Sega's Booth

In Sega's own main exhibition area, two home console titles that collaborated with Hollywood occupied the central position.

Two external speakers were set up in front of the Jurassic Park 2: The Lost World demo screen.

The roar of the Tyrannosaurus Rex crushing the jeep made the booth partitions tremble.

The high-polygon dinosaur model optimized by the Second Development Group ran at a stable 30 frames per second on Jupiter, with extremely detailed skin texture and muscle contraction.

At the Jurassic Park 2 demo machine, Sega of America is guiding a character into a field exploration trailer that is half-stuck in the mud.

The character on the screen stepped into the carriage and casually pulled the deformed iron door shut.

Players gathered around the edge of the experience area initially thought it was just a pre-programmed cutscene, but the view didn't change, and the crosshair in the third-person over-the-shoulder perspective remained steadily in the center of the control interface.

The technician pushed the joystick, and the character walked towards the collapsed experimental table.

Pressing the button on the controller, the hunter on the screen reaches out and pulls open the metal drawer.

The drawer slides emitted a harsh metallic scraping sound, revealing the contents inside: a bundle of rusty copper wire, half a box of damp matches, and two large dry cell batteries.

The controller was clicked again, and the scattered items were packed one by one into the character's tactical backpack.

In the original development plan, producer Yu Suzuki's obsession with this kind of scene interaction went far beyond this.

At the end of last year, when the project was in its mid-stages, Yu Suzuki even led the development team to disassemble two real off-road vehicles down to their skeletons, attempting to incorporate all the hundreds of storage compartments, radio knobs, and even the opening and closing damping of each louver into the 3D model.

He even submitted an application to the Hardware Department, requesting that Jupiter be given a dedicated micro physics expansion card so that the game could calculate in real time the rebound trajectory of cans of different weights falling onto the metal floor.

This radical proposal was immediately rejected by Nakayama Takuya as soon as it was submitted to the president's office.

Hisao Oguchi was also present at the time.

He still remembers the scene where Nakayama Takuya threw that thick stack of draft physics calculations back at Yu Suzuki.

Nakayama Takuya drew a heavy cross on the whiteboard with a red pencil. "Suzuki, players buy this disc to escape from under the jaws of dinosaurs and experience the thrill of jungle combat. Nobody has the time to stand in a trailer and search through eighty empty drawers one by one. You're wasting all your computing power on these meaningless, dead things. The motherboard chips can't handle the rainstorm effects at all. When the frame rate drops to ten or so frames, players will just throw their controllers and curse. With the current capabilities and capacity, you have to make trade-offs."

Hisao Oguchi added insult to injury, cutting 70% of the interactive elements in the proposal and only focusing on key survival supplies and tactically valuable bunkers and mechanisms.

The system that was ultimately presented at the E3 exhibition was the product of compromise.

After looting the carriage, the operator in the video retreated to the window.

Through the mud-splattered bulletproof glass, two adult velociraptors were wading through the mud outside the vehicle.

The dinosaur's scaly claws snapped at the dead branches on the ground, its head trembled slightly, its ears pressed tightly to the sides of its head, and it made a wary gurgling sound in its throat.

Several North America college students gathered around the booth couldn't help but move closer.

"Shoot! The rifle is on my back!"

The young man in the red hat standing in the back row couldn't help but shout out.

The technician did not use a gun.

The status bar in the lower right corner of the screen shows that there are only two heavy slugs left in the shotgun ammunition. These types of bullets are unlikely to kill a dinosaur with two shots given its hard bones.

The technician brought up the backpack menu and dragged the half-box of matches and shredded medical gauze he had just collected, along with the small half-bottle of diesel fuel he had previously extracted from the abandoned generator, into the crafting area.

As the gear icon flashed, the three miscellaneous items transformed into a simple Molotov cocktail within the crafting box.

Next, the technician stripped the ends of the bundle of rusty copper wire, wrapped one end around the battery terminal at the bottom of the trailer, and let the other end hang down along the metal handle of the door, with the stripped wire end soaking in a puddle outside the door.

The logic behind this prop-making and environmental utilization is a continuation of the prop-making framework from the first Jurassic Park.

Although Resident Evil was the benchmark for horror games on this generation of consoles, Sega had its own pride, and games could never be made like Resident Evil's "red key opens red door".

