game trailblazer

Chapter 193 Nintendo's Crisis
At the beginning of the ICQ craze, Zhang Lexing and his entourage including a microbiology expert came to Boston as scheduled. Also at Starbucks on Boylston Avenue, Zhang Lexing met Chen Zishan and her mentor Jay McInerney.

When Zhang Lexing and his accompanying microbiology expert Aix Darbier walked into the Starbucks, they happened to see Chen Zishan sitting in the seat by the window and waving. The middle-aged men on the left and right should be her mentor, Jay McInerney. Zhang Lexing also waved towards Chen Zishan, and then walked in that direction with Aix Dabier.

When Zhang Le was approaching, Chen Zishan got up and introduced to Jay McInerney: "Jay, this is my friend Zhang Lexing."

"Mr. Zhang, nice to meet you." Jay McInerney stood up and extended his hand over in a friendly manner.

"It's nice to meet you too, Mr. McInerney." Zhang Lexing took a step forward, shook hands with Jay McInerney enthusiastically, and then let go.

"You are Susan's friend, just call me Jay." Jay McInerney said with a smile.

Zhang Lexing stepped aside and introduced to Jay McInerney: "Jay, this is my friend Ax."

Aix Darbier came up to shake hands with Jay McInerney, and after a few more pleasantries, they both took their seats.Zhang Lexing waved, and the waiter immediately came over and asked, "Sir, what do you need?"

Zhang Lexing looked at the table, Chen Zishan and Jay McInerney each had a cup of coffee in front of them, so they turned to the waiter and said, "Have a latte."

At this time, Aix Dabier, who was sitting next to him, glanced at the menu on the table, and then said, "A glass of American style."

"Okay, a latte, an American, please wait." After the waiter finished writing, he nodded and left.

"Zhang, I heard from Susan that you are interested in investing in our research project." Jay McInerney asked straight to the point.

"I'm interested, but can you introduce your project first? To be honest, I don't know much about it." Zhang Lexing leaned back and looked at Jay McInerney and said.

Jay McInerney turned his head to look at Chen Zishan, and then said with a smile: "Well, let me introduce it. Our research direction is microbial genetic engineering. Simply put, we use genetic engineering to design Viruses that are needed, and then stay on and use custom viruses to produce what we need."

"Can you talk about the function of the virus, specifically what is it produced?" This is not the first time Zhang Lexing has heard of the custom-made virus. Chen Zishan once mentioned it at the beginning of the year, but it was very vague. Now that there is an opportunity, of course. To learn more about it.

Jay McInerney picked up his cup and took a sip of coffee. Just as he was about to open his mouth, the waiter came over with a tray on which there were two steaming cups of coffee.

"Two gentlemen, please take your time." The waiter brought two cups of coffee to Zhang Lexing and Aix Dabier respectively, made a gesture of please, then turned and left with the tray.

Zhang Lexing took a sip from his cup, then raised his head and turned his gaze to Jay McInerney again. He cleared his throat and said, "We are researching a kind of nano-electrodes and wires. If ordinary metal wires are used, the corresponding The manufacturing cost is too high, and the difficulty is not small. Later, we found that the protein secreted by some organisms can make the calcium carbonate molecules align in an orderly manner. Inspired by this, we plan to use the gene of this protein to control the reproduction of the virus, so that the virus can automatically Generate nanometer-level biological wires. At present, this technology has achieved preliminary results, but unfortunately there is a problem with the funding. Otherwise, after further improvement, it can be used in many places, such as the production of micro-batteries, and it can also be used. This kind of self-assembly technology produces biochips, which can be said to be very versatile..."

Jay McInerney talked eloquently, and popped up some technical terms from time to time. Thanks to Aix Darbier's explanation in a low voice, Zhang Lexing understood most of it. Don't worry. It's nothing but the "viral battery" that Chen Zishan mentioned once aroused his interest.

"Jay, is the micro-battery made with a custom-made virus you mentioned just now safe? If the shell of the battery is broken, will the virus leak out and affect the health of the user?" Zhang Lexing couldn't help but say My biggest doubt.

Jay McInerney smiled, and he waved his hand and said, "Zhang, don't worry, when we do this research, we will do harmless genetic processing to the virus, even if it is accidentally leaked, it will not be harmless." cause harm."

