Chapter 654 558 What? ! 5 Billion Dollars to Build a Pokeni Base? !

pokeni is really brave. Any other company would be a little cautious and hesitant.

People in the industry described Qing Zhiyuan as a lunatic, trying to pull chestnuts out of the fire.

But judging from the final result, Qing Zhiyuan is the one who can best reap the first wave of dividends.

Since Pokeni's two Pokémon opened up the situation and once again successfully harvested a wave of New Year's money, other game manufacturers have caught wind of this and began to release their own games as usual.

The gaming market is booming.

This is the classic lipstick effect.

…

January 13, 2002.

After the New Year, Takahashi Kazuma held the 2002 annual strategy meeting in the company's top-floor conference room.

The main purpose is to report to Qing Zhiyuan, and at the same time, let the company's board members have a more overall understanding of the current pokeni situation.

"Judging from last year's sales, we increased by 215% year-on-year, with total revenue for the year reaching US$47.6 billion and net profit of US$4.3 billion."

The actual profit may be higher than this, but part of it will be moved to subsequent quarters when making financial reports.

For example, the revenue from the two Pokémon released at the end of 2001 was not included in the 2001 revenue. If this part was included, the number would be even higher.

Seeing this data, everyone including Satoru Iwata of the strategy department and Ken Akanishi, director of the program department, couldn't believe it.

It is so powerful that it can still take off despite the economic downturn. The pokeni group is like a monster.

But everyone laughed very happily. After all, they all have shares. The better the company develops, the more money they can get.

"The launch of Yu-Gi-Oh! and Frontier Online have provided the company with a stable source of income. Now these two games provide a total monthly global revenue of nearly more than 600 million US dollars."

In other words, these two games alone accounted for about one-sixth of last year's total revenue.

Everyone has also firmly felt the horror of online games.

The remaining revenue, approximately US$3 billion, comes from the share collected by the Dandelion Game Platform. More and more third-party games are now available on the Dandelion Game Platform.

Many independent studios and even individual game producers have even been born.

Correspondingly, the Dandelion Game Platform has gradually grown from releasing almost 30 games a month to now selling 100 games a month. In fact, it has experienced very rapid growth.

In the previous life, the Steam platform released an average of 1,211 games per month in 2023. The current Dandelion game platform is still far behind, but it also means that there is strong room for growth.

"Then the Pokémon franchise provides a large portion of the revenue for the company's games... Shenmue, The Matrix, Bulldog... those also provide a lot."

In addition to games, pokeni also has a lot of revenue from Internet advertising...

In short, judging from the financial report shared by Takahashi Kazuma, P Agency can definitely be regarded as a very remarkable Internet giant.

…

You make a lot of money, but you also have a lot of money to spend.

In addition to maintaining the normal operation of the company, such as server and bandwidth costs, as well as various equipment costs, employee salaries, bonuses, etc. also need to be paid.

These account for a large part of the expenses.

In addition, investment must be made in expanding reproduction. The research and development expenses for future technologies alone will cost billions of dollars every year.

This number is still increasing.

…

After Kazuma Takahashi's report, everyone sighed heavily.

In addition to being infinitely excited about the company's bright future, I also feel a lot of pressure because of the heavy burden on my shoulders.

For example, Satoru Iwata, as the head of the company's strategy department, spent a lot of money to acquire companies and industries, including the research and development of SDS handheld consoles.

Last year, we spent money without getting anything back. As a result, disasters like 1211 occurred in the United States.

Although it was a natural and man-made disaster, no wonder Satoru Iwata, but it always gives people the feeling that the strategy department is not good enough.

On the other hand, Qing Zhiyuan is relatively calm, and his trust in Satoru Iwata has not diminished at all.

However, in view of the current situation, it seems a bit difficult to convince the public to let Satoru Iwata take over as CEO in 2002. It will probably take another two years for the seeds planted before to bear fruit.

When the time comes, with Satoru Iwata's outstanding vision, strong strategic determination, and clear planning for the company's future strategy as his main achievements, he will naturally become CEO, and there should be no problem.

Qing Zhiyuan's plan is that after Satoru Iwata takes over as CEO, he can safely retire to the decision-making level as chairman, and then delegate daily affairs to Satoru Iwata.

…

After Kazuma Takahashi's report, the bosses of other departments made corresponding reports.

