Chapter 353 It’s all cabbage prices
In the 1980s, the United States had just ended the Vietnam War. Reflections on the Vietnam War and fear of the tropical jungle made action movies with such elements the most popular movies at that time. One of the types.
For example, "First Blood" added jungle elements, and "First Blood 2" started the war directly in Vietnam.
Yang Ye launched "Predator" at this time, also following this trend.
Although "Predator" moves the battlefield to the jungles of South America and is not a Vietnam War theme in the traditional sense, the corresponding genre elements are all available and not a single one is left behind.
In the setting, all the equipment worn by the actors is equipment from the Vietnam War. The pistols equipped by the commandos in the film are Desert Eagles.
Tropical virgin jungle, large-scale gun battles, field teams... these were all popular with the audience at the time, and they also set the claustrophobic tone for the overall temperament of the film.
The suspense setting is exactly the same as "Alien". In short, "Predator" combines the characteristics of "Alien" and "First Blood".
As long as the film is shot according to the tone set by Yang Ye, it will be difficult for "Predator" to succeed.
In terms of actor selection, Yang Ye directly designated Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Schwarzenegger has been making movies for more than ten years, and he has always been depressed.
In the early days, my German accent was too strong when I spoke English, so I had to do a side job.
It was not until two years ago that he gained a little fame with the Conan the Barbarian series, and now he is considered a second-tier actor.
Shay signed a three-movie deal with Schwarzenegger for a salary of 500,000 per film.
The next step is to choose the director. For this kind of assembly line horror film, if there is successful experience, the director is not actually important.
Because the director is just an executor, how to shoot and how to shoot, with Yang Ye drawing the frame in advance and Xie Yi checking it, the final product will be exactly the same.
Just like the Marvel series of movies in later generations, not many people actually know who the director is, and they don't care.
Unless the opponent is an outstanding person like Ridley Scott or James Cameron, Yang Ye will give him autonomy if he understands their abilities. Others do not have this treatment.
......
After signing Schwarzenegger's film contract, Yang Ye can implement a small plan of his.
In early October, Shay came to Marvel Comics, and CEO Stan Lee led the company's employees to warmly welcome him.
As early as 1978, DC produced "Superman", which exploded at the box office. Marvel was jealous and wanted to make a movie.
However, it is useless to be jealous, DC is backed by Warner, and its father is rich.
Marvel has no backer. If Marvel wants to make a movie, it can only discuss it with other film companies.
If a film company intends to make a movie, then the character must be licensed to the other party. This is the origin of Marvel's "selling heroes".
Since the release of "Superman", Mr. Stan Lee has been going around and contacting a large number of film companies, hoping that they can make Marvel movies.
However, "Superman" only made a splash. The second film received mediocre reviews, the third film was bloody, and the fourth film hit the center of the earth.
Warner can't even do it, and other companies can't do it themselves.
Stan Lee had his head shaved and his head was full of enthusiasm. He had been busy for several years but had not sold many roles.
Although we have made a few movies, they were all developed by second-rate small companies. For example, "Captain America" could not even enter theaters and was directly released on video tapes.
At this time, the arrival of Shay made Stan Lee feel like a savior, and he planned to package and sell all the characters under the company.
Unfortunately, Shay was not a rag collector. He was picky and reluctant to buy a little spider. The asking price was two hundred thousand dollars, but there was not a penny more.
At this point, Stan Lee was still as happy as if he was having a holiday.
Although Lian Mei is a weakling among the eight major companies, it still bears the name of the eight major companies, right?
With a big company taking over, Marvel’s movie dream seems to be coming true.
...
Yang Ye did not directly acquire Marvel because he did not want to make United Artists Pictures too big.
In a few years, Sony will acquire Colombia, and he pointed at Sony to fight lightning in the front!
As long as you buy Spider-Man and hold the lifeblood of Sony Pictures... the bug in your hands in advance, that's enough.
Although the MCU Marvel Universe has become a big success after 2010, it has only been brilliant for ten years, and its revenue is not as good as a small insect.
More importantly, computer technology is not yet mature, and many characters cannot be developed after being bought, so they are of no use.
For example, Iron Man, Thor, and the Hulk all require a lot of special effects, which are difficult to achieve.
Little Chong is different. This thing can be shot as an action movie, and it only needs a small amount of special effects to assist.
