Chapter Summaries

Bill woke up at Benjamin and Simon’s gaming gathering and became fascinated by the video game Disco Elysium. He began playing, stunned by its moving, richly layered paintings.

• Bill woke up on Benjamin’s sofa while Benjamin and Simon played Red Alert.
• Benjamin told Bill he could try Disco Elysium and explained that Bill had passed out from low blood sugar.
• Bill started to leave, but the game consoles and Red Alert displays caught his attention, so he asked if he could play.
• Benjamin loaded Disco Elysium, and Bill marveled at its animated oil-painting title screen and its depiction of Revachol.

Bill played Disco Elysium and became absorbed in its richly detailed world, realizing he had mistaken the game’s scope and regretting that he had borrowed it without being able to repay the favor. As he prepared to leave, Benjamin offered him any NP cartridges from a bin, welcoming him to enjoy more games.

• Bill used the selection controls to dress the protagonist, find keys, and explore the room’s interactive objects.
• After speaking with Klaasje, Bill learned that the protagonist was a police officer investigating a case in Revachol after days of drunken trouble at the Whirling-in-Rags.
• Bill discovered the hostel’s larger first floor and found a city map among the documents in the game box, realizing the game offered far more places and stories to explore.
• Bill stopped playing because he felt he had imposed on his hosts and needed to find work and a place to live.
• Benjamin asked whether Bill liked games and offered him any NP cartridges from the bin beside the sofa.

Disco Elysium earned widespread critical praise and award nominations, though its sales were limited by its length and GAMENOVA’s incompatible disc drive. As Lin Lixin presented Francis Bacon’s final painting at a press conference, Jiang Wanmeng began exploring how optical discs might play video and decided to travel to an international broadcasting technology exhibition.

• Disco Elysium received a broad slate of award nominations and near-unanimous critical praise despite selling only slightly more than twenty thousand copies on its first day.
• Lin Lixin told reporters that the Insulindian Phasmid could mean different things to different players and credited Francis Bacon with the game’s distinctive oil-painted art.
• Lin Lixin revealed Bacon’s framed final painting and announced that it would be displayed at the GAMENOVA Game Museum.
• Jiang Wanmeng considered how optical discs might overcome VHS’s limitations and began imagining a Video CD.
• Jiang Wanmeng decided to take his engineers to the international broadcasting technology exhibition in Las Vegas to learn about the industry.

At Apple’s 1992 launch, John Sculley unveiled the Newton MessagePad, a handheld office device developed with Micro-Nova Semiconductor. Lin Lixin recognized its promise but believed its immature technology, high price, and limited software ecosystem would prevent it from succeeding.

• Lin Lixin and Vivian attended Apple’s product launch, where John Sculley greeted them.
• Sculley described Apple’s search for a portable computer and credited technological cooperation with Micro-Nova Semiconductor.
• Sculley showed how Apple had stripped down a laptop’s components to create a compact, stylus-equipped PDA.
• Apple revealed the Newton MessagePad, prompting excitement among the audience.
• Lin Lixin assessed the Newton’s potential and identified its usability, price, and software ecosystem as major obstacles.

Lin Lixin traveled to Japan to persuade Sega to build a reusable universal 3D arcade board that would cut development time and hardware costs. He outlined the shared 3D technology it could provide, then introduced a new AM2 project: Virtua Fighter.

• Lin Lixin told Vivian that GameNova’s main objective for the year was storage and that he had prepared for future mobile devices through the Hermes project.
• Lin Lixin arrived in Tokyo and explained to Satoshi that arcade games remained popular, making Sega well positioned to benefit from the downturn.
• Lin Lixin told Hayao Nakayama that Sega needed a universal 3D arcade board, and Yu Suzuki explained how shared 3D functions could replace repeated custom hardware designs.
• Lin Lixin argued that a common platform would help Sega share technology, shorten development cycles, and reduce arcade machine costs.
• Lin Lixin placed a document on the table and revealed Virtua Fighter, a planned 3D fighting game from AM2.

Lin Lixin argued that fighting games still had room to grow and proposed making Virtua Fighter stand apart through realistic, logical martial-arts choreography. He left the team considering how kung fu and motion-capture data could make grounded combat visually compelling.

