Tokyo Video Game Tycoon.

He wants to share video games with his friends.

Once he returns to the United States, he wants to let his friends there experience the charm of video games!

Chapter 110 The Hero's Multifaceted Journey Through Dragon Quest

One month after its release, Dragon Quest III sold 3 copies, making it the fastest-selling game to date.

Dragon Quest 1's sales have also surpassed one million.

This was also the first game on the Famicom to surpass one million sales, and Yusei Electronics Entertainment even held a special celebration within the company.

If we consider the conversion rate, Dragon Quest 3 should be quite good.

In addition to video game sales, Dragon Quest also generated revenue from other sources.

Among them, Dragon Quest merchandise has begun to gain popularity.

Toys such as the Hero's Sword, Hero's Armor, and Lot's Shield from Dragon Quest have become the best-selling products at the moment.

Not to mention that you can see these things everywhere, the image of the hero fighting the dragon in children's minds is now almost synonymous with their Koshien Superman.

Children's first choice is no longer just Koshien Superman figures, but also Dragon Quest related products.

The production team that made the Koshien Superman tokusatsu series was very frustrated.

These kids are such a disloyal bunch. They used to love Koshien Superman so much, but because Dragon Quest became so popular, they switched sides in the blink of an eye, making it harder for them to sell their merchandise.

Secondly, there are strategy guides for the game Dragon Quest.

This was mainly handled by Kasuga-sha.

Because Dragon Quest III is a very large game, Kasuga Publishing and Takeyusei decided to publish a separate combined strategy book for the first and third parts. The A4-sized book has more than 3 pages of color printing and is quite exquisite.

Priced at a hefty 5,000 yen, it's not exactly cheap, but that hasn't deterred players who genuinely love the game.

On the one hand, the strategy book can help them better complete the game; on the other hand, it is also very memorable, being the world's first standalone game strategy book.

To promote the collectible value of this item, Kasuga Publishing even issued a book number.

The initial print run was 100,000 copies, with a total of 100,000 serial numbers. Among them, there was a chance to randomly receive a signed copy from the main creators, just like a lottery.

Kasuga-sha is indeed very good at business in this regard; Takeyusei doesn't need to worry about anything.

Then, 100,000 copies of the strategy guide sold out in the first week after the game's release, with not a single copy left.

This excited Kasuga Publishing, as they had never seen such a booming sales performance for some of their previous popular manga.

So they contacted the factory overnight to print another 200,000 copies.

These 200,000 copies are almost sold out in just one month.

Kasuga-sha has made a lot of money just by selling books. Daigo Ikeda, who is the main person in charge of promoting video games in the magazine, is now beaming with pride and his status in the magazine has risen rapidly.

Of course, Zhu Youxing earns even more. He only provides an idea and can easily collect all kinds of profit sharing from the book.

The sale of just one strategy guide book can bring him tens of millions of yen in revenue.

Zhu Youxing had anticipated this.

In the days before the internet was widespread, strategy guides were considered the most precious treasures by gamers. Anyone who owned such a book could become the object of many people's admiration.

Even if the internet becomes widespread later, strategy guides will still become a valuable collectible, and loyal players of certain games will buy them without hesitation.

In its previous life, Final Fantasy VII sold millions of copies of strategy guides alone. Dragon Quest's only problem is that it doesn't have a large enough player base; otherwise, its sales would have been even higher.

Of course, the Dragon Quest craze is not over yet.

Savvy businessmen began contacting Yuxing Electronics Entertainment, willing to spend money to purchase partial licenses of Dragon Quest artwork and create collaborative merchandise.

The company's copyright operation department has just been established and is now specifically responsible for any copyright derivatives related to Dragon Quest. Licensing collaborations and such have already begun.

Following that, Yusei Electronics Entertainment announced that it would be producing an anime adaptation of Dragon Quest.

The anime's storyline will revolve around the story of Dragon Quest I, further increasing the value of this IP.

Companies like Surui Electronics, Vides, and Jinping Entertainment watched with envy.

They then suddenly realized that video games are not just for playing games.

Once a game product becomes famous, or even goes viral, the derivative revenue it generates can be astonishing.

The video game industry is beginning to develop into a mature industrial chain, and it is no longer limited to making money through games.

Jinping Entertainment decided to focus on game software development after clearing out its inventory of modified CD players and game consoles.

They seemed to understand that not just anyone is qualified to make game consoles.

You can also make a lot of money by working with others on game development projects.

Jinping Entertainment is a company that owns many IPs such as animation, film and television, and novels. Their executives immediately thought that they could make money by making games based on these IPs. This kind of derivative product can make another round of money and squeeze the potential of their own IPs as much as possible.

Whether they will actually make a serious game remains to be seen.

Meanwhile, Wides is also seriously operating the games on its current arcade machines and plans to try to develop some IP series or something.

Surrey Electronics went even further, announcing that its best-selling game, Sun Knights 2, was in production and would be released as a bundled limited edition, adopting some of the sales models of Yusei Electronics Entertainment.

