Rebirth of America, this is my time

"If you have anything to say, tell me immediately!"

After putting the screaming Ballmer into the room, Ethan naturally leaned back on the boss's chair.

Following his wave, the bald man who received the order also reported decisively.

When time quietly enters February, the laziness caused by the holidays has disappeared. As companies are busy working on this year's performance, the desire related to money and cooperation related to success have all turned into documents. , got into the fax of the game of destiny.

The first company to send an inquiry was McDonald's.

Last year, they gained a lot from their cooperation with Destiny Games. The launch of Happy Meal allowed them to gain a large number of customers. Compared with the historical average after the launch of the meal, the number of visits to McDonald's restaurants in North America increased at least after the meal was launched. Three percent.

As America's national fast food brand, a 1% increase in traffic can bring them huge economic benefits, and now, a cooperation project has achieved 3% for them?

This kind of exaggerated benefit is simply more outrageous than advertising for a year!

Especially when they found that with the end of the event, the traffic of restaurants in various places had dropped significantly. Even if they reached a cooperation with Paramount and moved "Star Trek" toys into the restaurants, they could not curb the decline. After gaining momentum, they understood that people cannot be compared with each other.

Although everyone understands that no one in this world can continuously stimulate the market, because the wealth in people's pockets is limited, when people's spending exceeds a threshold, even if their country encourages advanced consumption, it is impossible Explode the future income of the people.

However, all capitalists are greedy.

Even if they know that they cannot take all the people's wealth for themselves, they still want to get people to spend more money on their own businesses and capture people's consumption in other industries.

When this fact emerged, those popular IPs in North America would definitely not be able to help McDonald's realize its dream. Therefore, McDonald's once again found the Destiny Game and wanted to reach a new cooperation.

"What McDonald's is asking for this time is not Jack the Snake, Shredded Snake Queen, or Mr. and Ms. Pac-Man, but the "Empire Strikes Back" we are producing."

Ballmer waved his hands and said: "McDonald's wants the name 'Star Wars' to appear in their restaurants. They want Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader to come to McDonald's together."

"Oh——" Ethan understood.

He put his tripod on the desk and asked lazily: "Have McDonald's talked to Lucas?"

"We talked about it."

"How did George react?"

"George said that if McDonald's only wants to license the movie image, then they can negotiate directly, but if they want a gamified image of the movie character, then McDonald's needs to talk to us."

Ballmer said: "George's own wishes are also very clear. If McDonald's can cooperate with the promotion of "Star Wars", then he sincerely hopes that we can reach a cooperation with McDonald's."

In the new agreement finalized between Destiny Games and Lucasfilm, Ethan has the right to use all images related to the "Star Wars" game, whether it is T-shirts or toys, as long as Lucas pays dividends, he can do it .

After Lucas had given up the initiative in negotiations, if McDonald's wanted to stack up the BUFF, it had to get Ethan's consent, so... they came.

This fact made Ethan nod slightly.

After thinking for a moment, he said: "I agree in principle with this cooperation, but the specific details need to be dealt with in detail. Steve, you are not only a member of Destiny Games, but also the chairman of Destiny Pictures, so this matter is decided by You go and talk about it. If you have any issues, you can discuss them directly with George. Anyway, he is also the co-president of Destiny Pictures now, so it should be easy for you to communicate? "

"Yes." Ballmer said with a smile: "Then I will make an appointment with McDonald's later?"

"Yeah." Ethan waved his finger, indicating to the bald man to figure it out.

The second company to send a letter inquiring was the American Football League.

After the first national electronic game competition ended with great success, they made a lot of money from it and were looking forward to Destiny Games hosting the second competition.

But they waited and waited, but there was no news related to the second competition.

Ever since, they took the initiative to inquire and wanted to know if Destiny Games had any new competition plans.

Ballmer couldn't answer this question, so he pushed the matter to Ethan. After learning about the desire of the rugby league, Ethan leaned on his seat and closed his eyes directly.

"These capitalists are really greedy."

"Before, as soon as the league entered the offseason, they could only hold their noses and rest."

"There's no way you can get a bigger benefit out of it."

"But now, when they find out that even if the league goes into the offseason, they can make money by hosting our games, they want to keep this business in their hands."

"This is really..."

"Ah!"

Ethan chuckled, showing emotion.

After thinking again and again, he said: "Holding competitions can indeed mobilize people's enthusiasm for video games and enhance people's love for brands, but it is meaningless to hold them every year. So we set a rule that it will be held every two years. The second competition will be held next year.”