• Yuji Naka questioned why Sega planned to make a fighting game for its new arcade board, given the crowded market and the challenges of 3D controls.
• Lin Lixin said the genre was not saturated and argued that fighting games could include many formats beyond conventional one-on-one bouts.
• Lin Lixin explained that Virtua Fighter would innovate within familiar fighting-game conventions and contrast with Street Fighter’s exaggerated characters and moves.
• The project leads worried that realistic moves would look less appealing, so Lin Lixin argued that logical action could be beautiful and satisfying.
• Lin Lixin pointed to kung fu and motion-capture footage of a Hong Kong action star, then asked whether the team enjoyed Hong Kong-style action movies.

Lin Lixin arranged for GameNova to develop a martial-arts fighting game and invited Jackie to help with its action choreography. After learning that the Jackie Chan Stunt Team had disbanded, Lin offered to rebuild it as a professional action production company backed by GameNova.

• Lin Lixin assigned Yuji to lead the 3D engine work and Suzuki to prepare the game design proposal, while arranging martial-arts advisers.
• Satoshi brought Jackie to Game Freak headquarters, where Jackie praised Mirror's Edge for helping him gain an opening in Hollywood.
• Jackie explained that the stunt team had disbanded because its members needed better-paying work and he could not support them indefinitely.
• Lin proposed that GameNova establish a modern, contracted stunt company with structured pay, insurance, retirement funds, and a wider talent pool.
• Lin described plans to connect the team with GameNova's film production resources and concluded that Hollywood was his turf.

Lin Lixin brought Jackie and the Jackie Chan Stunt Team to Sega’s AM2 team to help develop a fighting game, and Jackie began reviewing its action designs. As Jackie grasped how frame counts shaped combos and impact, Lin Lixin reminded him that Virtua Fighter’s main advantage was its 3D gameplay.

• Lin Lixin offered to solve the Jackie Chan Stunt Team’s problems and open its path to Hollywood, and Jackie accepted.
• Lin Lixin brought Jackie and his team to Sega’s AM2 development team, where Yu Suzuki and the developers welcomed him.
• Jackie questioned the frame counts in the draft moves and demonstrated that Akira Yuki’s Iron Mountain Lean needed more time to build force.
• Lin Lixin explained how fighting games separately designed startup, active, and recovery frames to allow reactions and tactical play.
• Jackie recognized how frame counts connected moves into combos, and Lin Lixin pointed out that Virtua Fighter’s key advantage was 3D.

Lin Lixin explained why most developers failed when they moved fighting games into 3D, then returned to California to prepare GameNova’s Virtua Fighter project and inspect the new ROG Model 1 motherboard. The motherboard’s voltage regulation and monitoring features promised to make arcade hardware more reliable and easier to maintain.

• Lin Lixin recounted how Capcom and SNK struggled with 3D fighting games, while Virtua Fighter, Tekken, and Dead or Alive survived by taking different approaches.
• Lin Lixin returned to California with Jackie and explained that GameNova would provide a production base and help re-form the Jackie Chan Stunt Team.
• Lin Lixin told Jackie to coordinate motion-capture recordings with AM2 while he went to inspect the Sega Model 1 board.
• Hsu showed Lin Lixin the ROG Model 1 motherboard’s LCD voltage display and described its voltage regulation and sensor features.
• Lin Lixin learned that the Model 1 could monitor power and temperature, helping prevent hardware problems and simplify future maintenance.

Sega’s trial release of Virtua Fighter sold out, and Matsumoto Shoki and Furukawa Kentaro tried the new fighting game after growing tired of Street Fighter II. They discovered its roster and martial-arts styles, then began a match as they noticed its 3D character models.

• Sega began trial sales with 500 arcade machines, and its stock sold out through its existing network.
• Matsumoto Shoki and Furukawa Kentaro left Street Fighter II to look for a different game and found Sega’s new Virtua Fighter cabinet.
• The two noticed Virtua Fighter used only three buttons and examined Akira Yuki’s profile, which listed Bajiquan and Master Wu Lianzhi.
• Matsumoto chose Sarah Bryant while Furukawa chose Akira Yuki, and they prepared to fight.
• Matsumoto noticed the character previews were 3D and had visibly polygonal faces.

Players discovered Virtua Fighter’s fluid 3D combat and powerful impact as the game spread through Japanese arcades and drew attention to martial arts. Ken Kutaragi saw Sega’s Model 1 board and decided to redesign PlayStation around powerful 3D graphics, even if it meant defying Sony’s management.

