On the final day of the Carnival, Gastar Electronic Entertainnt announced the official release date for the Switch: July 1st, 2010.
This period happened to be a ti when people were relatively free. With sumr approaching, the demand for entertainnt was on the rise. The heat made everyone restless, and people needed so kind of outlet.
And obviously, video gas were an excellent option.
The end of the Carnival marked the beginning of the final four-month sprint.
At this point, the arrow was already nocked—it had to be released.
Shortly after Gastar's Carnival wrapped up, Surui Electronics also unveiled their own new-generation ho console.
When it ca to handhelds, Surui had clearly taken a much bigger hit than Gastar.
Back when smartphones first started to gain traction, Gastar temporarily pulled out of the handheld console market. They didn't invest too much capital or energy, so now as they restarted efforts, there wasn't much pressure. On top of that, Gastar was essentially run under a one-man rule by Takayuki. Whatever he said went. Even if the company went under, he wouldn't be accountable to anyone.
...
...
But Surui Electronics was a different story. Their nurous shareholders would never allow one single product line to heavily drain the company's capital—let alone lose money doing so. That would only stir more dissatisfaction.
So in the short term, it was unlikely Surui would return to the handheld market. At the very least, they'd want to first observe how Gastar's new handheld perford.
In the past, Gastar had crossed the river by stepping on Surui's stone. Now it was Surui's turn to cautiously follow in Gastar's footsteps.
Of course, part of this dynamic involved a quiet partnership between Surui's current president, Hayakawa Ueto, and Takayuki.
On the surface, there was little connection between the two, but behind the scenes, they had quietly ford an alliance.
They would no longer engage in open competition—at least not in the short term. Their shared goal was to fully suppress their mutual thorn, Mikfo, preventing it from making another bold push into the player market. Once Mikfo was neutralized, Surui would make its return.
Recently, Surui also reached a cooperation deal with Facebook.
Facebook would provide Surui with its own smartphone operating system.
This OS was, simply put, open source—offering far greater developnt flexibility compared to Mikfo's closed ecosystem.
That openness made it a fertile ground for ga developnt.
Surui could use this opportunity to grow its smartphone business.
Sure, it ant paying Facebook a hefty licensing fee each year, but at least it ant they were officially in the ga. They wouldn't be left behind when the new era arrived.
As for whether they could make any real profit from it—that was a different story.
Just a few days later, Surui finalized the decision to release their new ho console between Halloween and Christmas this year.
That was also the ti of year when people were most eager to spend money.
There was a reason most companies chose to release their newest products during this window—it was a strategy backed by years of market experience.
Following that, Surui and Gastar launched into their final sprint together.
During this period, both companies doubled down, announcing one or two first- or third-party gas every one or two weeks.
Each ga looked impressively polished.
With this steady stream of ga announcents, players hardly had any downti. There was always sothing new on the horizon, keeping attention locked in.
anwhile, things weren't going so well over at Mikfo.
They faced direct, aggressive competition from Facebook on one side, and the hungry stares of Gastar and Surui on the other.
Gastar could be set aside for now—they were a ga developnt company at their core, and their competition with Mikfo wasn't that overt.
In fact, Mikfo had mostly targeted Surui in the past.
Now it was clear Surui was looking for other ways to fight back.
Coincidentally, Mikfo was preparing to release their own new ho PC.
The ho PC market was sothing Myron Case had long obsessed over.
His previous attempt at a PC line had essentially been smothered by the rise of video gas—it never made a splash.
But he still firmly believed that Mikfo's PC line had untapped potential.
Unfortunately, the competition wasn't exactly weak. Surui's ho console had already drawn much of the gars' attention.
Ever since Surui adopted the industrialized ga developnt model from Gastar, their progress had sped up significantly.
Large-scale, mass-produced gas started rolling out.
These industrial-style gas had a major downside—heavy homogenization.
But for now, players were still willing to accept that kind of ga.
There were pros and cons to this approach.
On the plus side, lots of unsuspecting users were drawn in by the flashy, cool-looking visuals. They were willing to give these gas a try.
These types of gas had very low barriers to entry. Both new and seasoned players could quickly pick them up and have fun.
The downside was that they could rapidly wear down players' patience.
Homogenized gas like this might last two to three years before players started to feel bored. If Surui didn't consider a shift in strategy soon, these mass-produced gas could beco a deadly poison.
Takayuki hadn't warned Hayakawa about this.
Not because he was petty, but because he figured that if he did, Hayakawa might start suspecting he was a ti traveler. One person suspecting that was fine, but there was no need to share too much with a rival like Hayakawa.
The more you say, the more mistakes you make.
Besides, whether Surui lived or died wasn't really Takayuki's concern.
If Surui did rise to prominence one day, the downside of these mass-produced gas might actually beco Takayuki's ace in the hole—a trap he had quietly left behind for Surui to fall into.
After all, this was business. You couldn't afford to get sentintal.
Surui, for their part, fully understood this. If they ended up falling into that trap, Hayakawa would likely chalk it up to his own lack of foresight—unlike Takayuki, who had predicted it all. It would simply an his skills weren't good enough.
As for Mikfo, the common opponent of both companies—their ga developnt team was slowly coming together. Clearly, they were hoping to reclaim so market share through video gas.
But that would be extrely difficult.
After all, the gaming market had long been split cleanly between Gastar and Surui. Anyone else trying to break in now? It was going to be an uphill battle.
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