Reborn America, this is my time

Chapter 16 Exidy
The next day.

Once again, Ethan Jones drove the Ford F-150 borrowed from Thomas Johnson, carrying the "Snake" game console wrapped in a tarpaulin, and galloped towards Sunnyvale, 23 miles away.

In the future, this city will be part of the famous Silicon Valley, but now, the only famous companies here are massage parlors.

Of course, Ethan didn't come here to find a massage shop. After walking around the streets of Sunnyvale for a few laps, he accepted the advice of the kind aunt. It stopped in front of the factory building surrounded by iron railings. On the gate with spikes, there was a sign that said Exidy in white letters on a red background.

After honking the horn, a white man in labor attire emerged from the factory building. After seeing the expensive Ford pickup, he trotted over immediately and asked, "Sir, who are you looking for?"

"I'm looking for Pete Kaufman." Ethan took off his sunglasses.

The handsome face like Tom Cruise made the white man stunned for a moment, and said, "Sir, I am Pete Kaufman."

Then, he asked again: "Are you Ethan Jones? The Ethan Jones who called me yesterday?"

"Yeah, Pete, I'm Ethan."

Ethan patted the steering wheel neatly, stretched out his thumb with his right hand, pointed to the back of the car, and said, "I've brought over the machine that I introduced to you on the phone yesterday."

"Oh yes! Ethan, welcome to our Exidy game company..."

Pete Kaufman nodded quickly, opened the iron gate, and motioned for Ethan's car to stop casually.

That's right, Ethan came here today because he wanted to seek cooperation from Exidy, a slot machine manufacturer.

And this is a decision he made based on the information he collected in the current video game industry in the past two months.

The video game industry is very interesting.

Although the world's first electronic game was born in the laboratory in 1947, it was not until 1960 that the appearance of the world's first commercial minicomputer PDP-1 brought electronic games from the scientific laboratory to the advanced level. school.

Even in the second year, the creative students of MIT developed "Space Wars". The games born in the past few years have only been circulated in major universities and have never been successfully commercialized.

The reason is always the same, that is, computers are too expensive.

Scientists believe that computer-based video games cannot be popularized when computer prices remain high, and university students also believe that the general public may not be able to access this game in a short time.

But in the same year that "Journey to Oregon" appeared, a person named Nolan Bushnell felt that video games did not need the medium of computers at all, and their game feedback could be displayed with the most basic physical technology. Walked into a dead end!

So he made the "Space Wars" created by the students of MIT in 1962 into an electronic arcade version with the simplest physical technology, and named it "Computer Space Warfare". The first official commercial video game on the Internet.

But "Computer Space Warfare" failed for the same reason as Ma Yun criticized the words of Alipay engineers——

'Many R&D personnel always like to use their own ideas to design products, completely ignoring the feelings of the general public. They always think that subdivision is the best, but they don't know that subdivision will only bring visual confusion to ordinary people. , what users want is simplicity. '

"Computer Space Warfare" is a cumbersome product, and the game made by the proud son of heaven cannot be understood by ordinary people.

But it doesn't matter, because in the second year, that is, in 1972, Nolan Bushnell saw the game from the road to simplicity, table tennis, at the press conference of the Mirowa Odyssey.

Because at that time, Mirowa priced the Odyssey at one hundred dollars, which was not a price acceptable to American consumers in 1972, and the coin-operated arcade machine made by Nolan Bushnell only cost 25 cents. It will allow consumers to experience a new thing like video games.

So, feeling that the opportunity came, he decisively copied the table tennis game, made it into "Pong", put it in the bar, and then...

The legendary stories that countless people have heard also appeared.

Low price + novelty makes Atari come out!
Nolan Bushnell also successfully opened the door of the video game industry with his Atari!

Although Nolan Bushnell's plagiarism is a fact, he is indeed the father of video games, because when a group of engineers were thinking about how to let the public play video games on computers, he directly took the computer as a high-level The threshold was smashed.

This broken window idea of ​​not building a house without a foundation is where other engineers are speechless.

