game trailblazer

Chapter 361 The Power of the Halo
"What! How is this possible!"

With a bang, there was a muffled sound from the president's office on the top floor of the Nintendo headquarters building. Hiroshi Yamauchi slapped the table and roared into the phone, "Did you make a mistake in your investigation? What's wrong with the current market situation?" There will be such results..."

Hiroshi Yamauchi feels that he is very angry now. Under the pressure of DreamBox64 and PS128, the N2 host has become a "fleet of existence" object, and the price has dropped to freezing point. It looks like it's getting better.

Finally, NGC's first game is about to be completed, and the planned release date is not far away, but "Halo" came out again, and it sold more than 100 million sets in one day.Hiroshi Yamauchi still remembers that "Resident Evil 2" once set a sales myth of 200 million sets on the first day, and then pushed the PS game console to a more brilliant new world. Compared with the 100 million sets of "Halo", although There are some gaps, but it is still a new myth today. At least Hiroshi Yamauchi has not seen any of his own games that can reach this level recently. He believes that Ken Kutaragi will have the same opinion.

Hiroshi Yamauchi moved his aching palm due to excessive excitement, and thought to himself: "It seems that I have to go to Miyamoto-kun's place." Thinking of this, he got up and went to the outside room, and turned to his secretary Mami Makoto. Yu ordered a few words, and then went out to Shigeru Miyamoto's information development headquarters.

The information development headquarters is located on the seventh floor of the Nintendo headquarters building. At the beginning, Shigeru Miyamoto only led five or six people to occupy a small office, and what he did could only be regarded as simple and ordinary. Development work, even the name of the department is very common, just the Fourth Development Department. At that time, the most prosperous Nintendo was Junpei Yokoi, known as Shigeru Miyamoto.Later, with the strong support of Hiroshi Yamauchi, the Fourth Development Department gradually grew stronger, and changed its name to the current Information Development Headquarters. Today, the Information Development Headquarters has become a huge department that occupies two-thirds of the entire seventh floor. .

Perhaps because the platform switch was too late, the information development headquarters, which has always been invincible, has encountered a lot of trouble. The development progress of the signature game with the internal code name "Mario 128" has always been extremely slow, so that Hiroshi Yamauchi had to transfer the first game. Hopes are pinned on Konno Hideki, who took the lead for the first time, and his "Louis' Haunted House".

It has been about ten days since the last time I came to the Information Development Headquarters, and the planned launch date of NGC is getting closer and closer. Originally, Hiroshi Yamauchi was a very patient person, but he was aggressive with DreamBox128 and PS2. The more dangerous market environment forced him to do a lot of things he didn't want to do, but he couldn't do otherwise.

After these years of development, Nintendo has basically broken away from the constraints of a family business, and has become a joint-stock listed company that is closer to the modern enterprise system. While obtaining more development funds, Hiroshi Yamauchi has also correspondingly lost his respect for Nintendo. Absolute control. The reason why he can still control Nintendo these years is mostly due to the prestige accumulated in the past and the glory he once brought to Nintendo.However, if Yamauchi Hiroshi cannot continue to lead Nintendo to create brilliance, it may soon lead to shareholders' questions, and may even lose the chairman's seat. After all, shareholders don't care about an old man's dream in this age. It's better to care about whether the company can continue to make money.

While thinking about the helplessness in his heart, Hiroshi Yamauchi stretched out his hand and gently pushed open the door of the Information Development Headquarters, his mood suddenly became tense...

……

Quiet, very quiet.

In the Sega Headquarters building in Tokyo, it became uncharacteristically quiet. Not only the secretaries who like to chatter all kinds of gossip in the bathroom and telephone lines on weekdays became abnormally quiet, even the people walking in the aisles of the building were inexplicable. became cautious, and the source of all this came from the same quiet conference room.

In the quiet meeting room, except for the slight sound of Isao Okawa turning over the documents in hand, there were almost no other sounds, as if everyone in the meeting room was the same, but in fact, not only the vice president Hideki Sato was present, Even Xiang Shanzhe, who had been at odds with him, was there, and even some supporters of these two sat quietly at the conference table.

Da Chuangong's complexion was ugly. Under the torture of repeated illnesses, he no longer had much energy to support himself, but today's so much is because of the bad news mentioned in the document in his hand.After taking a big mouthful of oxygen, Da Chuangong's pale face showed a little blood, he exhaled hard and said, "This is the situation, what do you guys think?"