The core of survival horror lies in the oppressive feeling brought about by the scarcity of resources, and the means to cope with the predicament must rely on common sense. It leaves room for players to freely combine their ideas, giving them a sense of intellectual superiority in using their weak bodies and clever minds to manipulate these Beast.

In this generation, Sega has designed various habits and characteristics for a wide variety of dinosaurs that are consistent with fossil biology research. These factors can help players deal with the dinosaurs' pursuit.

These descriptions of habits and characteristics can all be found during the game. They are not hidden, and there are usually more than one or two places. As long as you know where the player is, you can easily find them by using some logical analysis and guessing.

On the screen, the technician lit a Molotov cocktail, slammed open the side window, and threw the cocktail into the distant, open bushes.

In the instant the flames exploded, the dry branches burst into flames, crackling and popping.

The velociraptor, which was originally close to the trailer door, was immediately attracted by the flames and the explosion. It raised its neck sharply, its eyes instantly drawn to the source of the fire, and let out a sharp hiss as it pounced on the bushes with its claws.

Taking advantage of the moment when the dinosaurs were distracted by the sound and light, the technician quickly opened the back door, climbed out of the carriage, and crouched down to hide in the tall grass on the other side.

Throughout the entire breakout process, not a single precious high-powered rifle bullet was wasted.

Hisao Oguchi, standing to the side of the main booth, had his hands in his suit trouser pockets as he watched the entire demonstration.

The deputy head of the Second Development Group, who was overseeing the event, wiped the sweat from his face and whispered, "Director, Mr. Suzuki sulked for three days in the smoking room after President Nakayama cut some of his features. Now it seems that the common-sense production system the president set up is far more eye-catching on set than piling up those rigid interactive elements."

Hisao Oguchi turned his head and glanced at him.

"Suzuki is an artist; all he thinks about is creating a 100% realistic virtual world. But we're making a commercial game, and we have to find a balance between Jupiter's existing hardware capabilities, development cycle, and player satisfaction."

He pointed to the growing crowd of young people gathered in front of the booth.

"At least a third of the people who just gathered around were there to see the gory scenes of dinosaurs tearing each other apart. But once they understand the synthesis and environmental control, and know that batteries and wires can stun small dinosaurs, and that insect repellent spray plus a lighter can be used as a makeshift flamethrower, they'll go back and discuss the gameplay like crazy on BBS. This kind of spontaneous word-of-mouth is much more effective than spending hundreds of thousands on TV advertising."

The deputy team leader nodded repeatedly, jotting down several details from the scene in his notebook. "The business representative from Universal Pictures also came over for five minutes just now, and he looked a bit off. He probably didn't expect that we could actually save the project that was delayed for more than half a year."

"Ignore those vampires at Universal." Hisao Oguchi withdrew his gaze. "They're only concerned with counting the zeros on the checks. Tell the demo coordinator on duty not to keep using the same route. For the next demo, have them try using tranquilizer darts and raw meat to lure the dinosaurs into the mud trap. We need to show these picky United States that Sega isn't just producing a cheap, low-budget movie; this is a real masterpiece that will keep them studying for dozens of hours."

The movie "Fast & Furious 2" next door presents a completely different picture.

In dual-player split-screen mode, the edges of the screen are stretched and blurred the moment the nitro is injected, and the controller's vibration motor hums loudly.

"The frame rate is very stable with two players on screen simultaneously." The head of the Overseas Affairs Department walked quickly through the crowd to Hisao Oguchi's side. "The frame rate drop issue that everyone was worried about during split-screen mode has been completely resolved by the development team through an optimization solution of dynamically removing distant vegetation in the final test version."

It's decided.

Hisao Oguchi, with his hands in his suit trouser pockets, glanced at the banner hanging behind the booth.

Have you finalized the list of judges for the inaugural Game Critics Awards, spearheaded by IDSA this year?

The supervisor flipped through the roster in his hand and lowered his voice. "A judging panel composed of more than thirty mainstream game media outlets and independent writers."

This selection process isn't based on sponsorship amounts; it's entirely based on on-site testing and scoring. They've been divided into several groups these past two days, conducting undercover investigations throughout the venue with scoreboards.

"No wonder these manufacturers went to such lengths to display complete levels on their booths." Hisao Oguchi turned his head and glanced at the numerous demo machines scattered throughout the venue.

