiqin on the phone, Zhang Lexing brought his assistant Lin Qianrui again.

After recounting the matter, Zhang Lexing explained: "Lin Qianrui, you can follow up on Thomas Karinsk, if there are any changes, notify me in time." ”

"Okay boss, I'll take notice. Lin Qianrui nodded and said respectfully.

"Well, there's nothing to do, you can get busy first. After Zhang Lexing finished speaking, he waved his hand.

"Boss, then I'll go out first. Lin Qianrui bowed slightly, turned around and left.

Unexpectedly, as soon as Lin Qianrui walked out of the door, Wang Mengyao hurriedly ran in again, Zhang Lexing couldn't help frowning, and was about to ask, Wang Mengyao spoke first, she kicked her breath and said excitedly: "Boss, the prototype of the next-generation game console has been made!"

"What!" Zhang Lexing stood up with a spirit, holding the table with both hands, and looked at Wang Mengyao who was still panting in disbelief.

"Boss, the prototype of the next game console has been made. Wang Mengyao repeated again.

Now Zhang Lexing understands that there has been a breakthrough in the research and development of the next generation of game consoles, but he remembers that there were no achievements last year, why there have been such big changes in just one year. Zhang Lexing shook his head slightly, as if he wanted to shake out this question, he didn't care about thinking about it now, he just wanted to see the prototype immediately.

Thinking of this, Zhang Lexing waved his hand and said to Wang Mengyao: "Okay, let's go and have a look." ”

After arranging the car and road guards, Zhang Lexing and Wang Mengyao came to the Game Research Institute together and directly found the hardware research group presided over by Chen Zhipeng.

"Boss, let me introduce you. Chen Zhipeng, who received the news in advance, led Zhang Lexing to walk inside, and introduced unhurriedly: "The reason why the results came out so quickly is that I am grateful to the mini computer that the boss gave us last year, as well as those suggestions." It was with this help, along with the support of other departments, that we were able to complete the design of the prototype. ”

"That's not bad. Zhang Lexing nodded and said, "By the way, where is the prototype?"

"Boss, look here. Chen Zhipeng led Zhang Le into the workshop of the hardware research group, pointed to a table against the wall and said.

Zhang Lexing looked at his hand, there was a large green anti-static table mat on the table, and on top of the table mat were two large machines, a bit like game consoles, but they were too big.

"What is this?" asked Zhang Lexing, pointing to the two machines on the table.

"Boss, this is the prototype we designed, Moonlight Goddess 1 and 2. Chen Zhipeng pointed to the two machines and replied proudly.

"Damn, it's the goddess of moonlight, such a big guy. Zhang Lexing couldn't help but slander, of course, he definitely couldn't say this, otherwise even if Chen Zhipeng didn't turn his face on the spot, don't expect them to work hard to develop it in the future.

"Moonlight Goddess No. 1 and No. 2, I can't imagine that you either don't do it, or you will do it as soon as you do it. By the way, why are there two of them?" asked Zhang Lexing.

"Boss, yes. Your suggestion last year mentioned too much processor collaboration, and we worked in this direction, at the beginning, we considered it in terms of the main processor (CPU), image processor, audio processor, etc., which is the origin of Moonlight Goddess One. Later, the integrated motherboard of the Electronics Research Institute came out with a dual-CPU version, which inspired us, so we redesigned a motherboard that supports dual main processors (CPU), after testing, we found that although it could not reach 100% performance improvement, the processing speed of the whole system has been greatly improved, and it can achieve more refined game graphics, which is the origin of Moonlight Goddess II. Chen Zhipeng came to the table, gently touched the two machines, and explained to Zhang Lexing at the same time.

After listening to Chen Zhipeng's introduction, Zhang Lexing suddenly became interested: "Chen Zhipeng, tell me about the situation of Moonlight Goddess No. 2, what kind of system is it, and what is the performance?"

"Okay boss, Moonlight Goddess No. 2 is like this......" Chen Zhipeng opened the shell of a machine on the table and began to introduce it.