"And the game of competition..."

"Let's announce it this Christmas."

"If our sales of "Starry Sky" can exceed 15 million this year, then next year's competition game will be "Starry Sky". If "Starry Sky" does not exceed 15 million, then next year's competition game will start from "The Empire Strikes Back" Choose from two arcade machines of "War"."

"There are two sets of wordings for the announcement. If we choose "Starry Sky", then we will say thank you for the fans' support. Fifteen million sales represent fifteen million players. This huge participation allows us I am flattered. If we choose "The Empire Strikes Back", then we will say that arcade games have a wider audience, and the operating purpose of our Destiny Game is to create happiness with heart..."

Ballmer pursed his lips when he heard the vacillating stance.

The adaptive rhetoric made him want to laugh.

But he knew that at this moment, he couldn't laugh.

Because once he laughs, the boss will definitely throw him out.

The third company that sent a letter to inquire was the Disney Group.

Yes, it's the Disney Group, not Roy Disney.

During last year's competition, Ethan licensed some of the characters from the Destiny game to Disney and asked them to produce peripherals. After enjoying the success of the sales, they wanted to keep this part of the proceeds.

But unfortunately, when Ethan signed the licensing contract with them last year, he only agreed on a one-year sales time limit. When this summer comes, Disney will lose the sales authority.

This is unacceptable to them.

Therefore, before the contract was about to expire, they took the initiative to send a letter asking about authorization renewal.

“Is this what Roy Disney means or is this what the Disney Group means?”

After listening to Ballmer's description, Ethan asked the key to the matter.

"Roy Disney wants us to take back the authorization." Ballmer replied neatly.

Simple words explain everything.

"Then take it back."

Compared with Disney's control, Ethan simply doesn't like these small amounts of money.

At the same time, this incident also let him know that Roy Disney...

"This guy really has limited abilities!"

"Half a year has passed and we still can't get rid of the shareholders in the Disney Group."

Ethan shook his head in disappointment and said, "I finally understand. As the only orthodox member of the Disney family, why can't he get the support of the Disney veterans?"

"This guy has nothing but ambition."

Perhaps it was because the topic was a bit sensitive that Ballmer didn't know how to proceed, but it was also possible that Ballmer understood the seriousness of the matter and simply chose to remain silent.

But no matter what his attitude was, Ethan didn't care.

As for toys...

"You communicate with George and ask them how their Star Wars toys are sold."

"If Lucasfilm has a solid toy sales channel, then we can try to borrow it. Whether it's working with Toys "R" Us or working with Hasbro, I have no problem with it."

"As long as our toys can be successfully sold throughout North America, it will be considered a success."

"Oh, by the way, for the sake of clarity, we are setting up a subsidiary to handle the toy business."

"Just call it Destiny Toy, and you will be responsible."

"You should be fine, right?"

Ethan cast a questioning look at Ballmer.

"certainly!"

Ballmer smiled and said: "I feel energetic!"

"Yeah." Ethan waved his hand to show off.

After talking about external matters such as McDonald's, the Football League and Disney, the next content of Ballmer's report was all related to the company's internal operations.

For example, the equity incentive plan of Michael Blanco Manufacturing Company has been prepared, and the plan has been unanimously approved by the senior management of the manufacturing company. Now I want to ask Ethan to review it;

For another example, the two games of "The Empire Strikes Back" that Ethan reviewed previously have entered the testing stage. If there are no problems, they are expected to be put into production next month;

For example, Steven Spielberg made the decision to make "Raiders of the Lost Ark" into a scrolling shooter. Although he was a die-hard fan of video games, the newly formed Amblin needed money.

When dreams and reality collide...

Steven Spielberg made the most business decisions.

"Okay, I respect his choice."

"Tell him to send a copy of the script after it's finalized."

"I will let the production team in the company make the game based on the plot content."

When the decisions came out of Ethan's mouth, the guys who had a tacit understanding after years of cooperation got busy in an orderly manner. At this moment, the fate game is like a powerful engine, which is constantly roaring with the cooperation of various departments.

And Ethan...

All he could do was watch quietly.

no way.

When a company develops to a certain scale, the leader at the top of the pyramid is no longer the promoter of daily operations, but the helmsman who controls the direction. They can influence the direction of the company, but how do they get to the desired destination? That only relies on everyone working hard.

In this situation, Ethan is both relaxed and anxious.

Relaxed because he didn't have to do the work himself.