In the past, manufacturers could simply throw out a pre-rendered animation to fool everyone at trade shows.

However, spurred by the award mechanism, Relic, which focuses on real-time strategy, Valve, which is dedicated to first-person narrative, and Nintendo, which is playing with 3D cameras in new Nintendo, all presented highly polished gameplay footage.

"Did you reserve a special camera angle for the judges during the demo of the modified cars in ' Fast & Furious 2 '?" Hisao Oguchi asked.

"Keep it. The leftmost test machine that isn't connected to the large screen is ready to use at any time." The supervisor drew a line under the roster.

Hisao Oguchi nodded.

On the third floor of the Georgia World Congress Center, the heavy wooden doors of the enclosed meeting hall blocked out the noise from outside.

Outside the door was a bustling exhibition area, while inside were two thousand cushioned chairs, all packed to capacity.

Those who can sit in this hall all wear full-pass badges or senior professional badges around their necks.

There were no fancy flyers in the aisle. The audience included vice presidents and chief technology officers from major game companies, copyright directors from the six major Hollywood, and game industry analysts from Wall Street.

The slides on the big screen moved across rows of densely packed clauses.

On stage, the Operations Director of a France publisher is reviewing their losses in the North America market last year.

"Simply replacing French text with American English won't sell on the West Coast." The speaker pressed the page-turner, his voice amplified, "The humor inherent in the French context, even in United States United States, might not be easily understood through a direct translation. To truly penetrate international markets, tiered reviews, retailer return policies, and localization of slang in target regions—each step can eat up more than 20% of the profits."

The professionals in the audience immediately started taking notes in their notebooks.

The next speaker was from Seattle, and the topic he discussed was the emerging online arena.

"Relying solely on television advertising and print magazines for promotion has reached a point where costs are unsustainable. We tested a promotional model that involved building an independent official multimedia website. Offering low-resolution video clips and wallpaper downloads on the website, along with a BBS forum, the spontaneously generated discussion among players resulted in a conversion rate far exceeding that of traditional street posters. Even game patches can be distributed directly through the web server, eliminating the huge risk of distributing discs again."

Technical architecture, project budget cycle control, and overseas distribution revenue sharing model.

Speakers took turns on stage, and very few audience members left their seats until the afternoon of the following day.

It's Sega Galaxy's special time.

Hattori, dressed in a custom-made dark gray suit, strode onto the podium.

A young translator wearing a simultaneous interpretation headset followed beside him.

Hattori didn't prepare any fancy intro video; the first slide that lit up on the projection screen was simply a project form marked with four huge red crosses.

Many people in the audience who knew Hattori began to whisper among themselves.

After Bandai and Sega merged, Sunrise and Sotsu's copyrights were all brought under the Sega Galaxy umbrella.

In the industry's perception, Sega is currently the business giant that has most successfully integrated toys, animation, comics, and games.

Everyone originally thought Hattori would use this platform to talk about how to dismantle an IP and sell it for money, but unexpectedly, he started with an internal list of projects that were rejected.

Hattori rested his hands on the edge of the podium, his tone steady.

The translator's voice followed. "Ladies and gentlemen, these four projects were plans that Sega Galaxy directly halted in the second half of last year. Two light novel adaptation games, and two sets of mecha model kits targeting the North America market."

The audience was completely silent.

"Many of our peers saw the profits we made on Hollywood collaboration projects and thought that as long as they had a popular film or animation IP, they could just put together a gameplay mechanic, put derivative toys in Toys "R" Us"R" Us, and the money would roll in on its own."

Hattori raised his right hand and tapped it lightly twice on the table.

The slideshow transitions to a set of glaring financial accounting data, including mold loss fees, warehousing late fees, and copyright prepayments.

"The prototype samples provided by the North America team for this model project were extremely detailed, but the Japanese side insisted on pushing a design featuring cute anime girls aimed at younger children. We conducted a small-scale blind test, and the core buyers simply weren't interested. If we grit our teeth and produce hundreds of thousands of plastic products and ship them to the Port of Long Beach, there are only two possible outcomes: either they'll be sold off as scrap in Walmart's clearance section, or they'll just pile up in warehouses, consuming millions of US dollar of working capital."

Representatives from several Hollywood production companies in the back row of the audience exchanged bewildered glances.