• Furukawa and Matsumoto played Virtua Fighter, explored its many moves, and noticed that the fighters moved through three-dimensional space.
• Yamazaki visited an arcade and stepped in to demonstrate Akira Yuki’s signature Crushing Strike, Cloud Body, Twin Tiger Palms.
• Virtua Fighter’s popularity brought visitors to Master Wu, who heard repeated requests to learn the game’s Bajiquan moves and welcomed the interest in promoting the art.
• Ken Kutaragi examined Sega’s ROG-M1 board and concluded that 3D would define the future of gaming.
• Ken Kutaragi decided to redesign PlayStation with a custom 32-bit Sony graphics chip and planned to speak with Toshiba.

Lin Lixin attended the NAB exhibition to promote GAMENOVA’s high-density optical discs and explore the Video Compact Disc market. He met Jiang Wanmeng, the engineer behind the VCD concept, and proposed combining a decoder chip with GAMENOVA’s optical drive.

• Lin Lixin and Sam discussed turning GAMENOVA’s old headquarters into a museum that recreated the company’s former rental space and arcade.
• GAMENOVA received an invitation to NAB to demonstrate its 650 nm high-density optical discs, which could store nearly 1 GB.
• Lin Lixin went to NAB hoping to pursue the Video Compact Disc opportunity and undermine Sony while expanding sales of GAMENOVA’s own disc technology.
• Lin Lixin surveyed the exhibition, where Panasonic displayed widescreen VHS equipment and Sony showcased its Trinitron televisions.
• Lin Lixin recognized Jiang Wanmeng at GAMENOVA’s booth and learned that he had independently considered putting films and television programs on optical discs.
• Lin Lixin offered Jiang Wanmeng his assistant’s contact information, described GAMENOVA’s high-capacity discs, and suggested integrating a decoder chip into the optical drive.

Lin Lixin launched GameNova’s fifth-generation console project, Nova-Fusion, bringing together the company’s hardware advances and a Linux-based operating system designed to preserve games in standby. He then chose Lucas Arts to develop the launch title, which he revealed would be based on the Tower of Babel.

• Lin Lixin reflected on Motorola’s failed Iridium Project and the danger of completing advanced technology after the market had moved on.
• Lin Lixin announced Nova-Fusion, a fifth-generation console combining GameNova’s CPU, graphics, sound, memory, and optical-disc technologies.
• Lin Lixin specified Nexus OS, which would support standby and let players resume games without restarting the console.
• Mark Cerny took the Nova-Fusion plans and led his team into development, with hardware targeted for Christmas.
• Lin Lixin went to Skywalker Ranch and told the assembled Lucas Arts team to make a game based on the Tower of Babel from Genesis.

Lin Lixin pitched Tim a visual puzzle adventure inspired by the Tower of Babel, where players decipher the languages of different peoples. The chapter ended with Tim understanding that the game would use small, simplified constructed languages shaped by each civilization’s culture and grammar.

• Tim guessed that Lin Lixin’s Tower of Babel game would be an adventure with puzzles, and Lin described it as a visual puzzle game starring a traveler among peoples who could not understand one another.
• Lin explained how players would infer words from context and environmental clues, prompting Tim to become excited about the language-deciphering gameplay.
• Lin clarified that the game would use almost no text from real-world languages and would not require fully functional constructed languages, since each language only needed to support its current level’s puzzles.
• Tim warned that repeating the same deciphering process on each floor could become dull, and Lin agreed the game needed changes between civilizations.
• Lin explained that each civilization would have its own culture, symbols, and grammatical structure, with the first level’s devotees using thirty-four characters and simple subject-verb-object sentences.

Lin Lixin and Lucas planned a language-learning puzzle game built around five symbolic writing systems, while Lin and Mark Cerny began designing a convenient controller for GameNova’s fifth-generation console. The chapter left them considering a contact-charging dock powered by pogo pins and lithium batteries.

• Lin Lixin summoned Lucas to Skywalker Ranch to discuss designing five symbolic languages for Tower of Babel Hymn.
• Lucas proposed giving related words shared visual components, allowing players to infer meanings instead of memorizing every symbol.
• Lin Lixin and Lucas outlined a story in which learning different peoples’ languages reunited a divided world, then Lin assigned Lucas to lead the game’s development as an NX exclusive compatible with GameNova’s fifth-generation machine.
• Lin Lixin met Mark Cerny and asked him to design a new controller focused on convenience.
• Cerny proposed using pogo pins to charge the wireless controller, and Lin suggested building charging docks for places such as a bedside table or coffee table.