There are several key points in the program. One is the development of [Trailblazer Engine 2 Generation], which has greatly optimized its performance.

At the same time, after Nvidia's chips are updated, Trail Blazer Engine 2 will be able to effectively support ray tracing and some real-time changing dynamic effects by next year.

Although it is not as powerful as the previous Unreal Engine 4, it is still enough to lead the entire era.

To put it bluntly, as long as the hardware level can keep up, Qing Zhiyuan has already planned the iterative content of the engine, and there will be no problem with a little push.

"Sega has completed the development of the new handheld SDS. It passed the company's internal testing in the second half of last year and can even run Pokémon 3D and "Monster Hunter" smoothly."

Iwata Satoru gave a big piece of good news.

Upon hearing the news, Qing Zhiyuan couldn't help but curl up the corners of his mouth slightly, which was even harder to suppress than AK.

"It's good. This way, this year's E3 electronics show can use SDS to stir up a bloody storm." Qing Zhiyuan smiled and nodded.

Others also laughed and said nothing.

The president is so bad.

After the release of this SDS handheld console, many game manufacturers are expected to lose sleep.

…

When it was finally Shinji Mikami's turn to report on the game business, it was already past 4 p.m.

""Bug Master 2" and "Violet Evergarden" were completed and passed testing at the end of last year, and are now handed over to the operation side for promotion."

Shinji Mikami glanced at Kazuma Takahashi, who immediately responded, "Yes, according to the release schedule, Mushishi 2 should be released in February, and then "Violet Eternal Garden" in April

Moreover, according to the president's request, "Violet Evergarden" has been simultaneously animated by Kyoto Animation. It is expected that the first episode will be broadcast in the summer of this year, almost July. "

New show in July?

Qing Zhiyuan silently noted the time and said it was good.

It’s almost equivalent to the fact that as soon as the popularity of the game subsides, the popularity of TV animation picks up. The two form a chemical linkage to maximize popularity and sales.

This set of patterns is already familiar to pokeni now.

There is no need for Qing Zhiyuan to remind him, Takahashi Kazuma will make arrangements on his own.

…

"The production of the Spirited Away game has been completed, but in order to cooperate with Ghibli, it will not be released until July this year." Shinji Mikami said.

"What's the release time of Ghibli?" Qing Zhiyuan asked.

"It will be released in April this year."

"Okay, I understand." Qing Zhiyuan made a special note in his notebook.

In this life, "Spirited Away" was released a year later than in the previous life, which is really weird.

What is Mr. Hayao Miyazaki doing? !

Calculating the time, if the game is released in July, it is not impossible.

It is equivalent to making Spirited Away popular around the world first, and then the E3 electronics exhibition in July can shock the audience with the game "Spirited Away", maximizing the gimmick and dissemination, and then releasing it. Game Harvest.

This is the most ideal state.

Shinji Mikami continued to flip through the PPT and said, "The movie "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" is scheduled to be released globally in February this year.

Our game is scheduled for May.

According to the filming progress of "Game of Thrones", it should not be broadcast until the second half of this year, and it will be broadcast through the Internet, which needs to rely on the streaming function of P-NET. "

"You need to connect with P-NET about this. By the way, I will be invited to the docking meeting when the time comes. I will call the person in charge of Shangyue River."

Qing Zhiyuan was originally the person in charge of the two companies, but there were too many things to do, so Yuehe could only entrust it to Hitotsubashi Bune.

"Okay president."

"Then, we don't have a production plan for "Spider-Man" yet. If we want to do it, we have to determine the production method and team. It is expected to take up to two years to complete.

It also depends on the specific needs and technical difficulty. "

Spider silk is the biggest problem for small spiders.

Although 3D games have been developed for several years now, the functional development of [elastic objects] and [deformable] is still completely insufficient, which can be said to be almost 0.

Therefore, when the spider silk is made, it is either very hard, like a steel pipe, or the deformation algorithm may be unqualified, causing all kinds of mold wear and flying around.

"Let's put it on hold for now, but the functional aspects can go first." Qing Zhiyuan looked at Akanishi Ken, "When the planning department holds a meeting on specific requirements, pull me in and I will come up with the program content."

"Okay president."

Ken Akanishi took notes with a bitter look on his face.