Jay McInerney's statement aroused Zhang Lexing's greater interest. It is conceivable how small a micro-battery with nanometer-level wires should be.Zhang Lexing still remembers that batteries have always been a major problem that plagues the miniaturization and battery life of electronic equipment. If this kind of micro battery can be successfully developed, it will definitely far exceed the power that conventional lithium batteries can provide with the same volume. It means that mobile phones, notebooks, portable audio-visual equipment, etc. can be used for a longer time, and portable game consoles can also use this kind of miniature battery. This is what Zhang Lexing is most interested in.

Zhang Lexing's thinking also changed accordingly. Originally, he just wanted to help Chen Zishan find something interesting to do, but now he really wanted to recruit her.Glancing at Aix Darbier who was sitting next to him, and seeing him secretly making an affirmative gesture, Zhang Lexing felt confident, picked up the coffee and tasted it slowly, not in a hurry.

Jay McInerney waited for a long time, seeing that Zhang Lexing had remained silent, he couldn't help becoming anxious: "Zhang, what do you think about our research project?"

"Well, I think it's okay." Zhang Lexing said calmly.

"Would you like to fund our research project?" Jay McInerney continued.

"That is also possible, but my current business focus is mainly in Asia, so I hope to set up the laboratory in Hong Kong, so that I can more easily understand the progress of the research."

"However, it's easy to fail to keep up with the most cutting-edge technology. If I can set up the laboratory here, I can use my relationship to gain some research convenience, and the technical exchange will be more convenient."

Zhang Lexing frowned, turned his head to look at Aix Dabier, and saw that he nodded slightly, so he changed his mind and said: "Well, keep a laboratory here, and set up a laboratory in Hong Kong at the same time." Research institute, we usually have a little more personnel and technical exchanges. Jay, what do you think?"

"That's fine, but the funds needed to build two laboratories at the same time are very large." Jay McInerney nodded, looked at Zhang Lexing, and waited for the final answer.

"So I hope you can come up with a budget. After all, I don't know much about your research project, and I don't know what equipment and facilities are needed. Let's do this. After the budget is made, we will continue to discuss it in detail." Zhang Lexing will Handed over his business card.

Jay McInerney took the business card and looked at it carefully, nodded and said, "Okay, I will work out this budget as soon as possible."

Zhang Lexing stretched out his hand and said with a smile, "I hope we can have a happy cooperation!"

"I'm sure it will." Jay McInerney smiled and held Zhang Lexing's hand.

……

Just when the ICQ craze had just started in the United States, in RB Kyoto, an island country on the other side of the ocean, the N64, which Nintendo had repeatedly delayed, finally revealed its mystery. Super Mario 3".The excellence of this work far exceeds the imagination of all participants. In the fully 64D Hakoniwa world, the 3D bearded Mario runs, flies, and swims freely at an image switching rate of 3 frames per second. The fluency and realism of the action is jaw-dropping, and its emphasis on presence is unmatched by all similar works in the past.Although the complete version was not released in this preview, the large number of different and interesting level designs set in the game made everyone completely overwhelmed by its rich connotation.What is even more shocking is that Shigeru Miyamoto also revealed that the cartridge capacity of such an excellent game is only 60Mb (64MB). Will change the game!"

The official name of the N64 is Nintendo Ultra 64 (Nintendo Ultra 64). Its main processor is a specially developed MIPSR-4300i 64-bit RISCCPU with a main frequency of 93.75MHz and a computing speed of up to 93MIPs (million instructions per second).In addition, there is a dedicated graphics coprocessor developed by SGI, including two sub-processors, RSP (controlling 3D graphics and audio functions) and RDP (handling the drawing of all pixels in the hardware).Coupled with 32-bit Rambus RDRAM as memory, as well as other components and peripherals, theoretically the performance of N64 exceeds that of PS game consoles by a lot.However, when the detailed hardware specifications of the N64 were announced, many game development companies gave up, because the N6 was so stupid that they insisted on using cassettes as storage media. In the words of a certain company boss: "Doesn't that old man in Yamauchi know The cost of a cassette is almost two hundred times that of a CD, so it’s obviously asking everyone to make less money!”

But obviously Hiroshi Yamauchi doesn't think so. In his opinion, cassettes have many advantages, such as the reading speed is faster than optical drives, and why cassettes are not easy to pirate. He also gave many reasons for this. You can also get another disk drive out.As for Shigeru Miyamoto and others, what they care about is that the N64 mainframe can be released. Although they are a little disappointed that they can't use the optical drive, after seeing Junpei Yokoi's example, no one will be unhappy at such a critical time.

