How can you advertise that your network is faster than others?
Perhaps even decades from now, Gamenova's performance in today's livestream will be repeatedly studied and emulated by those who study GG.
I won't give you any of that fluff.
It doesn't rely on any verbal introductions or GG-related terms.
They just blatantly put the download progress bar right here.
A 320MB file downloaded at an average speed of 6-8 Mbps.
In a gaming news talk show, it downloaded at an astonishingly fast speed right in front of everyone.
Precise targeting, precise results, and the ultimate GG effect.
Before the talk show even ended, Nexus's customer service department was inundated with calls.
A flood of orders instantly depleted Nexus's human resources and production capacity for the month.
If you're slow to react, try contacting them immediately about the new modem; it's too late to get through on the phone.
Even if they were lucky enough to get through, the order would be delayed indefinitely. It's no wonder they're so frantic; anyone with even a basic understanding of the internet can sense its terrifying potential at this moment.
What is the traditional internet speed?
To put it simply, even the highest-spec 56k modem currently available for consumer use only achieves a download speed of 5kb/s.
5kb!
If you download Quake 2 at this speed, it will take hours; you won't be able to play it in less than a day.
Not to mention that this 5kb is not stable.
If you live in a remote area, far from the mobile network operator, the download speed will be further reduced.
In this environment, let alone downloading anything, even browsing a plain text World Wide Web would take minutes.
What is the price of the second-generation Nexus modem?
8 Mbps...
This is not just a simple matter of doubling; it's fucking beyond what's a simple matter of doubling.
That's a hundredfold improvement! Unfortunately, currently only the area surrounding California is eligible to use it.
The bottleneck is not in infrastructure or personnel.
Nexus has more than enough manpower to support operations in at least a few more states.
Accessing the network only requires reusing the existing telephone line backbone.
The real problem lies in the attenuation of ADSL.
While high frequencies bring higher information density, they also result in more severe attenuation.
Each area requires a DSLAM relay, which is Eri long.
This means that just in the San Francisco Bay Area, the area where Gamenova is headquartered, a vast network of double-layer relays would need to be densely deployed.
And all of them require a regional switch for aggregation.
Unfortunately, this part of the work requires certain qualifications; it's not something you can just pull off by randomly picking an immigrant off the street.
The labor costs involved are enormous.
The construction costs involved were astronomical. Even if Gamenova alone, combined with the combined budgets of Sony, Microsoft, Bell Telephone and Telegraph, and a whole host of publicly traded companies in Silicon Valley, it would still be impossible to achieve nationwide coverage.
This can only be done slowly, starting in California and gradually expanding outwards.
It may even require the combined efforts of other ISPs.
Regardless, the marketing effect of this show was absolutely top-notch.
Even excluding those guys who don't care whether they can actually pretend in their current location and just want to make a phone call to join in the fun.
The remaining amount is sufficient to cover Nexus's expenses during this period.
It's worth noting that besides Micron, a wafer fab that's burning through cash every single second, Nexus is Gamenova's largest expense business.
The social impact of free email has far exceeded everyone's imagination.
Now, nmail has almost become synonymous with the concept of "email".
People have even started to use "nmail" to refer to all email addresses.
Even if he might actually be using a paid email address from a commercial ISP.
This kind of subtle, pervasive cognitive pollution is the most terrifying. And the corresponding expenses are equally staggering.
A large number of tape enclosures purchased from IBM were used for cold storage of email files that had been backed up over a long period of time.
In the 1990s, storing files of this size was an extremely difficult task.
A cassette tape cabinet the size of a bathroom can only store a few dozen gigabytes of data.
Lin Lixin wasn't in a hurry, and kept injecting resources from Gamenova to maintain the normal operation of Nexus.
Let's wait a little longer.
Before long, the world will understand just how terrifying the Internet truly is.
Once the first-generation ADSL network is fully deployed, at least in California, the next phase of the plan can officially begin.
When that time comes, whatever amount of money you give Nexus now, Nexus will return double.
As for now...
It's time for the eagerly waiting players to finally get their fill.
"Next news: I heard that Shiori Fujisaki will be in Los Angeles this week for the third stop of her tour this year." "Yes, Rebecca, at the Hollywood Bowl. I really have to express my envy to those fans who already got tickets, because they're all... sorry, sold out!"