Anxious because he needs to be responsible for the feeding of nearly 10,000 people under his command.

And when Ethan was controlling the overall situation of the company and thinking about the unresolved chip problem, at the end of February of 1980, a figure that he had almost forgotten appeared in front of him.

"Boss, I'm back."

The dusty Julis Noble looked at Ethan with a smile.

"Wow! Julis! What's going on with you? Why do you look tired?"

Ethan was a little surprised.

Get up quickly.

While inviting Julis to sit down, he personally poured the girl a glass of water.

When Julis traveled across the ocean to take root in Neon for the development of the company, she was actually the person who made the biggest sacrifice in the entire company. Ethan may be businesslike when dealing with others, but facing Julis?

He will show his greatest kindness to the other party...

Taking the water glass handed over by Ethan, she took two sips and said, "Boss, I came here from Neon overnight, and I was sorting out information during the flight, so..."

"It's normal to feel trapped, isn't it?"

After a brief explanation, Julis changed the topic to a specific issue, "Boss, I came back suddenly because something unexpected happened to Neon."

"I can't control or judge these things, so I can't report to you over the phone. I can only fly back and communicate with you face to face..."

With that said, Julis handed a slightly curled document to Ethan.

Although it is not bound, neatly arranged, it is the best storage in case of emergency.

And when Ethan opened it and took a look...

The clear description made him frown.

Because what Julis reported was not a change in Nintendo.

Nor was it the Sony that Ethan had asked him to stare at.

But Sega.

Although Sega is a long-established American arcade production company, in the past few years of the crazy development of video games, Sega's presence in the arcade industry has been very weak.

Since 1975, Ethan has only been in contact with them twice. The first time was in 1975. At that time, Ethan was looking for cooperation with "Snake". He found Sega and hoped that The other party was able to help with the distribution, but Sega refused; the second time was two years later, when "Pac-Man" became a big hit, Sega, who wanted to obtain overseas agency rights, and Nintendo, who wanted to obtain Neon agents, approached them at the same time. door.

Then……

Ethan chose Nintendo.

Since rejecting Sega that time, Ethan has never met them again. In the early days of the development of the Destiny game, Ethan also thought about whether Sega, who had mastered thunder and lightning in his previous life, would jump out and snipe him, but then As there were more and more enemies around him, he gradually forgot about this matter.

Now, Julis's report is very interesting.

In February last year, Sega officially announced that they had reached an agreement with a neon company called Esco Trading and officially acquired them. After the deal was completed, Sega said that the deal would bring them more overseas revenue, and they decided to open a large number of arcade entertainment centers in neon Sapporo under the name Esco Trading to provide an online platform for players who like video games. A fun place to play.

At the same time, after acquiring Esco Trading, they can also cooperate with Toho under the name of Neon Company to jointly develop a monster game related to "Godzilla".

Since Julis was focused on Sony at the time and had no time to care about anything else, she left this matter behind. Of course, the subsequent failure to report it also reflected her feeling that Sega was a company that could no longer make waves with neon. Relatedly, when their Destiny game can beat everything and Neon companies are looking up to catch up, Sega is buying land to build an arcade? Want to be original? Isn’t this the old birthday girl who hangs himself to die?

And just when Julis was thinking about how many months Sega could sustain on the road of originality...

At the end of last year, Sega launched their self-developed game, "Godzilla" to the market.

Since the game was not released with much fanfare, Sega did not sell its arcade machines aggressively. It only placed "Godzilla" in the arcades it controlled. Therefore, when the product was first launched, it did not gain much popularity from the public. Pay attention, but after a month of operation...

This game has a charm all their own.

In just thirty days, they set Sapporo on fire.

Although Julis didn't know exactly how much money the game made, she knew it must be super profitable because shortly after the game was launched, Sega promoted the product's creator, Neon Man Hayao Nakayama, to Sega's Global Executive Vice President.

Not only that, while gaining a new identity, Nakayama Hayao also said that their self-developed "Godzilla" has received a lot of attention and will be launched in other arcades in the first half of this year.

When this fact emerges...

Julis knew that she might have been careless and did not dodge.

Note: ①In reality, Esco Trading was acquired by Sega in February 1979. ②The founder of Esco Trading is Nakayama Hayao, who reverse-merged Sega in 1983. ③In reality, Sega did invest in many arcades in Neon, which gave them a lot of gains. After all, the income from real estate speculation is stable, and all businesses can be transferred to real estate speculation.