The N64 console showed up. According to Hiroshi Yamauchi's vision, as long as he "shocks his body", many game development companies should immediately bow down and worship him, crying and begging him to raise his hand and reward everyone with a bowl of food.At first it seemed that this was how it developed. At least Yukio Osato, the executive director of Hudson, publicly praised the development environment of N64, thinking that it was as superior as wheat flour, and could process the required games at will.Fukushima Yasuhiro, the president of Enix who is also involved in RPG game development, also announced that he will join the N64 development team. The first game he plans to launch is called "J Project 2". Everything seems to be developing as Hiroshi Yamauchi expected... …

However, something happened soon. Scowell, which Nintendo tried to win over, suddenly announced that it would join the PS camp, and would launch "Final Fantasy VII" on PS, and also stated that "Dragon Quest 6" would be the SFC platform. It is the last work on the Internet, and its sequel will be switched to the next-generation game console. Although it is not stated explicitly, everyone can taste it.Scowell took away two masterpieces, which is not fatal to Nintendo, but affected by this, a large number of game companies that are still on the sidelines have also fallen to the PS camp, many of which are because Disappointed with Nintendo's choice of cassettes as storage media, it is more of the impact of Nintendo's gradual development of arrogance and arrogance. The new works and masterpieces of the PS camp follow one after another, such as "Grand Racing", "Pro Evolution Football", etc., and even the low-key "Resident Evil" has made a lot of money. Compared with Nintendo, it looks much poorer. .

Only then did Hiroshi Yamauchi realize that his company was in crisis, and many companies that had been happy to cooperate with him had left one after another. Only 4 companies in RB China were willing to develop games on the N64, and only Rare was left overseas. Intention, and many masterpieces that originally belonged to the Nintendo platform have spread their wings and soared. The only one whose movement is unknown is "The Legend of Zelda" mastered by Tianzhiyuan, and the only thing Nintendo can get out of it is "The Legend of Zelda". Mario series.Hiroshi Yamauchi knew that the launch of N64 would definitely be another tragedy if there was no support from a masterpiece that could be sold. So far, he had no choice but to lower his figure, and even went out to win over the wavering game developers in person, trying to make a breakthrough for the N64. Accumulate as much wealth as possible.It's a pity that it has not been very effective. Even companies such as Rare, Tianzhiyuan and Konami, which had very good cooperative relations in the era of Nintendo's Famicom (FC) and Super Nintendo (SFC), have never let go. Cope with salty words.

Hiroshi Yamauchi didn't understand this very much. It wasn't until one day that his subordinates sent an investigation report to his desk that he realized that companies such as Rare, Tianzhiyuan and Konami belonged to a company called Dongfang Industrial Co., Ltd. Group company, and recently, Oriental Electronic Entertainment Co., Ltd., which also belongs to the Oriental Industrial Group, is negotiating with Nintendo on the transfer of GameBoy-related patent authorization. Due to Nintendo's insistence, the negotiations on the transfer of patent authorization have not made any progress. "Maybe this is The reason why companies such as Rare, Tianzhiyuan and Konami have ambiguous attitudes!" Hiroshi Yamauchi thought.

Although GameBoy has made great contributions to the development of Nintendo, it has long been a bit outdated and backward, and some of them cannot be put on the table.As early as the beginning of 1994, a senior commentator of the Chicago Tribune declared: "GameBoy is outdated and should be ruthlessly thrown into the trash!"

In fact, there are quite a few people in Nintendo who have this kind of cognition, even the pillars of companies such as Arakawa Minoru, Miyamoto Shigeru and Takeda Genyang also have this kind of view. In their eyes, the N64 can really determine the outcome A game console, as for the GameBoy, it's more than an outdated children's toy.Only Junpei Yokoi and his first development department are still optimistic about GameBoy. However, Gunpei Yokoi had to leave Nintendo after VRBoy caused a fiasco. Affected by this, GameBoy has also become a game in the eyes of Hiroshi Yamauchi. It's a bit dispensable, but it's just that I don't want to license GameBoy's patents to others out of instinct.

But when Hiroshi Yamauchi guessed the "reason" for the ambiguous attitudes of companies such as Rare, Tenzhiyuan, and Konami, he couldn't be tougher, and some people under him also took the initiative to persuade him: "Anyway, the GameBoy will only last for two days." It’s time to move on, why bother to affect the development of N64 for a gadget that is about to withdraw from the market”, after repeated persuasion, Hiroshi Yamauchi was finally forced to waver, so he slowly began to have some troubles on the negotiating table between Dongfang Electronic Entertainment and Nintendo. Some substantial progress has been made.

(End of this chapter)