As the pioneer of SRPGs, Fire Emblem's status is absolutely worthy of being recorded in gaming history.
At the same time, it is a Western fantasy world, so it doesn't have a high barrier to entry in the Western market where people are familiar with D&D.
Its groundbreaking gameplay is enough to make any player of this era exclaim "Holy crap!"
But before that, they had to go to the Hardware Department first.
"A 16-bit machine? Are you sure?" Gerald scratched his face. "Another game hitting a performance hurdle?"
He knew Lin Lixin's personality well; his sudden request clearly indicated that he had a new game project in mind.
"Yes, reliable intelligence indicates that SEGA is already secretly developing a new generation of home consoles."
Lin Lixin casually brought up Sega as a pretext, saying, "If nothing unexpected happens, Nintendo and Sega will both release next-generation home consoles within two or three years, and 16-bit is definitely a given."
"Then we'll have to redesign our CPU architecture and rebuild the N Language compiler."
Gerald roughly estimated the workload and clicked his tongue.
Upgrading to 16-bit is more than just a change of a single number.
Compared to 8 bits, the increase in address space is not the apparent 2, but a full 16 times.
The maximum supported memory has increased dramatically from 64KB to 1MB.
Such an improvement is enough to change many things.
For example, color depth.
In 8-bit color mode, a maximum of 2^8 colors can be supported, which is 256 colors.
However, after increasing it to 16 bits, the result becomes 65536, which is 2^16.
65,536 colors!
In addition, because Z80 did not have the capability to produce 16-bit chips, they also needed to replace the processor with Motorola 68000.
The completely different instruction set and hardware architecture rendered their N Language, on which they depended, completely inoperable.
This isn't something that can be done in a day or two.
"I can handle the N Language issues; the priority now is to determine the hardware parameters."
Lin Lixin recalled the specifications of the Nintendo SFC and Sega MD, "The dual-CPU architecture still needs to be retained, but we can make it 16+8, and the 8-bit auxiliary chip will still use Zilog."
Goods.
Although Zilog has no capability in 16-bit systems, they remain the best manufacturer in the 8-bit field.
"In addition to this, this 16-bit processor must have one important function."
He tapped the whiteboard and wrote on it: [Variable Width Mode]
Gerald narrowed his eyes, quickly understanding what he meant.
"You want a processor that can switch between 8-bit and 16-bit?"
This feature may seem like a gimmick, but it becomes incredibly useful on a home game console.
The most obvious function is that it turns into a simulator.
The next-generation console will be backward compatible by emulating an 8-bit environment, allowing for zero-cost compatibility with GAMENOVA's existing game lineup.
"That's right, the processor is the most urgent issue to address; the other parts can wait."
Lin Lixin nodded.
Regarding other next-generation hardware, such as sound cards and memory, these are not things that can be rushed.
"Graphics are also a big problem. The original number of colors displayed on screen is definitely not enough. We need a maximum of 256 colors displayed on screen. I'll talk to Vivian about this later."
Lin Lixin stood in front of the whiteboard, pondering a very important matter concerning the game console.
What should we name the new phone?
NB is here, NP is here.
We need to find a more catchy name to match such a next-generation 16-bit product.
"Hey!"
Lin Lixin's eyes lit up, and he quickly picked up his pen and wrote down the tentative name of the new machine on the whiteboard in a flourish.
[NovaXeno]
NX host.
"Puff!"
Vivian nearly choked on her own saliva.
"Maximum 256 colors on screen? 256?? Are you serious?"
They've worked incredibly hard with Micro-Nova, and it's only now that they've finally managed to resolve the performance issues with NovaWonder.
It can display 16 colors on the same screen, and expand to 64 colors using a color palette, which is already a very good achievement.
Now Lin Lixin is making outrageous demands, asking for 256 colors!
"Unrealistic."
Vivian shook her head, immediately rejecting Lin Lixin's proposal.
"It's not that it's impossible, it's just that I don't have the time."
Micro-Nova had only two people in total, including Gerald and Carmack who provided technical Support; it was basically a small workshop.
NovaWonder's success is due to their focus solely on design.
Actual production is still handled by chip manufacturers and foundries.
However, according to Lin Lixin's requirements, they need a next-generation product that surpasses NovaWonder in every aspect.
"If you really need that many colors, you have to sacrifice resolution."
Vivian pulled out a spreadsheet listing NovaWonder's specifications. "You want 256 colors? Sure, but we'll have to reduce the resolution to 320x240."
She knew Lin Lixin would never accept such a low resolution on a next-generation console, and she said this only to dispel his unrealistic expectations.
"Even piling on the components doesn't work? What if we just use two graphics cards like NovaBo did?"
"No, the architecture also needs to be redesigned, which will take a lot of time."
2
Lin Lixin frowned.
Hardware bottlenecks are always the most difficult to overcome.
Having just overcome the capacity limitation, now it's being hampered by graphics performance issues.
"Looks like it's time to expand enrollment."
Lin Lixin's gaze swept over the desk beside him.
Ho Kwok Yuen was busy at a high-performance graphics workstation.
"Hmm? This is SGI's new product from last year, right?"
"Yes, we just happened to need a batch of workstations, so I chose this new company, and it's surprisingly good."
SGI, Silicon Graphics, is a high-performance graphics website development company founded in 1982.
Although SGI gradually declined after the turn of the millennium, it officially filed for bankruptcy protection in 2006.
But at that time, SGI was still a rising Nova in Silicon Valley.
Its founder was none other than Jim Clark, the future Silicon Valley tycoon.
This amazing person's life is even more outrageous than that of a protagonist in a wish-fulfillment novel.
Throughout his career, he founded three companies, each worth billions of dollars.
Even his son-in-law is the founder of YouTube.
A man who had been unsuccessful for most of his life finally unleashed his accumulated talent and defeated all the ruthless opponents when he was nearly 40.
In particular, his invention of the [ Geometry Engine ] in 1979, the world's fastest graphics chip, was something that even Micro-Nova had to learn from and reference.
SGI workstations benefit from their powerful performance, possessing rendering capabilities far exceeding those of ordinary PCs.
Looking to recruit new technical talent for their graphics department, Dr. Jim was clearly a worthwhile candidate to bring in.
According to the timeline, 1986 was the year SGI experienced explosive growth, even leading to its IPO.
They must act now while they desperately need funds to rapidly expand and defeat their competitors.
Lin Lixin immediately picked up the office phone and quickly dialed a number.
" Sam, we need roughly—um—around ten to thirty million US dollars."