Tokyo Video Game Tycoon.

What's so great about this thing?

He didn't even want to brag about it to his classmates tomorrow.

In nightclubs, young entrepreneurs continue to tout the future of video games, while at home, children gradually put down their controllers, some even showing aversion.

Meanwhile, across the ocean in the United States, Zhu Youxing hadn't slept all night.

He was constantly thinking of countermeasures.

Increasing SFC production? That's not impossible; we could have a professional company contact China. The title of "world's factory" isn't just for show. However, that would be a case of "distant water cannot quench immediate thirst."

This phenomenon of bad money driving out good money must be nipped in the bud quickly and decisively, without the slightest delay.

However, increasing production must be put on the agenda.

So the next morning, Zhu Youxing instructed the company's business unit to handle the matter. He only needed to specify the country of origin for the manufacturing and then have the business unit employees supervise the quality.

If possible, Zhu Youxing also hoped to bring some cutting-edge technology back to China through this method, but this would require bypassing US surveillance, which would be a bit complicated. However, as long as one is determined to do so, there is always a way.

In addition to doing this, Zhuyouxing also approached Shenda Electronics, a factory that has been manufacturing game consoles for Youxing Electronic Entertainment.

As the cooperation deepened, coupled with the initial sincerity, Zhuyouxing has now become Shenda Electronics' largest customer, and the kind of major customer who prioritizes Zhuyouxing in everything.

Thanks to their major client, Takeyusei, they expanded their factory, making them one of the few positively developing companies in Japan's current OEM electronics industry.

Zhu Youxing made a direct call to his long-time business partner, Zhi Tian Guangren, who had been a sales representative for Shenda Electronics a long time ago and was now the main business manager.

"Tomoda-san, I remember your previous FC production line was slated for retirement."

Toshida Hirohito answered Takeyusei's call almost instantly. It could be said that without Takeyusei, there would be no Toshida Hirohito as we know him today. He cherishes his friendship with Takeyusei and never lets up. He is also very clear about the relative positions of the two, with Takeyusei holding a more dominant position.

Upon hearing Zhu Youxing's question, he nodded and said, "That's right. Isn't the FC production line already planned to gradually reduce its capacity? So we're going to phase out the old production lines. Do you have any questions?"

Zhu Youxing immediately said, "I need you to restart these production lines right now. There's a lot of urgent work to be done."

Upon hearing the word "urgent," Hiroto Toshida immediately straightened his back and said seriously, "Okay, I understand. I will arrange for the factory to replan the new production line right now. It just so happens that our new factory was built not long ago, and the production line has not yet been planned."

Hiroto Tomoda didn't know what Yusei was up to, but the demands of major clients were the top priority. In any case, Yusei wouldn't refuse to pay. Since its rise in the gaming industry, Yusei Electronic Entertainment had been estimated to have reserves of tens of billions of yen, making it a very powerful company.

Chapter 258 The Iron Fist from Low Prices

Low prices are a temptation for most people.

Even though people sometimes know that you get what you pay for, they still can't resist.

This is also a human instinct.

It's impossible for Zhuyouxing to go against the tide, to act against human instincts, and to price the game too high to compete with cheap, low-quality games. That's unrealistic right now.

There are probably only two or three million true core gamers right now. Most other gamers don't have much discernment, so it will be very difficult to get them to resist the temptation of low-priced games and play high-priced, fun games.

Since that's the case, Zhu Youxing might as well go all out.

You guys make games that are really cheap and in huge quantities, but what if I made them even cheaper?

However, don't even think about making cheap games on the SFC console.

The average cost of a cartridge for the SFC game console alone is higher than the cost of selling inferior cartridges produced for those junk game consoles.

This is a completely unprofitable business.

Zhu Youxing is indeed not short of money now, but he can't afford to spend it like this.

What if we run out of reserve funds?

Since this approach isn't working, let's try a different method.

Fortunately, the FC had not yet been released in the United States, and many players had not yet experienced the games of the FC era.