"Oh my goodness, but don't worry, we'll be drawing five lucky audience members during the call-in segment after today's show to receive a free VIP ticket."
"Actually, there were originally six. Rebecca, you know, you have to treat yourself well."
The impromptu program came to an end amidst the two's casual conversation.
Upon receiving a prompt from the on-site director, the two straightened their expressions and, without needing to look down at their scripts, quickly began to move forward with the program.
"Okay, we just received a notification from the competition venue that Master Lin has completed the installation of Quake 2. Let's turn the camera to the arena."
Finished downloading?
Only at this moment did the audience, who were still savoring the scenes from just moments before, suddenly come to their senses.
So fast?
There wasn't even a break for the end-of-week segment; the two hosts simply reported on some minor events from the week, and before they knew it, it was over.
This speed is truly terrifying. Even those viewers who had no concept of the number 8 Mbps finally realized at this moment that the situation was extraordinary.
What would happen if you used this speed to browse web pages, view photos, or download audio?
Does this mean that people can now cram more and more fancy content onto websites?
But there's no time for them to think about those things now.
Because the director showed the camera on Quake 2.
Lin Lixin appeared to be adjusting his equipment to ensure everything was working properly.
He opened a single-player map and wandered around aimlessly with his initial machine gun.
The other members of the Supernova Team and the Team Solid were in similar situations.
They didn't need to demonstrate the download process; the game was already pre-installed on their computers.
Within seconds, viewers in front of their televisions noticed its difference.
It's hard to say exactly what happened, but compared to the original Quake, the texture is completely different.
Although the map texture hasn't seen a significant improvement, and it lacks the polished feel of pre-rendered graphics found in games like Myst or Biohazard, it still manages to create a peculiar "texture."
Or rather, a sense of sophistication.
In the bar.
"I know! It's because the scene is darker, that must be it. There were very few such dimly lit environments in the original game."
One of them shouted loudly, his tone full of confidence, seemingly convinced of his guess.
Compared to the footage of " Quake " that was just shown.
The lighting in this scene is indeed significantly different.
It's no longer a brightly lit place; instead, you can feel a noticeable decrease in light intensity.
There are dark areas at the corners due to the obstruction of light.
It will also be noticeably brighter under the lights.
This is naturally due to the improvement brought about by the higher resolution lightmap.
The enhanced graphics card performance allowed Gamenova to create more detailed lighting and texture maps within the same area. However, differing opinions quickly emerged.
"No, it's those spotlights, you idiot!"
"Lamp?"
"Yes, it's those three red spotlights. Didn't you notice... they're emitting red light?"
The person speaking clearly has a more acute sense of color.
The most crucial improvement in lighting and shadow effects in Quake 2 was immediately apparent.
The first thing that wouldn't escape his notice was the image filter created using a professional film-grade color grading panel.
The original game visuals resembled a log video, lacking in color and emotion.
After Hideo Kojima meticulously adjusted the colors for every map, every environment, and every shot, the current visuals have reached a truly cinematic quality.
Although the texture resolution wasn't improved much.
However, this difference in color grading has genuinely brought about a leap forward in improvement.
This illustrates the importance of artists in a video game. Following this sophisticated color grading is a significant improvement in the scene lighting setup.
As the person before me described, the scene darkened.
But this is not simply a matter of turning down the brightness of the lights.
Rather, it's... a combined change in the color and color temperature of the light source.
The original Quake, while featuring colorful maps, lacked color in its background.
Bright places should be brightly lit, and dark places should be dark.
All light sources are emitting white light of varying intensities.
But things are different now.
The red light emitted by the three red spotlights bathed the entire corner of the passageway in red.
It collided with the other lights that emitted a faint blue glow.
The corridor lights, tinged with a cool blue hue, blended with the unsettling red light, creating a unique visual effect at this seemingly ordinary corner.
However, this was not an isolated case. As Lin Lixin moved around on the map, the entire map was revealed to the audience.
Gamenova, almost like a nouveau riche, lavishly arranged light sources in their maps, brazenly and unabashedly showcasing their brand-new lighting engine.
With just one glance, the terrifying nature of Quake 2 is already self-evident.