Lin Lixin and Cerny refined the NovaFusion controller design after Gerald Lawson advised them to prioritize comfort and balance before fitting in electronics. Lucas Arts then revealed a mysterious new game, Chants of Sennaar, in a brief trailer centered on the Tower of Babel and invented languages.

• Karen bumped into Lin Lixin, and Sam explained that she was Gerald Lawson's daughter.
• Gerald arrived and advised Cerny to settle the controller's shape and comfort before arranging its components, demonstrating how to divide functional zones and balance its weight.
• Gerald declined Lin Lixin's invitation to join the console team but offered to help while he was in California.
• Lucas Arts aired a short promotional video featuring traditional Mesopotamian-style music and an image of the Tower of Babel.
• The trailer showed minimalist in-game scenes with characters speaking invented languages, then ended with the words “Trust one another, unite your strength” and the title Chants of Sennaar.

After finding stability through odd jobs, Benjamin’s help, and GameNova’s Disco Elysium, Bill bought Tower of Babel Hymn and began playing it. He explored the game’s ancient desert ruins and encountered his first puzzle, but could not read the characters on a sign beside a lever.

• Bill reflected on his struggle to find work after prison and credited Benjamin and video games with helping him adjust to life outside.
• After watching a GameNova trailer, Bill bought Tower of Babel Hymn, postponing his planned second playthrough of Disco Elysium.
• Bill began the game and explored its warm-yellow ruins, climbing stairs until he reached a broken wall.
• Bill entered an area with a water channel and a submerged bridge that blocked the protagonist’s path.
• Bill found a locked door, a lever, and a sign bearing four characters he could not recognize.

Bill solved a sluice-gate puzzle in Tower of Babel Hymn and learned how the game’s language puzzles gradually united five peoples. As gaming media praised the title, GameNova’s hardware team debated controller layouts until Lin Lixin chose an asymmetrical design for the company’s next-generation controller.

• Bill and an NPC used a few symbols to solve a sluice-gate puzzle, and Bill learned basic words in the NPC’s language.
• Bill interpreted murals that introduced the game’s peoples and languages, then read an enthusiastic review of Tower of Babel Hymn in Electronic Games Monthly.
• Gaming outlets reported that Atari, Sony, and GameNova had begun preparing their fifth-generation consoles.
• Cerny, Sam, Will, Carmack, and others argued over whether GameNova’s new controller should use symmetrical or asymmetrical analog sticks.
• Lin Lixin decided that GameNova’s next controller would use an asymmetrical layout.

Lin Lixin examined GameNova’s wireless controller problems and decided the company needed to develop a more reliable 2.4 GHz RF system. After hearing about attacks on GameNova’s servers, he considered turning hacking into a game theme.

• Lin Lixin showed the team an Atari 2700 prototype and reviewed GameNova’s wireless controller technology and its history of interference problems.
• Sam proposed infrared controls, but Lin Lixin and Cerny explained that players would have to keep aiming and movement could block the signal.
• Lin Lixin decided GameNova should encode data packets with a controller processor and modulate 2.4 GHz RF signals, then assigned the hardware team further research.
• Sam told Lin Lixin that hackers had increasingly attacked GameNova’s and Nexus’s servers since the fifth-generation console announcement.
• Lin Lixin trusted Carmack, Linus, and the others to handle security, then considered making a hacker-themed game.

Lin Lixin visited Linus to check on Linux's development and proposed a Linux-based hacking simulator that could introduce the system to computer enthusiasts while helping GameNova address cyberattacks. Linus was wary of the idea, but Lin Lixin outlined a story-driven game called Hacknet.

• Lin Lixin visited Linus's apartment and examined the computer equipment Linus used to develop Linux.
• Linus explained that MINIX had inspired him to create Linux and described intercepting at least thirteen attempts to implant worms that day.
• Lin Lixin noted the cyberattacks targeting GameNova and suggested turning hacking into a simulation game.
• Lin Lixin pitched a Unix-terminal-style game that would faithfully reproduce hacking techniques while guiding players through a mystery.
• Linus warned that making such a game sounded illegal, and Lin Lixin clarified that it would be a simulation called Hacknet.