Reborn Tokyo Golden Age

Kyoto, Nintendo headquarters.

Hiroshi Yamauchi fiddled with the handheld in his hand, his expression did not show any fluctuations.

Yokoi Gunpei, who was sitting under him, had a serious face.

"This is the latest wide-screen portable game console from Baichuan Electric that caused us trouble?"

Finally, after being silent for an unknown amount of time, Hiroshi Yamauchi raised his eyes and spoke slowly.

"Hay" Junhei Yokoi's originally broad cheeks looked even thinner because of his tense complexion.

Shirakawa Electric's new wide-screen handheld device has not only brought troubles to Nintendo.

It can be called a business crisis, which is why Yamauchi Hiroshi and Yokoi Gunpei are now together.

What they are holding in their hands now is the widescreen handheld of Baichuan Electric. First of all, the appearance is much larger than before.

The most obvious sign is that the original LCD screen has almost doubled in size.

In addition, when the handheld is turned off, there are still colorful patterns on the screen.

When he got this new product for the first time, Yokoi Gunpei was taken aback.

Has Baichuan Electric's technology advanced to this extent? You must know that there is no color LCD screen on the market at the moment.

Surprised, Yokoi Junhei took it over and carefully identified it, only to find that the color pattern was not displayed on the display screen.

Instead, a special film was pasted on the LCD screen. The well-informed Yokoi Gunhei immediately thought of a similar film on the Atari home machine.

This is a very simple technology, and even the cost is quite low, but the effect presented cannot be underestimated.

Just like the handheld in front of you, it comes with a game called "The Prince of Tennis".

There are even green lawns on both sides of the screen as a background pattern, and the blocking in the middle is exactly the same as in reality.

All of this is the visual effect provided by the layer of colorful film, and the display screen remains unchanged, still the original TN-LCD screen.

The response was slow and the sphere jumped obviously, but the combination of the two immediately brought the effect to a higher level.

What a genius idea, Yokoi Junping looked serious, but at the same time he couldn't help but admire secretly.

This method of using low cost to develop new ideas is in line with the principle of "horizontal thinking of withered technology" that he insists on.

Turn decay into magic at the lowest possible cost.

Now this handheld with a layer of ordinary color film has brought big trouble to Nintendo.

Shirakawa Electric's new wide-screen handheld only has one game, and the price is 4,800 yen.

The larger the screen, the higher the sense of experience and fun, but the price is cheaper than before.

In terms of game content, there is not much difference between each other.

The sales of handheld consoles launched by Nintendo and Shirakawa Electric in the same period were about 30% lower than those of the latter.

As a veteran video game manufacturer, Nintendo has fallen into a disadvantage in an all-round way, so they can't help being nervous.

"It really is a strong enemy." Hiroshi Yamauchi put down the handheld device in his hand and let out a soft sigh.

Even he, who has always regarded game content as the king, has to admit that some small hardware improvements can bring unexpected increases to the charm of the product.

"Yamauchi-san, what should we do?" Yokoi Junhei asked Yamauchi Hiroshi for instructions in a low voice.

Of course, Nintendo has to make some moves, otherwise the handheld market will be swallowed up by the other party more and more.

This is Nintendo's most profitable pillar industry at this time, and there is no room for any mistakes.

"We will follow up too," Yamauchi Hiroshi gave the order without hesitation.

"But." Yokoi Junping also wanted to do the same in his heart, but to be honest, he was also a little afraid of Shirakawa Electric.

Why? It seems that the fate of plagiarizing Baichuan Electric is not very fast.

Needless to say, the earliest Aihua was sued once by Shirakawa Electric. A large sum of compensation was posted, and it is still a bit sluggish.

The later Gaode cross key infringement case is even more vivid in my memory, but this family is lucky, so the surname is Bai Chuan now.

Even for this reason, the chaotic handheld market at that time suddenly became quiet.

Even Nintendo, who is used to rogues, is a little scared of the shadow of a famous tree.

And until now, the cross key button is still the exclusive design of Shirakawa Electric.

Even Hiroshi Yamauchi is unwilling to provoke the huge legal department behind it.

But this time, Hiroshi Yamauchi waved his hand to reassure him, "Don't worry Yokoi-san, Shirakawa Electric has no patent for this technology."

"Eh?" Yokoi Gunhei was a little surprised.

Has Shirakawa Electric turned gender? If such a patent is not registered quickly, is it forgotten?

As if understanding what he was thinking, Hiroshi Yamauchi explained, "Atari applied for a similar patent a few years ago, and Shirakawa Electric couldn't apply even if it wanted to."

It turned out to be the case, Yokoi Gunpei subconsciously breathed a sigh of relief.

"By the way, President, shall we?"

Junhei Yokoi's intentions are obvious, should we take advantage of Shirakawa Electric's lack of reaction?

Get the authorization from Atari first, and then ask Shirakawa Electric for infringement fees.

"Do you think that Bai Chuan-san will leave such a big loophole?" Hiroshi Yamauchi would not underestimate Bai Chuanfeng.

"Uh..." Junhei Yokoi thought about it too, everyone is a genius, it is impossible to ignore this problem.

"But Yamauchi-san, will we infringe on Atari's rights by doing this?"

Isn't it possible for Nintendo to directly follow up with copyright infringement?