Although the sound effects certainly can't compare to the SFC, it's cheaper.

Although its graphics quality certainly can't compare to the SFC, it's cheap!

While it may not be as good as the Super Famicom in terms of content, and some gameplay elements may not be available on the Famicom, it's cheap!

Cheap is enough.

With the mature mass production of FC, coupled with the massive purchase of cheap chips at rock-bottom prices, the total packaging cost of FC can now be reduced to 500 yen.

Can you believe that a game console costs five dollars to produce?

Of course, those American guys can follow suit and launch even cheaper products, but I'm simply competing with you using my existing stock. And I have another heavy blow waiting for you: I'll take legal action and sue you all one by one. I'll treat those who are seriously making games kindly, but those who plagiarize, especially those who are too lazy to even modify the code and sell it as their own games, are just waiting to send me money.

The iron fist of the law will make you guys realize the consequences of rashly entering this market.

In fact, Yuxing Electronic Entertainment is doing very well. Their game consoles have always been best-sellers and are constantly in short supply in the United States because more people still prioritize buying a game console to try it out.

Once you buy a game console, you absolutely can't use those junk cartridges anymore; you can only buy SFC cartridges to play. Thanks to its reputation, Yusei Electronics Entertainment isn't particularly bad; Yusei is just taking precautions.

The company that's really struggling is Surui Electronics.

The inferior products further damaged their already low reputation, and now the market is in an extreme state: either buy the cheapest products or buy Yuxing Electronic Entertainment products.

Huh? What is Surui Electronics? I don't know. Do they make game consoles too? I thought they only made Walkmans.

Recently, sales of game consoles at Surui Electronics have plummeted, which is a terrible situation.

They are desperately trying to find ways to save themselves, but they can't find any in the short term, which is very frustrating.

They considered several times whether to open the game console's ports and let those trashy games be added to Surui Electronics.

But in the end, Hayakawa Ueto rejected them all outright.

He wanted to wait; he was somewhat unwilling to give up.

He didn't have Zhu Youxing's foresight, after all, he wasn't a time traveler, so he hadn't considered any strategies.

But Zhu Youxing seized this opportunity.

Don't be fooled by the fact that Takeyusei only wants to use cheap products to counter the bad money driving out the good; FC is also a window into this issue.

A sufficiently affordable game console can also introduce more players to video games, getting them involved first. Then, once they develop a liking for video games and are no longer satisfied with simple graphics and sound effects, they will pursue a better gaming experience. That will be the opportunity for Bamboo Star to gain more reputation.

Within a few days, Shenda Electronics immediately readjusted its production lines, assigning two of its three newly opened factories to the full production of FC. Furthermore, Shenda Electronics signed a new contract with the production line manufacturer, which would allow it to further reduce production costs by 10%.

At this point, Matsuhashi Minoru was still slightly anxious.

At this point, she also noticed something was wrong with the US market. It seemed that more and more people were starting to complain online and elsewhere that video games were trash and not worth playing.

Once this preconceived notion is formed, they will resist spending money on video games, and the impact will be far-reaching.

However, Matsuhashi Minoru couldn't make a decision directly, and Takeyusei also asked her to wait a few days. She hadn't slept well during those days, thinking about this matter every day.

Even though Yuxing Electronic Entertainment is thriving right now, she still has a premonition that if she doesn't do something soon, the gaming industry will be in danger.

Then, after the production line at Shenda Electronics was finalized and construction had begun, Zhu Youxing contacted Songqiao Minoru again.

"President, you've finally called! I've been waiting for you for a long time. I'd like to know what your solutions are for the problems that have arisen in the United States?"

Once the production line was ready to start operating, Takeyusei was no longer flustered, and he was finally able to call Matsushita Minoru with peace of mind.

He smiled and reassured her over the phone, "I told you before, don't worry, I've already come up with a plan."

"What is that...?"