Su Rui Electronics can be described as a good student. As long as Youxing Electronics Entertainment does the most successful thing, they will immediately follow suit, following behind Youxing Electronics Entertainment, as if they are feeling their way across the river, and waiting for the opportunity to surpass Youxing Electronics Entertainment at any time.

Moreover, even though they can't compare to Youxing Electronic Entertainment now, they have gradually gained some market share and are starting to move towards profitability.

In addition to these, their overseas business is also underway, and overseas promotional activities have begun. It is said that the feedback abroad is quite good, especially among people in Europe and America, who are very interested in this new form of entertainment.

After releasing Dragon Quest III, the First Game Development Team immediately began developing the next installment.

This time, Takeyusei set a new goal for them: to learn new technologies, because the next generation will inevitably be released on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES).

This gaming console with better performance will inevitably allow for larger-scale games and better graphics.

If they can't fully understand the capabilities of the game console, then Zhuyouxing won't allow them to release the game.

At the same time, Zhuyouxing also formed a new first-party game development team, named the Fifth Game Development Team.

This team will also be responsible for a dedicated series of games.

This game series is also one of Yusei Takeshi's favorites.

That's Final Fantasy.

Chapter 111 Cinematic Narrative of Final Fantasy

If Dragon Quest is a national-level game in Japan...

Final Fantasy is a world-class game.

Zhu Yuxing couldn't say exactly why, but people overseas definitely had a higher acceptance of Final Fantasy.

Perhaps it's because the story background of Final Fantasy incorporates more technological elements that align with modern aesthetics.

For example, a style similar to steampunk, or a futuristic technological background that is both modern and magical.

In an era of significant advancements in culture and technology, this kind of sci-fi style game may be even more appealing.

However, the style of the first Final Fantasy game was not like this; it only changed later.

If Dragon Quest is a happy ending story about a hero's legend, then Final Fantasy is often a bit darker, which makes Final Fantasy more mature and indirectly expands its audience a little.

In its previous life, Final Fantasy was Square Enix's last gamble; if it failed, the company would likely have to dissolve.

So at that time, they were somewhat desperate, wanting to break with convention, and in the end, they tried their best to create a game style called cinematic storytelling in the first game.

Achieving cinematic storytelling on the FC sounds incredible, and of course, it certainly wouldn't have the visuals of a real movie; it wouldn't even be as good as some old-school animations.

But this can be considered a start, setting one of the benchmarks for Final Fantasy.

Another point is that the protagonists in Final Fantasy are no longer perfect people, but rather flesh-and-blood souls.

They have their own sufferings, such as being tormented by darkness and light, or having personality flaws, etc.

This is completely different from the current role-playing games where the protagonists are gods or mute.

In today's role-playing games, people in this world are still clumsily imitating their own Dragon Quest and The Legend of Zelda, subconsciously setting the protagonists as mute and near-perfect characters.

With unparalleled courage and a powerful physique, he can face any enemy without flinching, almost like a true god.

But starting with Final Fantasy, the protagonists gained more personality and actually started talking.

In fact, characters with such depth and humanity are more memorable, which is perhaps one of the reasons why Final Fantasy has become so popular worldwide.

Then there's the classic game art style, and the Crystal Overture music, which is so classic it couldn't be more so.

No matter how it is adapted in later generations, it will always have a unique charm.

There's a saying in Japanese TV dramas.

The theme song of a 7 out of 10 TV series.

If the theme song is catchy enough, it can also attract the audience's attention and make them subconsciously watch the TV series.

Then TV series that score around 7 out of 10 can get an extra boost, increasing their revenue.

Video games also have a great demand for music, but unfortunately, the Famicom's performance was limited, making it difficult to create good music. In the end, the only solution was to use the unique 8-bit music composition method to help the game console play music.

But once the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) came out, this console, with its significantly improved performance, was able to do even more.

As soon as Zhu Youxing finished assembling the Fifth Game development team, he immediately sent them to find a sufficiently talented musician and a well-known illustrator.

As for the game's preparations, we can put them aside for now and wait until we find the illustrators and musicians first.

Zhu Youxing doesn't understand this world well enough. He can think of ways to make a painter, but he really can't say what kind of musician would be suitable.

However, he had copied down the score of the Crystal Overture and the Chocobo Song in advance, two of the most iconic elements of Final Fantasy music.

In any case, these two pieces of music are absolutely essential.

With the tasks assigned by Zhu Youxing, the game development team members, like protagonists accepting missions in a game, enthusiastically set off to find the illustrators and musicians they thought were suitable.

Then, Zhuyouxing threw himself back into the development of Metroid.

After more than a month of development, the game is basically complete. All that's left is debugging and making the game as perfect as possible.

For example, see if we can add more action-based combat attributes to the game itself, and see how we can make the protagonist's combat more visually appealing and impactful.

The feeling of impact is sometimes hard to describe, and it's difficult to say what the best kind is; you can only keep testing and trying.