Damn it, every time there is a conference there will always be something new, no matter if people can stand it or not.

"'Gravity' has made a major breakthrough. It is now quite complete. After the movie is released, the game will be available for sale here."

"Uh-huh."

Qing Zhiyuan nodded, very satisfied with this.

The game Gravity can be regarded as a collection of program function verification. As long as there are no problems with the game, a lot of new functions can be derived.

So we strive to do it well.

"The development of "fate/zero" has also been completed and has been put on the release list for scheduling. This time, it is still entrusted to Kyoto Animation for animation."

"Well, it's okay. There's no rush for the animation. It can be done half a year or a year after the game is released." Qing Zhiyuan said.

"As for new games..."Monster Hunter" has added a sequel, and "Monster Hunter 2" is now in development."

"Remember to bring an SDS with you this time," Qing Zhiyuan emphasized. "Monster Hunter 2 and the Pokémon series both have a requirement. Not only must they be playable on the Sega DC, but they must also be playable on the SDS."

"Okay, president." Shinji Mikami took notes silently.

…

It wasn't until almost 10 o'clock in the evening that this year's strategic meeting was concluded.

And it’s just a general outline. It will take time to refine the specific implementation in the future.

However, just like writing, the strategy meeting is a general outline, and the detailed outline must be deepened and improved over time.

It is even possible that earth-shaking changes occurred midway.

After the meeting ended, Qing Zhiyuan breathed a sigh of relief.

Fortunately, the company has experts in various fields, so it can operate so well, and everyone's confidence is getting stronger and stronger.

It’s really just around the corner for pokeni to become the industry leader.

Qing Zhiyuan is full of confidence in this.

"that……"

At this moment, the little secretary's voice rang.

She and Qing Zhiyuan were the only ones left in the entire conference room.

As the secretary to the board of directors, in addition to customizing meetings and taking meeting minutes, the junior secretary also has to take care of some of the chairman's daily affairs.

It can be said that it was quite hard.

Qing Zhiyuan was slightly stunned, as if he didn't expect that she was still there.

"President."

"Um?"

"President, shouldn't we also prepare to build a new pokeni building?" Ayase Akane said casually as she closed her laptop and turned off the equipment in the conference room.

Qing Zhiyuan rolled his eyes.

"What's new? It makes it seem like we've had it before."

"Yeah, what I mean is, pokeni has been established for 12 years this year, and it doesn't even have its own building. Is this ridiculous?"

Um……

It really doesn't sound like much.

Sony even has a building of its own.

Qing Zhiyuan thought for a while and felt that what the secretary said made sense.

pokeni is expanding faster and faster, and now the total number of employees worldwide has reached 100,000.

More than 10,000 of them are the core development department of the game, and many others are subsidiary support departments. For example, after the emergence of the Dandelion game platform, both online games hired a lot of customer service personnel in various countries.

Mainly to answer calls and messages from players, calm them down, and report some serious bugs.

In addition to customer service staff, there are also inevitable products of the times——

Local promotion team.

After the expansion of these personnel, the number of pokeni employees will expand rapidly, and it is even likely to exceed 150,000 people within this year.

As for the neon area, in order to take care of the existing core department members, pokeni should also build a building that can accommodate about 10,000 people.

"A building with 10,000 people should have at least 40 floors." Akane Ayase looked at the notes in her hand and came to a conclusion.

"But my ideal pokeni base should be similar to Ghibli." Qing Zhiyuan said.

"Um?"

"It is built into a large base. Each building can have its own characteristics, such as the Pokémon Building, the Demon Hunter Building... and there are entertainment facilities for children in the middle, just like Disneyland."

"When necessary, part of it can be opened for sightseeing and selling for money." Qing Zhiyuan was immersed in his own imagination.

"That's it, we don't have that much money, right?" Akane Ayase complained ruthlessly.

"You're not a professional in architectural design. How do you know how much it will cost?"

Qing Zhiyuan complained coldly, "If I spend 5 billion US dollars, I still don't believe that I can't build a pokeni base that meets the requirements!"

Akane Ayase wrinkled her little nose and waved her fist behind Qing Zhiyuan.

You have more money and you are great!

Five billion US dollars is used to build a house, which is really luxurious.

But...

Speaking of profession, Qing Zhiyuan suddenly thought of someone.

…

...(End of chapter)