Reborn Tokyo Golden Age

On April 1st, Akihabara in Tokyo became extremely lively on this day.

In front of the animation shops and electrical appliances shops lined up on both sides of the street, almost all scenes are crowded with people.

Although there were many people in the past, it is rare for the whole street to be impassable like now.

But even though the crowd was crowded, the unexpected crowd was faintly divided into two factions.

Although there is no obvious clothing to distinguish, everyone tacitly formed two piles in front of each store.

And the occasional glances to the opposite side all declare to outsiders that they are not in the same group.

Not only are they not in the same group, but even the two sides showed a hint of hostility.

And the reason why such a clear-cut situation is created, of course, has a lot to do with everyone gathering here today.

Just look at the magazine or newspaper they are holding in their hands.

"Shirakawa Electric VS Nintendo! REDAY GO!"

"The curtain is opened, and the game's two heroes are on the scene!"

"Red and blue duel! Depart today!"

Look, the atmosphere is here. As die-hard fans of the two families, if they can get along in harmony, then hell.

From more than half a month ago, the media has been hyping the duel between the two heroes in the game console industry.

What you should know, what you shouldn't know, everyone knows that there are big things happening in the game industry today.

And Akihabara, where a large number of animation, arcade, and electronics stores gather, is of course the first choice for young people.

Although the spring break is coming to an end, it does not prevent everyone from welcoming this grand event in the game console industry on the last day of the holiday.

Just arrived at ten o'clock in the morning, and the shops on both sides of the street opened their doors to welcome customers as if they had made an appointment.

"I'm coming!"

The store door has just been opened, and what is imprinted in the eyes is the distinct red and blue.

Red FC posters for Nintendo, blue FES posters for Shirakawa Electric.

They are hung in the most conspicuous position of the door, one left and one right, with a strong sense of purpose.

And the fans outside the door, who were in high spirits, couldn't help shouting when they saw this scene.

Then, as if they had received orders at the same time, the two groups rushed into the store together.

Their direction is the same, but the destination is after entering the door, one left and one right are automatically diverted.

When it comes to making trouble, the stores in Akihabara are better than the media.

These merchants who have been immersed in merchandising for many years know that different fan groups despise and have prejudice against each other.

It just so happens that the red-blue battle hyped up by the media has already aroused considerable discussion, so wouldn't it be too bad not to make good use of this?

As a result, each store changed its tricks to guide the confrontation between fans, and the tit-for-tat posters at the entrance were simply childish.

Some were so clever that they directly placed two large billboards at the door.

It will record the daily sales of Shirakawa Electric and Nintendo game consoles.

Whoever wins the day will put a small flag behind his board.

Look, the sales volume of the game console you support is lagging behind today, don't you hurry up and ask your friends to support it?

But no matter who wins or loses between Shirakawa Electric and Nintendo, the store will never lose money.

"FC! FC!", "FES! Give me a FES!"

One after another, greetings sounded in the store from time to time, and the cashiers were so busy that they didn't even have time to communicate occasionally.

The people crowded in front of the counter waiting to check out, their hands are red, red, blue and blue.

At a rough estimate, the number of the two seems to be about the same.

The reason for this evenly matched scene is because the fan bases of the two are about the same size.

This can be seen from the market share of the two handhelds. Although Shirakawa Electric has an advantage, it has not reached an overwhelming level.

And Nintendo is an old player in the game industry, and the accumulated fans can slightly make up for the lack of market share.

Another reason why there is not much difference between the two is that Shirakawa Electric's FES and Nintendo's FC are priced at the same price, 14,800 yen.

Look, isn't this a coincidence?

In fact, it is not a coincidence. The marketing departments of both companies have analyzed it.

If you want the student-based group to be able to afford game consoles, then the price must follow the principle of low pricing.

After Shirakawa Electric revealed its own price, Nintendo set the same price without hesitation.

However, Sega's SG-1000 was initially priced at 19,800 yen, but after comparing the other two, it silently lowered the price to 15,000 yen.

"The store manager! The store manager! Why is there no game console?" The loud voice silenced the crowd.

"Hey..." The busy clerk looked up at the red and blue packaging boxes on the shelf, and looked at the questioner strangely.

"Uh, I'm talking about Sega's SG-1000 game console."

"Cut~" The crowd booed unanimously.

The questioner blushed and ran away with his head in his arms.

This small episode did not affect everyone's enthusiasm for shopping. After getting the game console, many people stopped on another row of shelves.

why? Because there are densely packed game cassettes here.

Similarly, the cassettes of Shirakawa Electric and Nintendo have also made a distinction between left and right.

In fact, in the packing box in their hands, there is also a box of cassettes from the two clubs along with the host.

Nintendo gave "Donkey Kong", and Shirakawa Electric gave "Thunderbolt".

Both of them have unanimously released the most popular games under their names. If the game consoles are to sell well, the first game lineup is very important.

For children, how can a game be enough?

So the shelves filled with game cassettes were soon full of people.

