Meyer arrived at the apartment as quickly as possible.
Ethan understood his caution. A wholesale price of $4,000 was not something any arcade distributor could casually agree to.
Especially not Meyer, an exceptionally cautious businessman, who would never risk placing an order before seeing the prototype for himself.
"Ethan, is this Contra?"
The moment he stepped through the door, he saw the object he had been eagerly anticipating.
The cabinet was obviously handcrafted by Ethan and his team, and several design sketches were scattered messily across a nearby low table.
"That's right. But we've been pressed for time, so we haven't finalized the cabinet design yet."
Ethan nodded, casually picked up one of the sketches, and handed it to Meyer.
Meyer took one look.
It depicted a muscular tough guy wearing a sleeveless tank top, with a black headband tied around his forehead.
One look into those sharp, piercing eyes told you he wasn't someone to mess with.
Beneath the muscular man were the large letters spelling "CONTRA."
The "C" had been stylized into blazing flames, making it look especially fashionable.
The more Meyer stared at the man's face, the more familiar it seemed.
Suddenly his eyes widened.
"Arnold Schwarzenegger! So the rumors are true?!"
The streets had been buzzing with talk that Schwarzenegger, fresh off starring in Conan the Destroyer, was preparing to endorse a video game.
At first, everyone had dismissed it as nothing more than a piece of entertainment gossip.
But as time passed, the story became increasingly detailed and convincing, with people even vividly describing exactly what had supposedly happened.
It had left Schwarzenegger's fans deeply worried.
After all, everyone knew the state the video game industry was currently in.
To put it bluntly, endorsing a video game at this point meant putting money above reputation and standing against public opinion.
Making a decision like that while his career was on the rise was practically digging his own grave.
"That's right."
Ethan didn't care in the slightest and admitted it openly.
"We've already signed an endorsement agreement with Arnold Schwarzenegger."
He didn't continue the topic, instead switching on Contra and signaling for Meyer to begin playing.
...
Meyer considered himself a successful arcade distributor.
He had chosen to ride the wave during the golden age of video games and, within just a few years, had become one of the largest arcade distributors in California.
He had seen countless arcade machines.
Practically every arcade machine in the world.
But he had never seen anything like Contra.
It was like a game from the future.
From its visuals to its game design, every single element was extraordinarily refined, almost perfect.
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Meyer realized that his hands were trembling slightly.
"Ethan, I can pay a 50% deposit, as long as we can officially sign a supply agreement!"
Meyer was an experienced businessman.
During his play session just now, he had already estimated the hardware cost of the machine.
At the current price, Ethan would earn a net profit of well over a thousand dollars on every cabinet sold.
But Meyer didn't mind at all.
Because even so, the profit margin left for him would be few hundred dollars, which was already quite big.
With Contra's incredible quality serving as its guarantee, the business negotiations encountered no obstacles whatsoever.
However, after all the details had been finalized, Meyer didn't leave.
Instead, he stared at the machine before him for quite a while before suddenly speaking.
"Ethan, how many stages does Contra have in total?"
Ethan raised an eyebrow slightly, surprised by Meyer's sharp perception.
Arcade machines were different from home consoles.
Their revenue was closely tied to coin insertion frequency and the length of each play session.
Unlike Tetris, Contra was a story driven game composed of multiple stages.
For an average player to clear it from beginning to end, it would take at least half an hour, if not a full hour.
"Eight stages in total, plus a final boss."
"That's too long."
Meyer frowned slightly.
It wasn't that he thought a lengthy game was bad.
It was simply a disadvantage from a commercial standpoint.
"Ethan, arcade machines aren't home consoles. Most people don't have that much free time to spend playing them."
Unlike Tetris, where players could simply walk away if something came up and start a new game later...
If they had to leave halfway through Contra, the next time they played they'd have to start all over again.
That would gradually undermine players' enthusiasm.
"You mean... developing a save system for arcade machines?"
Ethan immediately understood what Meyer meant and stroked his chin thoughtfully.
Very soon, he came up with an exceptionally suitable solution.
"I understand. Just wait for my good news."
Hearing such a straightforward response, Meyer was briefly stunned but didn't say anything more.
When facing an all-powerful money printing machine, there was only one thing he needed to do.
Trust!
...
That evening, after Sam returned from watching the arcade, he listened to Ethan's explanation and scratched his head.
"A save system? On an arcade machine? Are you kidding me?"
No one understood better than Sam, who ran the arcade every day, just how many people used a single arcade cabinet daily.
That beloved original Tetris machine of his...
Sigh.
"If you want to store data for every player, how much storage would that require?"
"You're right, Sam."
Ethan didn't deny the point.
But he had no intention of using a modern save system.
He patted Sam on the shoulder, walked directly into Sam's bedroom, and began searching through his collection of game cartridges.
It had to be said that Sam's collection was impressively complete.
He had even gritted his teeth and purchased several games released after the Atari crash.
Ethan found a cartridge labeled Survival Island on the shelf.
It was a game released in 1983, just the previous year.
"Huh? I own this?"
Even Sam stared blankly at the cartridge cover for several moments.
Ever since the Atari crash, he had played video games much less frequently.
For him, buying game cartridges had often become nothing more than a collecting habit.
"What's special about this game? Don't tell me..."
"That's right."
Ethan nodded as he inserted it into the Atari 2600.
"This game has a save feature."
"But... How is that possible? This machine doesn't have any writable storage device."
Being something of a self-taught tech enthusiast himself, Sam immediately spotted the problem.
The Atari 2600 wasn't a computer.
It simply had no capability to write data.
"Of course it doesn't. That's why they didn't store the save data inside the console."
Ethan smiled as he navigated the game to the "Load" option.
The screen displayed the words [Enter Code], prompting the player to input data.
Below it were two rows of input fields, twelve digits in total.
"They stored the save file inside the player's brain."
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