Another reason is that Yang Ye knew a plan that had gone bankrupt.
In 1985, Marvel sold Spider-Man to a company called Cannon Pictures for $225,000.
Horror movies were popular in the 1980s and were very profitable, so Cannon Pictures planned to make Spider-Man into a horror movie.
The director is Tobe Hopper, who made "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre", and Tom Cruise plays Spidey.
In the script, after Peter Parker is bitten by an alien spider, he will transform into a giant spider...
Stan Lee couldn't stand this and went crazy on the spot.
Later, after trying many things but failing to make it, Cannon Pictures made such a huge impact when they made "Superman 4" that they lost their pants and went bankrupt.
The rights were then transferred to a company called Carloco Pictures, and Cameron took over the project.
Cameron also wrote the script, in which Schwarzenegger played Doctor Octopus...
But it didn't work out, and Carloco Films also went bankrupt.
Now, Tom Cruise, James Cameron, and Arnold Schwarzenegger are all following Yang Ye.
This... Yang Ye felt that it seemed a bit messy, so he bought the little spider back and pried away Sony Pictures' cash cow in advance.
After Cameron finishes shooting "First Blood 2", he will launch "Spider-Man".
As for what kind of "Spider-Man" these three people will come up with when they come together, Yang Ye said he is looking forward to it!
......
In the console war of 1983, Atari ultimately suffered a tragic defeat and was beaten to the ground.
Almost instantly, Atari lost almost all of its property during the war. The company had a large backlog of unsold game consoles and cassettes, and had no choice but to take them to New Mexico for destruction.
In 1984, Warner also gave up, announcing that it would no longer support Atari and began to sell Atari.
And this gave Yang Ye the opportunity to take over Atari.
Yang Ye and Xie made a decisive move and bought Atari for only five million US dollars, becoming the game department of United Artists Pictures.
In mid-October, Atari, which changed hands and was reorganized, held its first high-level meeting. The four major shareholders of United Artists, Yang Ye, Shay, White, and Adjani, all attended the meeting.
At the meeting, Shea announced: In addition to recalling Atari's former general manager Nolan Kyle, he will continue to serve as general manager.
It will be business as usual at Atari, there will be no other personnel changes.
Subsequently, Shea assigned Atari two tasks:
The first is to improve the home game console Atari 7800.
Atari's home console has a total of three iterations, namely Atari2600, Atari5200, and Atari7800.
The 2600 was the king of home consoles for a generation. The 5200 was a hit after it was launched in 1983 because it was not only expensive but also not compatible with 2600 games.
The developer was really crazy about making more money, but in the end he didn’t make any money and even killed himself.
Atari originally planned to launch the 7800 after Christmas in 1984, but Warner sold it.
Buyers of the original space-time did not look at the home console market and believed that home consoles were dead.
Because the home console market collapsed at this time, Atari's host project was cut off, so the 7200 could only sit in the warehouse gathering dust.
Although Yang Ye was optimistic about home consoles, after trying out the 7800, he felt that this device had many flaws and could not beat Nintendo, so he put forward some suggestions for improvement.
The boss opened his mouth and the employees ran away. Although Yang Ye just said it casually, it was not easy for Atari's R&D personnel to realize the functions he said.
The final launch of the Atari 7800 may have to be delayed for more than a year, but Yang Ye is not in a hurry and can afford to wait.
The second is to develop new games.
Hu Yinmeng, Yang Ye’s secretary, placed a game plan in front of all the senior executives present.
In 1988, a meteorite crashed near a Mayan temple in Central America, followed by a strange alien creature... the Alien.
An armed organization called "Kestrel" plans to build this place into a base for launching alien invasion wars.
Members of an organization called "Contra" sent two heroes, Bill and Lance, to destroy the other party's plan...
"Contra" is Spanish and is a militia resistance organization in a Central American country. The general name of "Rebel" means "rebel". After being translated into kana and then converted into Chinese characters, it is... Contra!
Nolan Kyle, the newly appointed general manager of Atari, looked at the two male protagonists in the planning project and felt that they looked familiar.
He couldn't help but look up at Yang Ye, and then looked down at the plan. After repeating it twice, he said: "Mr. Yang, may I ask who this Bill is..."
Yang Ye smiled: "No. Wrong, it's me. As for the other one..."
"Is it Mr. Sylvester Stallone?"
"You have good eyes!"