The first thing everyone buys is of course the well-known transplanted games, such as Nintendo's "Donkey Kong JR", "Popeye" and so on.

They are both very well-known arcade games, and countless people have played them.

Baichuan Electric also has popular arcade models such as "Pac-Man", so there is no need to worry about sales.

But generally speaking, the number of people standing in front of the game cassette of Shirakawa Electric was obviously more.

This is because Shirakawa Electric's FES first game cartridges are much more than Nintendo.

In addition to "Thunderbolt" and "Pac-Man", HAL also produced two games, "Tank War" and "Double Dragon".

And third-party game developers, Namco's "Little Bee" and Enix's "Gate" are also on the shelves.

And depending on the content of the game, Shirakawa Electric's game cartridges are also designed in different colors.

For example, the blue of "Thunderbolt", the yellow of "Pac-Man", the army green of "Tank War", etc., the game stickers are also very beautiful.

Unlike Nintendo's game cassettes, there are only three types on the shelves, and they are all off-white.

In the eyes of children, of course, colorful colors are more attractive.

Seeing the chattering discussions on the opposite side, the students holding Nintendo game consoles couldn't help but feel a little lost.

At the same time, the exquisite game posters on Baichuan Feng Electric's side caught their eyes from time to time.

It's really greedy, my heart feels like being scratched by a kitten, it's unbearably itchy.

In Nishikawa City, Hyogo Prefecture, in the dormitory of an ordinary university, a classmate with black-rimmed glasses was lying on the bed and flipping through books bored.

The motionless eyeballs, as well as a page of a book that was turned for a long time, all showed that he was absent-minded at the moment.

"Si Guoyi! Si Guoyi~"

A series of shouts came from far and near outside the door, and with a "bang boring" sound of the door, a short-haired boy in a vest rushed into the dormitory.

The loud voice made the classmate with glasses who was bored flipping through the book on the bed subconsciously frowned.

He raised his upper body and looked at his fiery old friend, wanting to know what the other party was excited about.

"Hey" His action caused the short-haired boy to cast his gaze here.

"Kojima, hurry up! There are good things!"

Seeing that it was the boring gourd from the same company, the short-haired boy couldn't help but raise the blue packing box in his hand and greeted him because of his excitement.

"Hey..." The classmate named Kojima was attracted by the behavior of the roommate, so he couldn't help getting up and walking over.

However, at this time, the short-haired boy had already started to fiddle with the old TV set in the dormitory.

Soon the TV was turned on, and the blue and white game console inside the box was also plugged in.

"What is this, Da Yong-kun?" The curious Xiao Dao beside him couldn't help asking.

"Game console, Baichuan Electric's FES game console!" Da Yongtou replied without looking back.

After the screen was adjusted, the logo of Shirakawa Electric appeared on the TV soon.

Da Yong rubbed his hands excitedly, and then lightly inserted a game cassette called "Double Dragon" into the game console.

Kojima standing beside him has been watching all this intently. This is the first time he has seen this new type of game console.

Soon a burst of music interrupted his reverie, and the huge Chinese characters of "Double Dragon" on the old TV were particularly eye-catching.

"It's started! It's started!" Da Yong clapped his hands excitedly, making a crisp sound of "snap".

"Ah~da~" Da Yong made a kung fu gesture with both hands.

It's a pity that because of his fat body, he couldn't imitate even a trace of Li Xiaolong's charm.

Soon he wiped his hands, though, and tossed a blue and white handle to Kojima.

"Here, take it!"

"Hey" Kojima caught the handle in a hurry, and then he was at a loss and didn't know what to do.

"Sit down quickly, idiot! The game has begun~" Following Da Yong's random clicking, the game soon passed the opening animation.

Then two villains, one red and one blue, appeared on the street with the city as the background. When Kojima was wondering what to do next, Da Yong set a good example for him.

"Ah~! Ya~! Hit~" The handle in Da Yong's hand was crackling when he pressed it, and even thought it was not enjoyable, so he thoughtfully dubbed the voice for the villain.

Infected by him, Kojima carefully pressed the button on the controller a few times.

"Swipe, swipe, swipe", the movements of punching and kicking are quite smooth.

Huh? kung fu~

Kojima was a little excited, and unconsciously, the movements of his hands became faster and faster.

Soon, the sound of crackling keys resounded in the dormitory.

"Ba Ga, died again!" Da Yong Rencai loved to play again, and the red dots representing the blood bars disappeared after a while.

On the other hand, Kojima still has a trace of blood on his face because of his wretched style of play.

"Onboard! Kojima, quick! Get him!", "Oops, dead again!"

The voices of yelling and yelling came and went one after another in the dormitory, and Kojima's dull expression gradually became more colorful.

He looked down at the HAL logo on the game cassette and the name of the game designer/supervisor: Iwata Satoru, not only secretly fantasizing in his heart.

Is this a game console? It's really interesting.

It would be great if my name "Hideo Kojima" could appear on it in the future.