"I plan to officially sell the FC game console in the United States, and I intend to sell it for $50 a console and $5 a game. If necessary, the price of the games can be even lower, even lower than the cost of the cartridges."

Currently, there are still a huge number of discarded cassette tapes stored in warehouses in Japan.

Most of those cartridges were old cartridges left over from the time players exchanged them for SFC cartridges for 500 yen during the upgrade process from FC to SFC.

With a little refurbishment, they can be put to use again.

The cost of these cartridges was even lower than the storage cost. Zhu Youxing had originally planned to destroy these cartridges because they were no longer of any value, but unexpectedly, they suddenly seemed to have some use at this moment.

A rough estimate suggests that there are tens of millions of these cartridges, covering all kinds. If they were all exported to the United States, even if they were sold for only one dollar, there would still be a profit margin of about 10%. Of course, this is on the premise that they are sold in their own stores. If these products are sold in department stores, they would probably lose money.

Matsuhashi Minoru listened intently to Takeyusei's words, her mouth agape at Takeyusei's strategy.

Chapter 259 Following Fashion

FC is now entering a slow phase-out period.

However, this only applies to Japan.

In the United States, the FC has never been released.

Especially on the FC, there are actually many high-quality games that American players have never experienced.

Initially, in addition to first-party developers, other third-party developers also gradually shifted their development focus to 16-bit game consoles.

During the subsequent upgrades of the Super Famicom (SFC), apart from Yusei Electronics Entertainment's own first-party games, only a small number of third-party games participated in the SFC upgrades, and most of the original Famicom (FC) games did not appear on the SFC.

Zhuyouxing considered making the game compatible with game consoles, but that would increase the cost of the game consoles again, which is not particularly cost-effective at present. Therefore, they can only try to encourage third parties to participate in the game upgrades, rather than backward compatibility.

Unfortunately, third-party developers felt it wasn't worthwhile, as they couldn't make more money from games with upgraded graphics. After all, their ideas differed from those of Zhuyouxing, and Zhuyouxing didn't insist.

This has resulted in many American gamers missing out on a lot of high-quality NES games.

If these games were also launched in the US market and low prices were used to open up distribution channels, it would actually be very cost-effective.

Because these 8-bit games were gradually becoming less popular in Japan, many third-party manufacturers had accumulated some inventory. They were originally planning to destroy them, but when they heard about Takeyusei's plan, they became interested.

Even if they could only sell them for five dollars in the United States, their average profit would be at most two dollars per cassette tape, but the promises made by Zhu Youxing were enough to tempt them.

This is a great opportunity to expand the market again. If they miss it, it will affect the future release of their games in the United States. It would be better to make use of these unsold cartridges and send them all to the United States to let the United States absorb the inventory here.

Fortunately, Takeyusei had long required these manufacturers to produce games in at least three languages, including the commonly used English. This reduced a lot of unnecessary work, allowing them to directly release Japanese game cartridges to the US market without having to do anything extra.

So, as September arrived, cargo ships from Japan began docking at ports on the west coast of the United States.

One by one, containers marked "Yuxing Electronics Entertainment" were hoisted down, containing tens of millions of game cartridges of various types, as well as more than five million Famicom (FC) consoles.

The day before the cargo was to dock, Matsuhashi Minoru stayed up all night at the port to wait for the unloading. She wanted to keep a close eye on the matter because it could very well be an operation that would change the landscape of the American video game industry, and she had to make sure that all the procedures were in perfect order.

Workers unloaded the containers one by one, and then began customs counting and confirmation. It took Matsushita four days to run around like this.

"Video games...cartridges, video game consoles? Such a large quantity?"

The U.S. Customs officers looked at the containers with surprise, then glanced at Minoru Matsuhashi, who was standing to the side, intently watching the unloading.

Matsuhashi Minoru turned his head and nodded: "Yes, sir, these are all goods prepared for sale in the United States, and all the tariffs and documents have been submitted in advance."

After carefully inspecting one or two containers, the officials finally nodded and confirmed the release.