And Nolan Bushnell's approach immediately attracted countless people to follow suit. In just two years, electronic arcade machines, a new thing, occupied the entrances of major bars, billiard rooms, and bowling alleys in America. .

It is precisely because the most difficult promotion process in an industry has been done by these game producers, so when Ethan decided to get a foot in the field of video games, he directly gave up on going door-to-door and door-to-door to promote idea.

First, the purchasing power of the masses is not enough.

Because the current electronic arcade machines are too expensive, when merchants equipped arcade machines at a price of 1000 or [-] dollars last year, at most the year before, they must want to earn unlimited benefits with limited costs. Rather than eliminating arcade machines in a short period of time.

At this time, in order to promote new games, Atari only dared to launch a motherboard replacement service. They took away the old arcade machines of the merchants, replaced them with new game motherboards, and then pulled them back, so as to realize the refurbishment of the game , and the merchants pay only one board money.

When Atari didn't dare to mention the elimination to the merchants, Ethan didn't even bother to scold him.

Secondly, Ethan remembered that when he was in school in his previous life, the teacher who taught finance said something——

'If you want to make money early, you can't beat the risk. If you don't make money early, all three generations will suffer. '

In Ethan's view, if he wants to make money in this industry, if he wants to make a lot of money, he has to erase the time of pushing the ground, and directly cooperate with the arcade machine manufacturers who have maintained close contact with the market, using the existing channels to sell goods!
If you have to describe it, it is actually the same as Hollywood film production routines.

Independent production companies that have production capacity but no distribution capacity will take a copy of the film to Bada after the film is finished, and ask Bada for help in distribution. Although Bada charges a lot of money in the process, the Independent studios can also try to reach the top by using a wide range of channels.

If you don't have fame, you have to give up profits!
And if you become famous, are you afraid of running out of money?
Therefore, before leaving Mirov, Ethan directly copied the list of all arcade machine manufacturers on the market collected by his old club.

Exidy is the closest video game manufacturer to Ethan's home, Los Gatos. Founded in 1973, they are now a game console supplier for many bars and billiard halls in the San Francisco area.

While Ethan drove the car in, several white men ran out of the warehouse after hearing the noise.

Knowing that Ethan is here to promote video games, several people present showed strong enthusiasm.

"Yo! Ethan! Glad you chose us!"

One of the middle-aged white men in suspenders and a bowler hat gave Ethan a high-five, then clapped his hands, and greeted the people around him: "Boys, move quickly, put Ethan in the car." Unload the game console for me!"

Ethan looked a little strange with high enthusiasm, and Pete Kaufman beside him introduced with a smile: "This is my partner Samuel Hawes, Ethan, to be honest, if you The machine is really as good as you said, I think we have a chance to cooperate, after all, people are tired of playing the games on the market now."

Ethan could understand Pete Kaufman's words.

Although Atari created a video game storm as early as 1972, so far, there is no real game independently developed by the merchant on the market, and everyone copies it.

The reason is also very simple. When excellent works come from university students and there is no clear copyright owner at all, plagiarism, the easiest way to make money in the world, will naturally be used by everyone instinctively.

And when everyone starts to copy, the homogeneity of the games played by consumers will be very serious.

At the beginning, they may play games out of interest, but later on, all arcade machine manufacturers must face the fact of self-development.

It is precisely because Ethan understands this that he will enter the video game industry.

no way!
Who let the 20-year-old already have 40 years of research and development experience?

(laughs~
　Note: ①Exidy: Exidy, the most famous work is "Death Race", which is a very violent racing game. The player drives a car to hit people. Its crazy violence made it appear in the "New York Times". And influenced the creation of "Mad Max" and "Violent Motorcycle". ②Although Nolan Bushnell plagiarized, he is still the father of video games. This is recognized in the industry, because his success is not in plagiarizing games, but breaking people's deadlock in thinking, and not using computers to make video games . ③The game environment in 1975 written in the article is true. Nolan Bushnell himself complained about it. He copied Mirov’s table tennis game, and others copied his "Pong". The market environment at that time was so outrageous and funny.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)