Chapter 37  

Chapter 37   : Case by Case (5)

“Why? You don’t think you can do it?”

“N No~!! I can . It’s just it’ll cause a bit of a headache for me if I can’t claim any responsibility…”

“On the contrary, the current situation is precisely the reason why you should do it . We will have no answer when we get hit with a legal sanction so please proceed . I will bear all of the responsibility . ”

“Yes sir~!!”

“Morita… Your voice is too loud…”

“Ah, sorry . Hayashi…”

Although I am anticipating what kind of shooting game these 2 otaku’s will brew up…

&

After this incident, Mr . Shige and I encountered each other in the halls but seldom exchanged greetings .

It was like this before with Dragon Warrior too; Mr . Shige was incredibly sensitive with the topic of games . Even at the presentation conference, the way he gazed at me was akin to staring at a rival rather than work colleagues .

In truth, I wasn’t disappointed with Mr . Shige’s response . From another point of view, it could be said that the best developer in Mintendo was acknowledging me as a rival…

Nevertheless, how many “Prey?”

“Due to the huge success of the Family cartridges, our own factories aren’t able to keep up with the demand . So we’d been assigning work to various small-scale factories, but the number of factories closing down is ever increasing due to the economy…”

“Ah… So President Yamauchi had been trying to wait until the factories closed down . ”

“That way, he could purchase them at the clearance price… But a strange event happened . ”

“A strange event?”

“Someone had bought these factories that were on the verge of closing down . On top of that, they had also taken care of the workforce for the companies so the owners were head over heels when they sold it . This person seems to possess a large amount of financial capital . The problem is, this person mass bought these factories but left the operations to the previous owners . The factory owners wouldn’t open their mouth as if they swore a vow even if I asked them so…”

“That really is a big problem…”

That’s… Because I’m busy and I can’t manage them from over here… In truth, not even those factory owners had met me face to face . Buying all the factories were taken care of through attorney Nakamura, who’d helped me with taking over Triangle Soft in the past .

Mr . Nakamura had cautioned me against investing too much money in a depreciating business, but foreseeing the obvious outcome of these factories not being managed well if I hired new workers, I purchased the entire factory’s labor force along with their owners to avoid the hassle of management .

Thanks to that, about 3,000,000 Yen had been taken out of my balance in a month, but it didn’t matter . The reason was because I would recover about 1,000,000 soon enough . How would it come in? Just like this .

“But Kang-kun, what is the topic that you wanted to discuss?”

“Ah, I want to ask something regarding Psychic Battle from you, Mr . Gunpei . ”

“Ah~ You’re talking about the last game from the presentation conference . Even at a glance, it truly seems like an amazing game . But from what the Inventions people are telling me, it’s impossible to implement with the current Family hardware . Is that true?”

“Mm~ about half of that is true . ”

“I didn’t think the Kang-Kun that I know would start something without future thinking, but half? What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I need a specialty chip that will boost the capabilities of the Family . ”

“A specialty chip? Where do you plan to put it in?”

“Of course, it’ll be inside the cartridge . It’ll be an apparatus that would increase the calculation speed of the Family device . ”

“Hmm~ This is… Theoretically possible . But it hasn’t ever been implemented before…”

“That’s fine . I know a company that can produce this specialty chip . ”

“Really? Who are they?”

“They’re a company called Raitex . I heard that Chandra, one of their employees, invented a specialty chip that could boost the capabilities of the cartridge . ”

“Raitex!?”

“Wouldn’t you know about them, Mr . Gunpei? They’re one of our subcontracted companies…?”

“Raitex is one of the companies that President Yamauchi tried to absorb… If he’d acted a bit sooner, we would’ve acquired that technique for ourselves…”

In the end, Mintendo had no choice but to pay upwards of 1,000,000,000 Yen to mass produce this chip that could boost the performance of the cartridge .

Mr . Gunpei had spent several sleepless nights trying to copy the technique to making this chip, but the results were ultimately a failure due to the anti-copying system implemented by the Indian native .

President Yamauchi was opposed to the release of Psychic Battle that couldn’t be released with the conventional cartridges, but due to the popularity resulting from FamiTong Magazine’s advertising and the expectations of consumers, he couldn’t easily order a cease in production .

“Kang-kun, do you really have the confidence that this game will scorch the floor? The price of production became too high after including your specialty chip or whatever, we’d have to sell at least a million units just to break even . ”

“President Yamauchi…”

“Mmm? What is it…”

“Have I ever disappointed you before…”

“You’re right… The reception at the conference was great, and Shigeru is working incredibly hard after feeling the pressure from you . It’s expected to be a hit, but…”

“If you’re worrying that much, I’ll alleviate some of that for you . ”

“Mmm? How?”

“I will only be using 1/10 the marketing fee of Super Marigee 3 . ”