Game Development Giant

Inside Mars Entertainment.

This is not a high-level meeting specifically held for a certain matter. In fact, Jester rarely convenes a high-level meeting specifically for a certain emergency, because Jester feels that this is completely unnecessary. Necessarily, for leaders like them, the most correct and safest way to deal with ever-changing situations is to remain unchanged.

The same is true for this high-level meeting. This is just a routine R\u0026D discussion at the beginning of each month. All the heads of various development groups are present. In this meeting, the discussion focused on the R\u0026D process last month. Problems encountered, and plans for the next month.

And just at this opportunity, someone casually mentioned the policy Hisao Oguchi proposed in the program two days ago to reduce the price of MD to $201.

Players outside the industry may not be sensitive to this price, but the top management within Mars Entertainment, whether administrative or R\u0026D personnel, are extremely familiar with this price. This price is just above the cost price. If If logistics and promotion costs increase, and the increase in production capacity does not effectively reduce production costs, then the price will be lost.

"They just want to lose money?"

Some people knocked on the table angrily and said, but most of the people present agreed, and they didn't understand why Sega did this.

Jester's face was expressionless. After looking around, he showed a very ordinary smile on his face and said simply: "Actually, there is nothing easy to understand. They know that through ordinary methods, there is no way at all." It may compete with us in terms of sales, because our advantage in North America is really too great."

After a short pause, Jester saw that the faces of many people present had changed, so he smiled and continued: "So. The only thing they can do is to use a person that we can't, or it's very difficult. Be determined to use methods to fight them."

What Jester said is right. In fact, the best way to deal with Sega's tactics is to imitate what Sega does. We will do the same. Anyway, I have more capital than you and I have more players. By the end of the game, you will definitely not be able to beat me.

But the problem is that the difficulty with Sega's method lies in the large number of players.

Indeed, the purpose of selling at reduced prices is to seize market share. After gaining market share, they can then rely on games to make money. This is the case for later generations of game console manufacturers, except for Nintendo. Both Microsoft and Sony will adopt this strategy, but the problem is that the more you sell, the more you lose.

in front of. When the profit of the game is not enough, a large amount of cash needs to be invested to make up for this huge loss. The more players you have, the greater the loss that needs to be made up. The amount of money required is an astronomical amount. Mars Entertainment’s accumulation over the years is not that it cannot pay it, but it is difficult to make this decision.

Once this decision is made. That means using real money to fix the loopholes.

Judging from the expressions of the people at the scene, Jester knew that at least half of the people did not agree to follow Sega in lowering prices. In fact, Jester himself was hesitant. He knew that if he did not follow Sega in lowering prices, , then there will definitely be many players who are dissatisfied, and they are likely to switch to Sega's camp, and it is foreseeable that after seeing that Sega's measure is effective, Sony, which follows closely behind, is likely to do the same. Learn from others.

All we can say is that the situation will be very unoptimistic.

Jester secretly sighed. He thought of a solution that was not a solution. However, this solution was only a temporary solution and could not cure the root cause. The most important thing was whether his company's beliefs were worth it in the eyes of players. Worth fifty dollars more than its competitors.

Is the loss of players caused by not bargaining within the controllable range?

These are all questions that cannot be explained at all, but they are the reality that must be faced soon. Jester asked those present: "Do you have any good suggestions?"

The whole audience was indifferent.

After waiting for more than ten minutes, no one spoke. They were all silent. Jester didn't take it seriously because he had been thinking about it for so many days and couldn't think of any better measures. He could only say it himself. : "Since you don't have any suggestions, let me tell you my response plan."

As he spoke, Jester took out a large stack of documents, placed them on the table in front of him, and then continued: "This is the investigation company I commissioned. It took a whole year to investigate Australia and the United States. The survey reports made after the market situation in South America. These are just brief introductions to the reports. More details are in the archives. I will ask someone to send you a brief introduction to these reports later. This is me. core of the plan."

Everyone didn't quite understand what Jester meant. He was currently discussing the issue of 16-bit computers. Why did his boss suddenly bring the topic to these backward places? Could it be that these places could still satisfy the market for 16-bit computers? Can't? Forget about Australia, but what the hell is South America?

In fact, this is why Jester suddenly remembered a past event in the game console industry, that is, in South America, FC used to be the most popular console for more than ten years. Even in the PS era, the share of FC consoles It is still the highest, especially in Brazil and Argentina, two countries that are still relatively wealthy.

Australia was Sega's most important market at the time, besides North America. This market was also the only place where they were stronger than Nintendo. Therefore, Jester felt that these two markets had great potential, but he had not done so before. He didn't pay attention to it, so before officially launching a strategy for these two markets, he still paid a research company to investigate.

The conclusion reached is very satisfying.

"I suddenly thought of a pretty good plan." Facing the doubts of everyone present, Jester just smiled and began to explain, "Actually, the content of the plan is very simple. Let's just follow Sega. If they lower their prices, we will also lower our prices. This is absolutely impossible. Even if we plan to lower our prices, it is definitely not at this time."

Everyone understands what Jester said. If you lower the price of Dreambox 2 before it goes on sale, and if you do it just after the news of Sega's price reduction comes out, you will inevitably be looked down upon. Being underestimated by the players.

"So, I thought of a promotional method to give back to the players, that is, use the old Dreambox console, and discount it into US dollars according to the condition of the old one, and buy the Dreambox2 console. In short, it is to trade in the old one for the new one."

No one has heard of this method before, and I think it is very novel. After thinking about it carefully, I feel that it is still very practical. In fact, this is also a method that Jester suddenly thought of leaving behind for future generations and used by Chinese electrical appliance manufacturers. Strategy, it turns out, this strategy is very successful.

"Is this okay? But what's the difference between this and a direct price reduction?"

Someone asked this question.

Jester smiled and replied: "This is why I mentioned the South American market and the Australian market before. The Australian market is the market we are planning to enter next. The main product is our 16-bit console Dreambox2. But in the South American market, there is no need to use Dreambox2 because the price is too high. Not only is it impossible for us to sell it at a low price to them, but even if we sell it, they cannot afford it."

At this point, many people also understood what Jester meant. Jester's meaning was very simple, that is, to use the Dreambox host to occupy the South American market.

"Not just a dreambox console, in fact, my first plan is a second-hand machine."

Jester expressed his idea: "When I went to South America to investigate the market situation, I also conducted a survey on rental game console stores. I found that in South America, many people are not interested in this game. I am very interested in that. Although the production price of our Dreambox console has been reduced enough to less than seventy US dollars, seventy US dollars is also very expensive for many people in that area, and we There’s no way it could be sold there for seventy dollars.”

"So, many people are interested in renting game consoles and opening rental stores for those who are interested to play. This is a very good idea. In fact, there are many such places in Brazil and Argentina." Jess When Te said this, a confident smile appeared on his face.

"My plan is that in North America, we will use this kind of preferential measures to please players. Doesn't Sega want to use direct price cuts to win over players? We can't directly imitate them. We use the old-to-new method to To please those players who belong to us in the first place.”

As he spoke, the corners of Jester's mouth curled up slightly, revealing a malicious look. He continued: "Furthermore, the advantage of our method is that we don't just cut prices, we acquire them." Second-hand hosts, after being refurbished, can be directly delivered to the South American market. If it is not possible to sell them directly, then we can completely sell them to the owners who open hourly rental stores, and they are also a quite large market group."

"Furthermore, I believe that even if Sega has the money to fill the hole, they won't be heartbroken if one or two years pass and they still can't see an improvement in market share."

At the end of the sentence, Jester slammed the table. (To be continued...)