After listening to his introduction, Zhang Lexing knew that this Moonlight Goddess No. 2 is really not simple, using a scalable symmetrical MIPS processor system developed by the Institute of Microelectronics, that is to say, the main processor is two MIPS processors with the same specifications, and the Moonlight Goddess No. 2 uses the MIPSR-4050A processor re-developed by the Microelectronics Research Institute and designed for game consoles. The image processor part uses ATI's specially designed Redwood chip, which has powerful graphics processing capabilities, can process 36 million polygons per second, and supports hardware-accelerated edge anti-aliasing, material mapping, bump mapping and other special effects. As for the audio processor, it comes from the innovative company, which is a special audio processing chip under development, and the innovative company calls it the Emu10k1 chip.

The scalability in the scalable symmetrical MIPS processor system means that the main processor, image processor and audio processor can be upgraded under the condition that the system remains unchanged, that is to say, with the deepening of research, once a more suitable processor appears, the main processor, image processor and audio processor can be replaced at any time, and the motherboard hardly needs to make any adjustments. This meant that the workload of the hardware research group was greatly reduced, which is one of the reasons why they were able to come up with two prototypes so quickly.

Seeing that Zhang Lexing's face was getting brighter and brighter, Chen Zhipeng was worried that his boss would immediately put the Moonlight Goddess No. 2 into production, so he hurriedly said the shortcomings of the prototype: "Boss, but the current prototype is not suitable for production." One is that the current technology is not mature enough, according to our estimated production costs, using the same production line as the PS game console, the production of a Moonlight Goddess II costs at least 12,000 Hong Kong dollars, although the performance is far more than those so-called next-generation game consoles on the market, but the price is not competitive at all. Another reason is to facilitate research, the current prototype is still relatively large, mainly to facilitate us to adjust and test the components inside, if you want to enter the production process, at least the volume must be compressed by more than 80%, which is theoretically no problem, but it will take a certain amount of time to really come up with the finished product. ”

In fact, seeing the huge size of the prototype, Zhang Lexing knew that it was impossible to produce it immediately, after all, the home game console he wanted to develop, not a home arcade machine, it was impossible for players to buy back a game console as big as a 29-inch color TV. If you put it next to the TV, you know that it is a game console, and if you don't know, you may think that it is a big iron box next to the TV.

Although it can't be produced immediately, it doesn't affect Zhang Lexing's imagination, and he even gave the future game console a "dream" name, because this is his dream all along. Seeing the success of the research and development of the "dream" game console in his mind, Zhang Lexing has begun to think about the future development strategy of the game console, and it is not entirely suitable to take the business route of Sony and Nintendo, at least in the mainland, with the per capita income that is far from other regions, two or three thousand game consoles can only be regarded as a relatively luxurious product for a long time, and this price will definitely not work if you want to achieve the purpose of rapid popularization. But Zhang Lexing is also reluctant to make the game console completely free, because in this way, the game console is likely not to be cherished.

The initial promotion model conceived by Zhang Lexing is a hybrid model of free and subsidized sales, and will rely on the Fengyun Game Club, which is currently developing. Zhang Lexing plans to raise a sum of money to set up a game console promotion fund, and then when the game console officially lands in the mainland market, it will launch a variety of preferential activities, such as players who have purchased Fengyun interactive products can participate in the monthly "dream" game console lottery, and 60 lucky winners will get the game console for free every month. Another example is the game console purchase subsidy plan, the price of the "dream" game console in the mainland may be set at 1800 yuan, all players who buy for the first time will be able to get 800~1000 yuan vouchers sponsored by the game console promotion fund, and installment payment is allowed, the vouchers can be used to redeem the game listed in the future, so that the price of the game console has become relatively 800~1000 yuan, I believe that after a few years, there should be more players who can accept this price. If the "dream" game console can be popularized in the mainland through various means, for example, it can reach 10 million units, and then there will be no need for Zhang Lexing to open his mouth, and naturally some people are willing to develop games for this market.

Thinking about the bright prospects of game consoles in the future, Zhang Lexing seemed to see the joy of players and the prosperity of the domestic game industry, and the corners of his mouth couldn't help but curl......

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