"Don't worry, first of all Atari can't find Neon. In addition, even if the other party finds us, we have plenty of solutions."

Hiroshi Yamauchi has already made calculations in his heart, and I may have to weigh Shirakawa Electric, but you are a foreign company and there are too many ways to deal with you.

"The design of the widescreen is directly discussed with Sharp. I believe there is no technical difficulty in this."

"Hay"

Nintendo's LCD screens have always been supplied by Sharp, and even Junhei Yokoi himself worked for Sharp for a while before entering Nintendo.

The relationship between the two companies has a long history of cooperation, and they get along quite harmoniously.

Therefore, on the issue of widescreen or color film, they cannot be troubled at all.

"By the way, which company supplies the display screens of Shirakawa Electric?" Suddenly Hiroshi Yamauchi thought of another question.

"It seems to be Seiko Suwa." Junpei Yokoi has learned about this information.

As a competitor, he has studied the hardware of Baichuan Electric Appliances all over.

"So it's Suwa Seiko, this is Sharp's old friend." Hiroshi Yamauchi let out an inexplicable exclamation.

The world's first commercial LCD screen was born in 1973, and the manufacturer of this LCD screen was Suwa Seiko.

Immediately after that, another manufacturer that produced LCD screens was Sharp, both of which were the pioneers of Neon's local LCD industry.

However, although the manufacturer of neon was first commercially available, LCD technology was invented by RCA (Radio Corporation) in the United States.

It announced related inventions in 1968, which can be said to have shocked the industry at the time.

Motorola, AT\u0026amp;amp;T, and Hewlett-Packard have all personally ended up investing huge sums of money in the development of LCD displays.

However, they are all in the wrong direction, and LCD technology is not yet mature.

I was eager to run all the way on the road of the big screen, and finally invested a lot of money but never got a return.

So a few years later, including RCA itself withdrew from the continued research of LCD commercial use.

However, in 1972, Suwa Seiko and Sharp Toutie took a fancy to this technology, so they obtained authorization from RCA and started their own research and development.

In only the second year, Seiko Suha successfully applied LCD screens to its watches.

Yes, Suwa Seiko is a watch company. LCD has made no achievements in the field of large-screen commercial use, but it has radiated brilliance in small screens.

From their respective origins, Suba Seiko and Sharp are not only competitors, but also have a little bit of incense.

However, it is not necessarily a competitor. After all, Sharp does not make watches, and Hiroshi Yamauchi shimmers behind his brown glasses.

"The performance of the improved handheld is quite good, it seems to be the same sentence.

When the content is not much different, the hardware becomes a critical race condition. "

At the Akihabara HAL Research Institute, Shirakawa Kaede is discussing the market performance of the new handheld with Iwata Satoru and Akagi.

"Overall, it's really good, but the cost has also increased a lot compared to before."

Akagi is responsible for the hardware design of the handheld, and he is also aware of the cost of parts.

"Especially for LCD displays, as the size increases, the purchase price also rises linearly."

The price of the widescreen handheld is reduced due to the reduction in games, so Baichuan Electric discounted the price a little.

Although the sales volume has increased significantly compared to before, the cost of display screens has increased, and the overall profit increase is not very obvious.

Regarding this point, Bai Chuanfeng has nothing to do, "Discuss the matter of the display screen with Suwa Seiko to see if there is a discount.

If it doesn’t work, talk to other suppliers, such as Sharp, which is also a major LCD screen manufacturer. "

In fact, the reason why Shirakawa Kaede first chose to cooperate with Seiko Suwa was also because Nintendo had already reached an agreement with Sharp.

He didn't want to go to Sharp unless it was absolutely necessary.

Who knows if their order volume will be inexplicably controlled by Nintendo, this is information related to the expected sales in the market, and it must not be leaked easily.

"Shirakawa-kun, besides the screen, the processor is also an important factor affecting the design."

Iwata Satoshi looked at Bai Chuanfeng eagerly, he still remembered the self-developed chip that Bai Chuanfeng told him a few months ago.

Bai Chuanfeng smiled, and took out a blue shielding bag from his bag.

"I knew Iwata-kun would mention this, well, this is it."

"Hey" Satoru Iwata couldn't wait to pick it up, "Shirakawa-kun, is this...?"

"SIC8089, an enhanced version of the 8-bit processor. Compared with the Z80, the performance has been improved by nearly 2 times, and it was sent to you just after the tape-out was successful."

"Really?!" Satoru Iwata rubbed his hands excitedly.

You must know that the chips used by Baichuan Electronics for handheld devices are still 4-bit processors.

What I have in my hand now is the 8-bit enhanced version, which is a proper shotgun for a cannon.

And with the new guy, Iwata Satoru can't wait to immediately invest in the research and development of the new handheld.

"The chip has just been taped out successfully and has not yet been put into commercial use. There may be some minor defects or hidden bugs.

So don't worry about the development of the new handheld, Iwata-kun, this adjustment process may not be completed in a short time. "

Just at the beginning of August, SIC's newly developed SIC8089 has also seen the real thing.

After preliminary testing, it can be put into the actual development and use process for the time being.

So the handheld has become the best application site here.

But the chip is also similar to a machine, and it needs a long period of running-in with the user before it can play its best performance.

And this kind of job is undoubtedly the most suitable for Iwata Satoru in front of him.