Yang Ye only said that Kyle had good eyesight, but did not admit that it was Stallone and admitted that he wanted to pay.
The prototypes of the two protagonists in "Contra" are Stallone and Schwarzenegger, and Yang Ye shamelessly tampered with one of them to look like himself.
Kyle was convinced, Yang Ye actually used his own image to make a game character, and even paired it with Stallone.
Let’s look at the specific content. The novel design made Kyle’s eyes shine even more:
In “Contra”, players hold ordinary single-shot rifles at the beginning. Fires in eight directions, and will switch to the obtained weapon after obtaining other weapons.
"Weapon capsules" will appear from time to time in the game. Shooting them down will reveal more powerful weapons.
Direct contact between the player and the enemy and the fired ammunition will lead to the player's direct death, so skilled avoidance skills are required.
Players can jump and use the direction keys to control the direction of movement and shooting when jumping, and the direction control when jumping is very important in the game...
The person in charge of Atari In fact, I don't like the new bosses to interfere in the company's affairs as soon as they arrive, but they have bankrupted the company, so they can only do what others say.
Then after seeing Yang Ye’s game plan, they were convinced.
These settings that may have seemed ordinary to later generations now seem to be very creative and groundbreaking, which opened the eyes of a group of people at Atari.
Kyle said: "It seems that Mr. Yang is also a video game enthusiast?"
"Yes, I like to play two games when I have nothing to do!"
Only one game Obviously it's not enough. Yang Ye has a lot of "creative ideas", but he is not interested in teaching these people how to do things step by step. Coming up with a "Contra" is already outrageous.
Yang Ye also needs more game companies to produce games for Atari's consoles.
Yang Ye said: "I heard that many people have left Atari in recent years, and some have even founded their own game companies?"
Kyle's expression was a little sad. There were many great people who worked at Atari, but they all left later, such as Steve Jobs.
After Atari launched the 2600 home console, it became the king of the industry, and it became even more crazy. It was complacent in the company's development, and more people couldn't stand it and left.
After these people left, many founded their own game companies, some of which had great influence in later generations, such as Activision.
Atari’s initial approach was to suppress these game companies, such as banning the games they produced from being launched on its own consoles.
The two sides fought back and forth, causing serious internal friction and wasting a lot of energy. This was one of the reasons for Atari's collapse.
The plan given by Yang Ye is... to turn hostility into friendship, everyone cooperates and makes money together.
Yang Ye said to Kyle: "I need you to accept these game companies, gather them all, and become Atari's suppliers. If they have good projects but have financial problems, Then become a shareholder and invest in them!”
“In terms of profit distribution, if the game made by a game company is very popular, it should receive more income.”< br>
Atari’s previous model was: when a game company makes a game, it pays a sum of money to buy it. After that, however many cassettes the game sells and how much profit it makes, it all belongs to Atari, and The game production company has nothing to do with it.
So when game companies make games, they often make them shoddily, just to sell them. It’s not cost-effective to do them well.
Usually after players buy it back, they get tired of playing it after a few plays.
As for Atari, in order to keep players fresh, they can only continuously launch new games.
As a result, the games got worse and worse, and players got bored faster and faster. Atari released more and more games, falling into an infinite loop, which finally led to a collapse!
Yang Ye finally said: "We need to build a complete ecosystem so that those third-party game companies can rely on us to survive. Only by letting them make more money can we make more money.
This can form a virtuous cycle, stimulate the enthusiasm of these game companies, produce more excellent games, and allow us to make more money.”
People here may not understand what Yang Ye said, but it's just like this these days, just be the big boss and make a lot of money alone.
The other people are all workers of Damn, and they are not even qualified to drink soup, let alone eat meat!
This is the case with Shaw Brothers in Hong Kong. If you pick out a batch of people, your employees will earn an extra cent, just like cutting off their flesh.
Shaw Brothers heroes like Zhang Che and Hu Jinquan never knew how much money they made for Shaw Brothers before.
As a result, after retirement, they were all in poverty, with no food to eat, and they had to rely on their former disciples to support them in their old age!
Yangye's business strategy is to increase revenue without cutting costs, and does not rely on squeezing employees to make money.
This truth is worthless in future generations, everyone understands it.
It’s just that truth is truth and understanding is understanding. Not many people in future generations can do it, let alone in this day and age. This requires a lot of courage!
(End of this chapter)