The situation is very bad, even very bad. Isao Okawa doesn’t understand why Sega has become like this now. The price reduction and sales of Dreamcast consoles are not as expected. The severance pay, etc., all kinds of disadvantages cost Sega too much money. Not only did he spend a lot of 500 billion yen that he used to stabilize the company a few months ago, but the company's deficit scale also increased from 236 to 583 million yen. [-] million yen soared to [-] billion yen, and Sega once again stood on the edge of the cliff.

Originally, the files in Isao Okawa's hands included the latest sales data of the popular games "Onimusha", "Heartbeat Memories 128" and "Halo" on the DreamBox3 platform, but he can no longer care about others. Now Sega has used It doesn't matter what others do, the huge deficit of more than 500 billion yen alone is enough to crush Sega to pieces.If it were someone else, maybe the first 500 billion yen would not be taken out, but Isao Okawa is different. In his eyes, Sega is a unique place where his dreams are placed, so he is not reconciled to Sega's hasty The end of , as it was a few months ago, is the same now.

Feeling the hopeful eyes of Da Chuangong, everyone lowered their heads in shame. During these few months, many people thought that their choice was right, so there were frequent fights under the calm water. After fighting back and forth, what we are facing today is a bigger fiscal deficit and a more sinister market environment. Looking back on the past, even Hideki Sato, who is persistent, feels a little bit remorseful.

Okawa Kou was not angry when his question was not answered, he knew what was going on, so he smiled magnanimously, pointed to the side with his hand, and said: "It just so happens that Kuchiki-kun is here, I have decided, I will be responsible for the company's financial deficit this time!"

Everyone looked at Isao Okawa and the lawyer next to him, Byakuya Kuchiki, in a daze. An unbelievable thought flashed through their minds, and expressions of surprise slowly appeared on their faces, especially Hideki Sato This is especially true for Tetsu and Xiangshan. They all know where Sega's 500 billion yen to tide over the difficulties came from.

"Kuchiki-kun, help me prepare a contract." Isao Okawa took a big breath of oxygen, and then said: "I am going to spend another 850 billion yen, hoping to help the company overcome the current difficulties."

"President!" Suddenly there was an exclamation in the meeting room. Although he had already prepared a little bit, the huge number of "850 billion yen" that Isao Okawa said still surprised everyone.After being surprised, everyone felt even more ashamed. After working so hard for so long, they didn't bring much improvement to Sega, but still asked a seriously ill old man to subsidize the company with his private property again and again. Sato Hideki and Kayama Tetsu The same is true for the two of them. They recalled all kinds of unhappiness during this period of fighting for power, and all kinds of behaviors during this period were particularly dirty against the background of Da Chuangong's behavior.

"Mr. Okawa, are you really sure? If it is 850 billion yen, you will not have much property left!" As an old relationship for many years, Kuchiki Byakuya knows the situation of Isao Okawa very well. 500 million yen, plus the 850 billion yen this time, it may be less than 100 billion yen that can be left to his children and grandchildren, so he has to confirm it again.

"It's okay, just do it according to this number!" Isao Okawa confirmed solemnly. He was actually very helpless, but if he didn't make a move, maybe Sega would start counting down to survive, so other things are right. It doesn't matter to him anymore.

A different kind of atmosphere floated in the conference room. Seeing the resolute expression on this pale old man's face, everyone felt an impulse in their hearts. They all hoped that under the leadership of Isao Okawa, they could bring Sega In the new future, the estrangement caused by different opinions in the past has disappeared at this time, and there is only one thought in everyone's mind: "Follow Mr. Okawa!"

The senior executives of Sega Corporation, who were somewhat divided, began to unite again. It seemed that Sega Corporation really ushered in the hope of rebirth...

Isao Okawa could no longer care about what would happen to "Halo", but Ken Kutaragi was so concerned about it that he became the first among several major game companies to learn about the sales of "Halo". The 15 copies of "Onimusha" on the first day once slightly stimulated Ken Kutaragi once, followed by the special edition of "Heartbeat Memories 3". "Halo" simply reached 100 million sets on the first day, and this time he couldn't take it anymore.

Due to inexplicable restrictions, Sony Computer Entertainment had to give up the game console market in North America and Europe, but Kutaragi Ken did not intend to give up even the game software part. After all, more or less PS2s have sold millions of units. Thinking about how much he could sell, who would have thought that such a powerful "Halo" would suddenly appear, disrupting his dream at once.Ken Kutaragi can figure it out with his toes. With "Halo" to open the way, the better game lineup on DreamBox128 will definitely achieve quite good results, so the disadvantage of PS2 game consoles will also become bigger and bigger.

Kutaragi Ken glanced at the shocking numbers on the report again, sighed slightly and said, "I'm afraid the days to come will be even more difficult..."

(End of this chapter)